One key to success for businesses? Never let your company become stagnant. Leaders should always be aware of future opportunities and the direction the business is heading. However, it is also important to consider where the business is currently and what can be done to improve operations. A wise way to do this is to optimize your business processes.
What is Business Process Optimization?
At its core, business process optimization is the action of working to make your business run more efficiently. The first step is to identify inefficiencies in your business’ current processes. Consider, what opportunities are available for optimization? Often, the process of identifying inefficiencies will point to the necessary solutions.
Depending on the size of your business, you could form a team of employees at different levels in your company to compile a list of the tools, software, workers, and processes involved in the different functions of your business. Once you have your current working business model outlined, you can begin to identify inefficiencies.
Sometimes it’s difficult to take a critical look at the way your business is currently operating. You may find that you need to bring in an outside perspective to identify opportunities for optimization.
One of the benefits of process optimization and eliminating inefficiencies is reduced costs and increased savings. When businesses implement new ways to save time, money, and resources, their bottom line will thank them.
1. Eliminate Inefficiencies With Custom Software Development
Some businesses may discover inefficiencies related to using multiple different platforms and tools to manage and complete tasks. If this is the case for your business, you would most likely benefit from custom software development. A custom software solution is tailor-made to address your company’s unique needs and pain points. Whether you need to manage customer transactions and interactions, improve communication between your employees, track inventory, or something else entirely, the processes required to complete each task can be housed under a single, efficient, and fully-customized platform.
Even though businesses must allocate money upfront in order to optimize their business processes through custom software development, an effective solution will bring an ROI that far exceeds the cost, time and effort required to produce the solution.
If you are unsure of what features to include in your software development project, you can always turn to a trusted software consultant. Businesses like 7T offer technology and software consulting services to help businesses develop a digital transformation strategy and implementation plan. Additionally, if you choose to begin development with the same company that you consult with, they will already be knowledgeable about the inner workings of your business. That familiarity will help them create an optimal custom software solution.
2. Achieve Business Process Optimization With Data Lake Creation
Another solution for reducing inefficiencies involves creating a data lake for your business. Data lakes allow businesses to eliminate disparate data silos and have a centralized location to store their data – unstructured or structured. The data in data lakes can be prepped and structured when businesses want to drill down into their data through data mining or use it for analysis. In addition, data analytics is another way to identify potential processes that could be optimized. The numbers tell a story, you just have to be willing to find the answers.
This solution is effective for businesses that are interested in analytics and want to expand the sources of their data for analysis. However, data lakes are not automatically the perfect solution for your data storage needs. Without proper organization and data lake management, they can quickly become another problem, rather than a solution. A “data swamp” will not help you optimize your business processes.
User roles and permissions not only help to secure sensitive data, but they also help limit the exposure to data that is not relevant to a specific user. This allows business users to find the data they are looking for more easily. Metadata tagging also helps with organization by tracking information about the data, such as the format, data lineage and relevant keywords for efficient searching.
When you host your data lake in the cloud, the benefits are even greater. Cloud hosting your data lake is a low-cost storage option and allows businesses to keep data that they think may be useful to them in the future. If your business is ready to streamline data analytics, a data lake could be the way to go.
3. Take Advantage of Current Technological Advancements
During the discovery process, you may determine that your processes are working, but they aren’t as smooth or efficient as they could be. Just because something isn’t broken per se, doesn’t mean it can’t be improved. These days, businesses are finding new ways to utilize automation technology in order to reduce costs, improve efficiency and free up their workers for different tasks.
Here are a few ways that businesses are using current technology to optimize their business processes.
- Manufacturing companies use IoT sensors to monitor their equipment and predict maintenance to reduce machine downtime. Machine learning and beacon technology can also be used to automate manufacturing processes. For instance, some machines are programmed to automatically start another process once the previous one is completed.
- Inventory and Supply Chain Management has benefitted from Predictive Analytics for demand forecasting, inventory management, warehouse operations and more. By utilizing data-driven insights, businesses are able to keep costs low. Utilizing PA can help reduce the amount of excess stock and improve knowledge of industry trends.
- Retailers are taking advantage of augmented reality technology to show consumers what products will look like before they buy them. Whether it is staging furniture or seeing how an outfit will look, customers don’t even need to set foot in a store. Meeting consumers where they are at and catering to online shoppers is a perfect example of an optimization strategy.
- Marketing teams are implementing the use of Natural Language Processing (NLP) to target and engage with consumers in a more personalized way. Rather than adopting a broad range approach and throwing marketing dollars to the wind, they can allocate their money strategically, connect with their consumers and lower the cost per conversion.
These are just a few examples of the potential technology that is available for your business. A personalized solution will include the tech that is best suited for your needs, processes, and business overall.
Business Process Optimization for Your Company
Business Process Optimization doesn’t have to be a daunting task. Instead, it is an opportunity to identify areas for improvement and help reduce inefficiencies in order to lower costs and increase revenue.
At 7T, we focus on building custom solutions that are right for your business. We want you to enjoy the development process and reap a large ROI. Our talented developers are experts in mobile app and custom software development, including ERP solutions and CRM platforms. We also specialize in data governance, cloud integrations and system integrations.
With headquarters in Dallas, we serve clients across the nation. To discuss your development project or inquire about our software consulting services, contact 7T today.
