Every manager is expected to finish projects on time. Unfortunately, delays are often inevitable, and things get misplaced or forgotten. That’s why many companies use a project management plan where they detail every step to monitor and track. But even a plan like that has flaws, one of the major ones being inflexibility, not to mention the amount of work and time required to create it.
Also, many organizations that are very project-focused tend to emphasize near-term achievement where they look to move through business activities with a beginning, middle, and end to the work. When companies operate in this way, many leaders miss the opportunity to improve business performance through a holistic lens. One that includes assessment and automation of things that re-occur and that can be systematized.
Ultimately, most of the work that gets done by an organization can be viewed as a system comprised of tasks, workflows, and processes. It’s these fundamental building blocks that, when optimized, allow a company to achieve its full potential. The question then becomes the “how” of optimization. Culture and mindset are extremely important to this endeavor. But just as important is leveraging the right technology to support the optimization of core, repeatable activities.
In today’s digital era, not only is it possible to achieve better business performance with workflow software, but it’s also possible to achieve transformational change. When a business is run as a well-orchestrated system, it is far more likely to excel than when everything runs through project plans or, worse, when everything is left to ad hoc execution.
It only makes sense that workflow management tools have become a go-to solution in high-performing companies where:
- Digitization makes processes and execution effortless
- Employees have higher morale, are more productive, and engage in high-value activities beyond routine tasks
- Work environments and their related data and information are more secure, and risks are inherently mitigated
If all of this sounds appealing, keep reading to learn more about choosing a business process management tool that will help your organization run more effectively while allowing your team to readily overcome obstacles along the way.
What Is a Workflow Management Tool?
In essence, workflow management software is a tool that lets you:
- Create and manage your workflow
- Modify and assign tasks to team members
- Track business execution and progress
It is the solution many businesses employ to find the most optimized way to reach their goals and targets.
This tool helps you visualize simple to complex processes by mapping each component, including tasks, artifacts, forms, related information, and more. Unlike informal or manual processes, workflow management tools automate, allow for escalations, enable sophisticated routing, and coordinate activity across an entire enterprise keeping everything in one place and allowing you to integrate external and internal resources.
How to Choose a Good Workflow Tool?
The workflow tool you choose ideally should be:
- Intuitive
- Feature-rich and oriented to best practices
- Flexible
- Accessible
- Secure
- Audit-ready
- Integrable
The workflow solution you decide to purchase should suit the size of your business in such a way that when you scale, the tool doesn’t limit you.
Visualization in a workflow is also vital. It helps you build an accurate process that guides you to success. The tool should be highly flexible as well so that when changes to your visual workflows are needed, they can be made on the fly. With more advanced no-code software tools, it’s possible to get near custom outcomes without having to leverage developers.
To analyze progress in any business, you need metrics. Before purchasing a tool, check whether the featured metrics and reports can help you make data-based decisions.
Lastly, you should pay attention to whether a workflow tool supports collaboration and coordination with deep permissioning and rules-based configuration. You want your system to be easy for everyone to use yet powerful enough to drive high-impact teamwork. But you don’t want to sacrifice security and the ability to control who has access to information and data at any given time.
Email integration and embedded chat functions are also important for keeping productivity high. Couple ease of execution with an unchangeable audit trail and configurable security protocols, and you’ve allowed your teams to accelerate safely.
Reasons Why HighGear Is the Right Tool for You
In theory, a workflow management tool sounds like the key to achieving any and all business objectives. But how can you really be sure? With HighGear’s workflow and process management system, the platform has been developed over 15 years by working closely with enterprise customers. 85% of the core functionality is pre-built, so you don’t have to worry about thinking through all the execution detail that you would need to support a robust environment. The remaining 15% of the solution is highly configurable so that you can operate at the speed of thought and the peace of mind that the tool is very adaptable. A near-custom solution without the need for developers has never been as easy or as accessible as HighGear.
You Can Customize Your Workflow However You Want
With HighGear, there are endless possibilities for your workflow design but without the complexity of many platforms. You choose what is included and how the solution gets deployed. Within the software, you will find:
- Flexible Forms
- Drag-and-drop, pixel-perfect design
- Over 200 pre-defined fields with the ability to customize and create your own
- Multi-layered form capability with security enablement down to the field level
- An Easy-to-Use Visual Workflow Designer
- A simple toolset that allows for an infinite number of workflow designs
- Swimlane/section capability to more easily organize and monitor your workflows
- Process mapping that allows for color coding and note annotation
- Enterprise-Ready Architecture
- Integration capable with an Open Web Service API
- Enterprise-grade security and access controls
- Cloud-based or on-premise deployment
HighGear’s dashboards and reporting capability provide real-time visibility and aggregated information in short order. Resource utilization, for example, is just one of many ways HighGear’s reporting and dashboard components provide insights into how well your teams are operating and where shifts in work assignments can add value. Along with all the ways that permissioning is enabled throughout the tool, reporting and information sharing are no exception. Put information and data in the hands of those who need it when they need it.
In short, our workflow and process management software is like being in a realm where you build everything as you wish without the obligation to adapt to someone else’s ideas or structures.
You Can Create Workflows in a Matter of Minutes
Intuitive design and customer support are the cornerstones of HighGear’s platform. Because much of the core functionality is pre-built, designing a fully scoped workflow in record time is feasible. Training and education support are provided on a continuous basis, and one-to-one engagement with our customer success team has led to many companies working with us for more than 10 years. While the tool is built to be self-service, HighGear has a professional service team that can do the work for your team should you prefer to have “quick start” assistance.
You Can Save Time with Workflow Automation
Whether it’s HighGear or some other tool, automation just makes sense from a dollars and cents perspective. Resources are highly constrained and more expensive to acquire in many businesses today – especially with the shortage of developers. Therefore, it is imperative that companies find alternative ways to be more efficient and provide better stakeholder experiences. And with distributed workforces, driven initially by the COVID pandemic, the demand for technology deployment to support new business models is only going to continue to accelerate.
Rather than trying to repair broken manual processes through re-engineering or some other non-tech-focused effort, look to platforms to ease the path forward. By doing away with routine and repetitive tasks that aren’t optimized anyway, automation will allow teams to focus on activities with higher strategic value. Cost savings, competitive advantage, easier audits, and overall business performance are sure to follow.
Instead, you can direct your energy to analyze the progress or improve further.
You can Digitize Effortlessly
Digital transformation efforts and software adoption are not without their challenges. So while there are many benefits such as a more significant market share, better profits, and higher revenue growth, choosing the right partner is as important as the platform itself.
Consider looking for a partner who:
- Understands your challenges through experience and commitment
- Offers the tools and support required for a comprehensive evaluation of their tool
- Demonstrates how the software is going to address your challenges
- Is a good cultural fit for who you are as a company
- Offers a platform that is integration and security ready
Considering these parameters – all of which HighGear incorporates into its prospect and customer onboarding efforts – the transition to digitization can be much easier and more valuable to any organization who is committed to real change.
HighGear is for enterprises that want to use a ready-made platform to scale their business, where no coding is required. Taking action to improve quickly is made possible, ultimately removing any barriers to accelerating better business performance.
You Can Integrate with Other Systems and Platforms
One of the challenges enterprise companies face is the existence of legacy systems. Many of the large-scale platforms that took years to fully deploy are almost impossible to move away from. So, newer tech providers must understand infrastructure issues and be able to accommodate integration with current as well as older platforms. HighGear has worked with some of the world’s leading companies and intimately understands the hurdles that exist, and provides a workflow automation solution that stands integration-ready.
Does HighGear Suit Every Business Need?
Highly regulated industries such as financial services, energy, and government have come to trust the security, auditability, and performance of HighGear. It is one of the best workflow and process management software platforms on the market – helping organizations such as NASA and Hewlett Packard Enterprises run business processes smoothly and efficiently.
Beyond the software’s capabilities, the company’s culture is truly one of service and support. Customers have access to “live” support teams – a rarity in the SaaS space. We recognize that we’re not the only option when it comes to advanced enterprise workflow automation platforms, and we pride ourselves on going the extra mile to ensure successful adoption and impact.
Schedule a demo or a consultation to see how HighGear can make a significant difference for your team, department, and enterprise overall.