In the beginning every business starts with a small, compact and clear structure of their business processes. It works well and with time, the small flaws are being fixed. This results in even better business dynamics, giving the chance to expand. And here is the moment where it is necessary to deal with more people, more complicated processes and manage bigger amount of information and resources. Growing is good, but it always comes at a price. Usually growing fast means to be able to control the chaos. The reason for this is the necessity to make additions to the already existing processes and on the same time educate new people with them. If the company is to expand it has to face such obstacles. Sometimes it is not that bad because it just takes time, sometimes it is pure chaos because the demand requires a rapid growth.
The final result is a company that is much bigger and complex, but is not as efficient as before. So a complete reorganization is required.
To explain better the above process let’s provide a simple example – a distribution company starts with couple of employees. It tracks all the sale records on Excel tables, as well as the warehouse management.
The purchase orders are not based on complicated data but just on the decisions of the owner, which very often are limited by the amount of financial resources.
However the products which the company offers are good and sell well. So it is required to hire more sales agents as well as a marketing manager to help accelerate the growth even more. This will mean that now it is not only necessary to track more information, but also the information should be transferred from the sales agent to the marketing department in order informed decisions to be made.
Therefore an account in Basecamp or other collaboration platform will be made. Furthermore, the big amount of sales will mean that it would be better to add better invoice software. And this process of adding new software/tools for every uprising need gets the company to the point where it uses 10s of different systems in order to operate. Huge amount of time is wasted to transfer data from one system to another, as well as to keep data updated. Not to mention that manual data transfers often results in errors, that could cost much.
When you end up in such situation it does not mean that the business was managed badly, it is a natural situation that comes with the expansion of the team and the scale of the company. However it is important at some moment to stop, evaluate all the processes and reorganize the company and choose the right technologies in order to allow it to continue its growth.
Generally, the main solution is to simplify the business processes. The next step is to organize them if possible in a better way and to define well the responsibilities for each step. Then around this new structure it is important to integrate one ERP system that will handle all the tasks and processes.
Working with just one piece of software will automate a lot of the tasks associated with manual data entry. For example to copy sales from the excel file and plot them into another file/program in order to generate forecasts or evaluate marketing performance. Integrated system will be able to manage the data with ease and use every piece of it in all other modules/departments.
The next step is further automation. Most applications provide few options of such automation, generally notifications in events of completed deal /step. However every company has different needs in terms whom and when to receive information on his email. Otherwise, those notifications are just pure spam in most cases and employees tend to ignore all of them, thus making everything pointless. Here are examples how Coriti ERP & CRM can help you go beyond the normal automation and provide custom solution based on your specific requirements/characteristics.
Production
Perfect coordination between production and sales department is crucial to the company’s success. Very often the connection between those two major components of a company is not a focus and there are flaws in the process. This causes production cycle to be longer and less flexible.
To secure a good communication and collaboration between production and sales we have developed various custom automation systems to match the needs of a particular organization. For example once a production documents and/or batch of items are ready and the status is changed to “Completed” then the manager at the sales department receives an email notification. This allows him to know earlier that he can count on particular goods . Such simple thing can save from few hours up to a whole day.
Another good example how the communication can be improved is a simple notification set up to receive an email if there is a change in the expected date to complete the production. This would allow making the necessary change in the shipping plan in time, as well as to talk to clients and alert them that a delay is expected. This not only helps to increase the time for reaction but also improves the service and relationship with the clients to a whole new level.
Sales
The system can navigates us through a longer process, consisting of several steps.
For example, one of our clients is a small distribution company. The specifics of the products they sell require an approval for every deal by the manager. Before integrating Coriti.com this was done through phone calls. When we add the necessity of making calls to the manager of other matters, we can sum up that this may lead to total chaos.
However, now when a new deal is added to the system, the manager receives a notification to check and approve/decline. After the manager’s approval the system automatically creates an invoice, as well as an expected transaction.
The sales agent has only to forward the invoice. Once it is paid the accounting department will mark the document as “paid” and this will trigger a notification towards the responsible sales agent to get the product delivered to the client.
Although it looks simple, such similar tasks required hundreds of phone calls per month. This time is wasted instead of being spent to get more clients and deals. This is where our solution allows the company to grow with its current resources.
Collaboration
There are countless applications online that will help collaboration between employees. We have not focused on a fancy design but to get the things done and of course to provide a customized solution if necessary.
We have as a client a medium sized marketing agency. Despite the fact that we develop a customized solution to fit perfectly their processes – every deal is a project on its own. Furthermore, a pack of customized automation system increases their efficiency and saves time. After a new client is added to the system a project template is chosen. Depending from the selected option a set of initial tasks are finished by the system. These tasks involve sending a remainder to generate the first invoice, to upload the contract, and set up initial tasks meetings, etc.
This greatly facilitates the process and allows the employees to spend time on real work over the project and not on bureaucracy tasks.
Much more examples could be added. Such custom automation of business processes and tasks are now something usual for us. We will not only deliver what you require but also suggest a technology that will bring value to your company – by saving time, improving efficiency and eliminating human errors.