Process Analysis & Improvement in Workflow Automation: A Roadmap

Careful assessment of current workflows uncovers inefficiencies, redundancies, and bottlenecks – much of which can be removed or streamlined by automating a process. Performing this due diligence is vital not only to the success of the automation project but is likely to maximize the return on investment in automating a business process in the first place. At its center is a business process analyst, who is charged with diagnosing operational pain points and redesigning the processes in a smarter, leaner way.

This article provides a plan to identify opportunities to automate workflows through business process analysis. We will outline the process from completing a business impact assessment and gap analysis, to aligning process improvements to achieve organizational goals through business performance management. By mapping out an effective plan you will be well positioned to have a foundation for effective automation and sustainable benefits.

Business Process Analysis in Workflow Automation

Business process analysis or the BPA can be referred to as an evaluation of business processes to discover and understand the improvement opportunities. In work automation, BPA is a bit like a roadmap to smarter, more efficient processes.

The BPA starts out with a business workflow map, or outlines all the steps, stakeholders and data points required to execute the process. Once the process is mapped, analysts will take the process apart to look for inefficiencies: where are the delays? Are there repeated approvals? Where is data entering manually that could, and should, be automated?

As a simple example, in a normal procurement process, approvals by managers and inconsistent documentation can delay a vendor’s invoices. BPA looks for these obstacles, uncovers improvement opportunities in the procurement process, and promotes automation opportunities like rule-based approval workflows or automated invoice matching, etc.

BPA makes sure that when it comes time for automation, the right processes are targeted for automation (as opposed to automating inefficiencies). It also ensures that the automation is going to produce measurable value.

Business Process Analysts lead the Automation

Business process analysts make automation possible. Think of a business process analyst like an architect, creating blueprints for operations that can be automated.

They are responsible for:

• Working with cross-functional teams to understand existing processes.
• Using process visualization techniques like BPMN diagrams, flowcharts, and software such as Lucidchart and Bizagi.
• Exploring and pulling performance metrics and data for recommendations.

A business process analyst is not a sole actor. They will interview stakeholders, watch the workflow in action, and rely on data that provide a clear distinction in gaps or efforts. The information they collect will ultimately inform which processes will be automated and which applications can or should offer the best output or outcomes.

Conducting a Business Impact Assessment

Typically associated with risk management, BIA for automation projects addresses the projected benefits, impacts, and potential disruptions from converting processes into automated workflows.

The organization may want to considering automating a customer onboarding process could reduce cycle time by 60%. The process of onboarding may not change too much, but team roles or customer touch points or other processes may change. A good BIA would assess the impacts being made in terms of time, cost, resources, compliance, and customer experience.

Starting with the BIA, there is also business impact analysis that goes deeper into core operational processes discusses the impacts associated with a breakdown or delayed process. Business impact analysis describes how to quantify the impacts when a process does not run in ideal or normal conditions, it is more applicable to inform prioritization for automation in high impact areas.

A good BIA is designed to allow the organization to not only have process efficiencies, but also design around intentional business considerations for automation to be strategic, intentional, meaning based, and risk aware.

Performing a Business Gap Analysis

Organizations can conduct a business gap analysis to close the gap between where they currently are and their desired future state or goal. This involves:

• Analyzing current process capabilities and performance.
• Determining desired end points or performance benchmarks.
• Identifying gaps and root causes.

For example, suppose a company wants to reduce customer support ticket resolution time from 48 hours to 12. A gap analysis may show that the main issues are that tickets are being assigned manually, and there is no sorting by priority. Automating ticket triaging and routing will address the solution to this gap.

A gap analysis will give you a direction to work in, as it ensures the automation efforts are supporting the business needs and measurable objectives.

Business Performance Management in Automation Projects

When processes become automated, the work doesn’t stop there. Business performance management (BPM) is employed to allow for consistency and continuous improvement over time.

BPM involves:

• Understanding KPIs (e.g. processing time, error rates, and customer satisfaction).
• Establishing dashboards and reports that extract, analyze, and report on the health of the workflows.
• Conducting reviews at an appropriate frequency that drive updates to rules, scripts, or triggers.
• Speaking with users to gather feedback on any bottlenecks or misalignment in the process.

For instance, automating the processing of an invoice may cut costs when we initially automate, but if we process exceptions poorly, we may just be accumulating errors, which BPM will identify and allow for intervention in real-time while enabling incremental improvements over time.

Essentially, BPM establishes the feedback loop for automation performance and improves the workflow depending on the changes to the organization.

Roadmap to Successful Process Improvement and Automation

The following is an outline that uses the elements outlined:

Step 1: Create Business Objectives
Define clear objectives for your automation project.

Step 2: Business Process Analysis
Document and examine current processes. Talk to the process owners, gather data and recognize delays and inefficiencies.

Step 3: Business Impact Analysis and Gap Analysis
Determine the business impact of the changes to the process. Determine the gaps between current performance and where you want to be.

Step 4: Automated Workflows Design
Once you have some knowledge of the factors involved, design your workflows with automation tools. Make sure the workflows fit into the technical environment of the organization and scalability requirements.

Step 5: Implementation and Monitoring
Install the automation and set up the monitoring dashboards. Ensure active communication to impacted teams, and train where necessary.

Step 6: Refinement and Scale
Refine according to performance sources. If successful, seek to roll out the framework within the broader department or other processes.

Case Example:
A mid-sized insurance firm automated its claims processing system. The business process review determined that manual data entry and inefficient checks were causing the delay in claims processing. After redesign, the processing time for claims was cut down from 7 to 2 days and lowered process errors by 30%. The performance was still tracked by frequent business performance reviews, which full of information we utilized to further optimize and streamline the process by adding auto-validation and other efficiencies.

Common Challenges and How to Overcome Them

1. Resistance to Change
Workers might resist change for fear of job loss or not be supportive of new systems. Solutions: Engage workers early in the procedures, make them see the advantage to their jobs, incorporate training.

2. Lack of Documentation
If our processes aren’t properly documented, analysis and automating the same is shooting in the dark. Solutions: Slow down and use business process analysts to visually map out and define our processes.

3. Technology Mismatch
If we automate with the wrong technology, it will add more inefficiencies to the system. Solutions: It is good to automate using technologies that complement each other or are an extension of existing technologies as well as scalability.

If organizations address these issues on time, it will ease the transition to automate processes and push forward successful results.