Business processes and workflows are how your company operates. Improve your workflows, and you improve your business.
It’s no wonder the market for workflow automation solutions is predicted to surge from $8 billion in 2019 to $39 billion by 2027, a compound annual growth rate of nearly 24%.
But there’s a simple way to automate workflows that doesn’t require significant investment, and that’s no-code application development.
Easy Automation, Big Benefits
No-code app builders allow citizen developers with no technical knowledge to build powerful, business-enabling applications, forms and workflows quickly and easily. They’re also robust and flexible enough that application development teams can use them to speed the creation of highly sophisticated workflow software.
With a no-code tool, users simply drag and drop reusable software elements onto a design canvas. Behind the scenes, the tool automatically assembles a functional, stable, and secure application for workflow automation. The result? Streamlined processes and better business operations.
Here are six ways workflow automation can boost your business today:
1. Higher worker satisfaction and productivity
– Repetitive tasks wear workers down. Automating workflows relieves them of the burden of these manual activities.
Just as important, automated forms and workflows can help workers avoid manual errors and ensure compliance. With process steps codified in software, workers can complete tasks right the first time and every time, with no missing data and no need to do things twice.
And with no-code workflow builders, employees feel more empowered. After all, they know the workflows they follow every day. So, they know how to automate those process flows to make their jobs faster and easier. No-code gives them a tool to do just that.
In fact, the greater process agility of automated workflows can drive up to a 30-point improvement in employee engagement, McKinsey says. And highly engaged teams are 14% more productive, Gallup has found.
2. Simplified departmental supervision
– This benefit of workflow automation often gets overlooked, but it’s an essential one. With smoother business processes optimized by workflow automation, managers can oversee their departments more effectively.
For starters, managers get better visibility into and control over how their teams are performing, because they can be confident tasks are carried completely and consistently. They can also be sure their workers are meeting deadlines and contributing to overall company success. And they can better forecast short term and longer term results, making decision-making faster and more accurate.
3. Improved line-of-business (LoB) processes
– From HR to finance, from sales to service to facilities management, LoB processes are the bedrock of your business success. With automated forms and workflows, you can supercharge the daily operations of every aspect of your enterprise.
A great advantage of no-code tools is that they make creating and fine-tuning workflow forms and processes fast and easy. LoBs don’t have to submit complex requests to the application development team and then wait for months to get the business-enabling software they need. And let’s say new customer demands or new ways of doing business dictate a workflow form or process change. Your citizen developers can easily go back and tweak the workflow solution, keeping your processes up to speed with business requirements.
4. Superior customer experiences
– Consumers have come to expect digitized experiences – and both Millennials and Gen Zers have grown up with them. No-code tools give you a simple and cost-effective way to meet their expectations.
With automated forms and workflows, you can optimize interactions with customers, serve them more quickly and reliably, and avoid unpredictable processes and results that can drive prospects to your competitors. You can also provide customers with self-service tools that make working with your company simple and straightforward. Ultimately, you have another way to deliver the experiences that build your brand reputation and keep customers coming back.
5. Lower costs with faster results
– Both manual processes and employee dissatisfaction can drive up overall labor costs – a make-or-break issue especially for small and midsize businesses. Paying workers to do repetitive tasks that can easily be streamlined doesn’t make good business sense. Automated workflows enable you to address these issues head-on.
What’s more, facilitating faster form completion to enhance productivity and making workflows reliable can accelerate the pace of your operations overall. Employees can complete one task and move on to the next – or have more time to focus on innovation and winning in the marketplace. That means you’re getting the business results you want faster and more effectively.
6. Greater marketplace agility
– Agility can be a business buzzword. But if you can nimbly respond to new competitors, emerging customer demands or unexpected market changes, you can stay a step ahead. You can enter new markets, build new business models, and drive new revenues.
In fact, 80% of companies say their business processes need to become more agile, Forrester reports. To achieve that goal, 72% plan to accelerate digitization. One simple way to digitize and become more agile? Automate workflows with no-code tools.
The Future of Workflow Optimization
With all the benefits of workflow automation, it should be no surprise that no-code is considered the future of application development. By 2022, sales of no-code solutions will have seen a five-year compound annual growth rate of more than 40%, Forrester forecasts. By 2024, 66% of all application development will be achieved through no-code or “low-code” tools, Gartner predicts.
Now is the time to leverage no-code app builders to digitize your forms, automate your workflows and power your business to greater success.
