Automated workflows themselves represent a long-term business trend.
But within this overarching trend, smaller trends come and go, dependent on business cycles, economic pressures, trendy new products, and other factors. As we move closer to the year 2020, it’s obvious how automated workflows have become established as a business necessity. Equally obvious is that workflow automation trends evolve based on changes in the overall business climate. Following are four trends that are shaping the future of automated workflows.
1. Greater Emphasis on Customer Experience
As soon as people started using apps for everyday personal tasks like booking hotel rooms, hailing a ride, or asking for customer service help, there was no turning back. Expectations among consumers have risen along with the number of apps they use to enhance their customer experience.
Businesses have had to upgrade their customer service processes to keep up with consumer expectations. The workflows that power customer service departments must be powerful, and they must increase business transparency in regard to customer relationships. Customer experience is a strong competitive differentiator at the moment, and businesses that don’t adapt their automated workflows accordingly will lose out.
2. More Attention to New Employee Onboarding
Currently, the labor market is tight. It has always been expensive for companies to replace employees who leave, and that problem is highlighted when it’s harder to find replacement talent. The quality of the new employee onboarding experience is a determinant in how likely an employee is to stay with the job.
At the same time, new employee onboarding must be accomplished before new people can get completely up to speed with their responsibilities. An employee onboarding process that is maximally efficient, and that demonstrates that the company values their new recruits helps ensure a positive first impression. This in turn reduces the chances of new employees jumping ship at the first appealing offer.
Companies must make every effort to retain employees in a tight labor market.
3. More Remote Workers and Dispersed Teams
Business teams may be scattered across time zones, and more companies than ever use remote workers rather than a traditional office-based setup. Advantages include lack of geographic constraints when putting together teams, and benefits to the employees who are able to work from home.
It’s not always easy carrying out complex processes with dispersed teams, and for that reason workflow software must have features that facilitate it. Workflows may take place within a single office, or across state or international borders, and workflow software must be up to the task, offering mobile-friendly interfaces, and rock-solid dependability.
4. Smaller IT Departments
IT departments in the companies that have them are shrinking. Much of this is due to increasing dependence on cloud-based software. With fewer on-site servers running software, business don’t need as many IT specialists to keep it running optimally.
But this also means that tasks that may have fallen to the IT department before – like the programming involved in creating automated workflows – must be accomplished in other ways. Fortunately, modern workflow software allows creation of workflows without the need for programming. These “no code” workflow solutions make automated workflows accessible to even small businesses with minimal IT expertise.
PerfectApps is workflow software that is more than ready to meet the needs of today’s business environment. It can be operated in the cloud or on the premises, and creating customized forms and workflows requires no programming whatsoever. Whether you want to build a better employee onboarding process, up your customer service game, or flawlessly bring together a remote team, PerfectApps can help. We encourage you to watch our demo video, or to contact us at any time with your questions.
