The 5 Steps to Begin Automating your Processes With Remote Workers
The Covid-19 pandemic has seen a large rise in the number of remote workers, as more people have gotten use to the idea of working from home. This trend is not going away, as many workers are now indicating that they are interested in working remotely, for the long-term.
This leaves businesses with a new challenge: how to automate processes when workers are remote. Process automation has become a key part to ensure that a company’s procedures and operations run as efficiently as possible.
We often think of business process automation as something that relates to in-person staff, but actually it can be applied to remote workers too. In fact, it will become increasingly important to understand how processes can be automated when staff are working remotely, as there are more variables.
Here we take a look at some of the things that your business will need to do if you want to automate the processes of remote staff.
- Get information from your team
It’s a great idea to talk to your team about their current processes and procedures when they are working remotely. This is vital information as it can provide you with details around not only how remote working differs from working on the premises, but also it can provide valuable ideas around the best and most efficient ways to do things.
When you are automating processes, it is vital to understand the areas that could be easily managed, and others that need the worker’s input.
- Make a decision on the kinds of things that can be automated
Process automation works by putting an automatic process in place to replace the need for repetitive labour from a worker. This can take many forms: populating invoices, dealing with aspects of payroll, etc. And these can be entirely dependent on your business and how you work.
It is important, then, to think about which aspects of your remote workers’ tasks can be automated and which cannot. This will form the basis of your process automation.
- Use remote to your advantage
There are many advantages that remote work can bring to a business – and this is the case with process automation too. This is an opportunity to re-think the way your business operates. For example, there may be some tasks that you have always done via physical work simply due to legacy ways of working.
As workers are now remote, here is a chance to change up systems and procedures and bring them into the 21st century. For example, storing your data on the cloud instead of on paper can open up your business to a huge range of automated processes.
- Focus on time efficiency
It is always the case that the focus of business process automation is to save your team time by taking away time-consuming tasks and automating them. This frees up your staff to use their working days for tasks that are more business critical.
As such you need to put a real focus on becoming time efficient. Think about the aspects of the tasks you do that slow you down and stop you from being able to get on with really productive work. These are key aspects that you will need to automate for your remote staff.
And Finally…Think in an Agile Way
This means build up gradually, don’t try and build the full car in 1 go! Build something that moves, then add a wheel, then doors etc. Constantly evolve and improve. This way of working ensures you can make change right away, and then adapt and grow and ensure progress is constant!
At Document Options, we are experienced specialists in business process automation and we would love to help your organisation save time and money, and become more efficient. Contact us today to learn more about how we could help with process automation for your remote workers.
