What Is Business Process Automation
The number one question I receive is “What do you do?”
More than anything else, I create Business Process Automation Software using Microsoft Access as a programming tool. In other words, a lot of the processes and the tracking and the things that have been/need to get done and the flow of work from one department to another can all be tracked, managed and reported upon through the use of your business computers.
I like to look at a business as being a machine and you may want to consider this perspective yourself. You have certain processes that you run: marketing, advertising, order taking, shipping, receiving, finance. Business functions such as these can often be mostly or even fully automated.
Your Business as a Series of Processes
If you wish to run your business effectively, if you want to grow your business, you need to look at these processes as a series of fixed steps that you perform when you’re running your business. When a new sales prospect comes in, you enter their name into the computer. After a period of time, you contact that potential customer and make notes in their record.
When your new customer places an order, that, too, is entered into the computer. The computer should then move that order to the next step, which is to send that order to the person (or computer program) responsible for fulfilling that order. For example, once an order is placed in the computer, the computer should automatically generate a purchase order for the product you intend to resell. Once the purchase order has been submitted to your vendor, that order should also appear on the computers used by your receiving department, and then tracked, pro grammatically, to make sure it is fulfilled by your vendor. Once you receive the product you’ve ordered for your customer, the computer then moves the process along by generating a shipper and an invoice. And so forth.
Automating the Business Process
So, then, a successful business constantly cycles through two distinct modes of operation. One is when you are running the machine: taking orders, shipping products, generating sales leads. All of this ought to be automatic — a series of steps that fly on autopilot within your business. That is when you’re “working inside your business”. The other side of the coin is the time you spend “working on your business”. Improving and optimizing the way that your business works. Deciding where you need to increase the amount of time you spend doing some things, such as sales and marketing, and at the same time looking for ways to make other processes you perform more effective and less time consuming.
How to Automate the Business Process?
The process is actually very straight forward, and the computer tools and software that you use are readily available. What I do, in working with my clients, is take some or all of these various procedures that a business performs on a daily basis and I put that system on the computer. For the most part, I use Microsoft Access and Microsoft Excel. Both of these programs are highly customizable and can be turned into a finished software system that you can use to automate your business. I create forms for entering customer information and orders. This information is then processed and sent along to the next step, such as taking a customer order and generating one or more work orders or a purchase orders, as needed. Reports can be generated to provide you with the information you want to see. Tracking, to-do lists, project management. All of this can be automated within the scope of a custom database and/or spreadsheet system.
This does many things for your business. It provides you with a standard process for running your business. Because we’re talking about software, you can easily bring in and train new employees because, for the most part, you are teaching them how to run a system on their computer. You then have the opportunity, at the times that are right for you, to look at your business, objectively, and see where processes can be improved, see where the bottlenecks are and make changes to these processes to improve the way you work and to grow your business.
Hope to hear from you soon!
Mike Turco – (310) 714-9669
Los Angeles Computer Consultant
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