Efficiency directly contributes to the success of any business. The only reliable way for your business to grow and prosper is to constantly evaluate your processes and capitalize on any areas you may be able to improve. Where is your company dragging its feet?
To recover and thrive after a crisis, businesses must be open to adopting new processes that will increase efficiency. Never allow your business to stagnate. There’s always more you can do to increase productivity and performance. Continue reading to learn how you can use technology to enhance your business processes and day-to-day efficiency.
1. Storage and collaboration
The ability to collaborate efficiently and effectively is incredibly important for any team. Storing work projects in the cloud enhances collaboration by allowing team members to easily access shared documents online regardless of their physical location.
SharePoint, available with Microsoft Office, is a secure place to store, organize, share, and access information from any device. You can collaborate on the same document at the same time as other team members—whether you’re in the office or not. Plus, you can save and store your work in the same online source, so when you’re ready to get started on the project again, you don’t have to wait for a team member to send you their edits or any changes they’ve made. All of their work will be in your shared online document, immediately accessible with the click of a button.
Don’t allow work to stall due to physical barriers. An efficient team is able to work together no matter their location. If, for any reason, someone on your team can’t make it into the office, there’s no need for a project to slow down when you can collaborate effectively online.
2. Process visualization tracking
Visualizing your business processes will help everyone in your company understand your current state of affairs and potential future. By taking a deep look at your processes, you can track your progress, identify inefficiencies, and implement improvements.
Visio, available with Microsoft Office and Office 365 licensing, is a tool used to create a wide range of diagrams, from basic flowcharts to pictorial Workflow diagrams. It’s designed to make any type of diagramming convenient and easy enough for anyone to accomplish. Visio has a wide array of available templates, symbols, stencils, and built-in shapes and objects, depending on how complex you want the diagram to be.
Save time by using Visio’s premade templates to track any step-by-step process. Whether you’re creating a business process model, projecting cash flow, or tracking project workflows, process visualization tracking will help you identify roadblocks, inefficiencies, and any areas that could improve.
3. Document management
Your business documents are useless if you can’t find them. Document management is a tedious business, but an effective system will save every member of your organization precious time and energy.
Ensure your business has a cross-company process for managing files, both in the office and in the cloud. Set protocols for labeling files, establish backup procedures, and assess your document management regularly to identify any problems or inefficiencies. Word Online, the web version of Microsoft’s venerable word-processing application, has evolved to include just these kinds of document management functions. And it is integrated into multiple other applications, making it a seamless experience to open, save, edit, and share documents across your organization.
Ideally, any file your team might need to access will be available in the cloud, so business functions won’t be halted just because someone isn’t physically in the office. Managing your documents online will mean fewer misplaced files and much less time spent searching through dusty filing cabinets. Rather than interrupt your work by getting up in the middle of it and walking across the office to the filing room, simply type the name of the file you need into your search bar.
4. Process and workflow management
Set up workflows and ensure they are running smoothly. You should never worry about where a project stands or what your team is up to. Workflows can be tracked and managed effectively online, so you don’t have to set a meeting with your team each day just for a progress report. Get an immediate update with the click of a button from any location.
Process Street can help you manage your team’s recurring checklists, procedures, and processes. With it, you can create and customize your own structured documents and checklist workflows that you can assign to your team. You can track your team’s progress from the dashboard, and receive notifications when members mark that they’ve completed a task. It’s an efficient and simple way to monitor and organize your team’s productivity from anywhere.
5. Ability to set up automated tasks
There’s no better way to maximize efficiency than through automation. Automations allow your tools to talk to each other, saving you and your team valuable time and brainpower.
Don’t waste time on repetitive tasks when a program could easily take care of them for you. Microsoft Power Automate, previously Microsoft Flow, will streamline repetitive tasks and paperless processes. Automations replace many time-consuming manual tasks such as sending notifications, propagating data, or duplicating workflows. Simply set your automations and watch the work complete itself.