Automation of business processes: preparation and implementation. Automation of business processes as a necessary condition for the effectiveness of the company Goals of automating selected business processes in the enterprise

Constantly changing market conditions, high speed in decision-making, multitasking in asset management and the need to reduce risks require modern approaches to the organization of business activities. The way out in the increasingly complex internal and external environment of the enterprise is the integrated automation of business processes. It allows you to free up precious resources for strategic planning and concentration of management on key areas of the company's work. We will talk about what automation and an ERP system are, why a process approach is needed, and what software is most popular in the world and in Russia.

Business and automation: yesterday, today, tomorrow

Business automation is a partial or complete transfer of stereotyped operations and business tasks under the control of a specialized information system, or a software and hardware complex. As a result, the release of human and financial resources to increase labor productivity and the effectiveness of strategic management.

Automation is usually carried out in two directions:

* Automation of the main business processes: for example, sales or customer service management. In this case, it is carried out to directly increase sales, the number of products produced and increase the profitability of the entire business as a whole.
* Automation of supporting processes such as accounting, reporting, office work. Such automation does not directly affect the increase in income, but it helps to reduce the time and costs of doing routine work.

The main tasks of business automation are as follows:

* effective support for the operational activities of the enterprise, organization of accounting and control;
* preparation of any documents for partners, including waybills, invoices, reconciliation acts and business proposals;
* quick receipt of reports on the state of affairs in the company for any period of time;
* optimization of personnel costs, increasing the efficiency of the use of working time by freeing employees from routine work;
* minimizing the negative impact of the "human factor" on the most important business processes;
* secure storage of information;
* Improving the quality of customer service.

Automation of business processes can significantly improve the quality of management in a company and the quality of its product. For the enterprise as a whole, it provides a number of significant advantages.

* Increasing the speed of information processing and solving repetitive tasks.
* Increasing the transparency of business and its manufacturability.
* Growth of coordination of actions of the personnel and quality of its work.
* Ability to control large amounts of information.
* Automation of manual labor.
* Reducing errors and improving control accuracy.
* Parallel solution of several tasks.
* Quick decision making in stereotypical situations.

As a result of automating business process management, the head of the enterprise receives more information for analyzing business processes in the form of detailed analytical reports and has the opportunity to manage the company qualitatively, taking into account external and internal indicators.

For example, when using the software "First Form" for the first six months of work, the most important performance indicators of the company increase:

* planning accuracy - by 40%;
* overall efficiency - by 50%;
* Saving the manager's time - by 80%.

Most companies begin automation with routine labor-intensive processes, as well as with operations that significantly affect profits and revenues: finance and accounting, document management, production and inventory control. Automation of such areas of activity as enterprise management, marketing, quality management and external communications at most Russian enterprises is just beginning.

In the context of the economic crisis, priorities in the field of business process automation are changing somewhat. The main trends of the current season include the following:

1. Use of cloud technologies. The main difference of this automation method is that the company does not have its own server. Such systems are very popular with small businesses, as they cost significantly less than the traditional version.
2. Active automation of marketing tools: implementation of CRM-systems, contextual advertising automation systems and BI-systems.
3. Development of machine-to-machine interaction technologies. The emerging trend of M2M - Machine to Machine - involves the minimum participation of a person in those processes where possible, since the complication of business processes and equipment does not always allow a person to adequately assess and respond to a changing situation.
4. Application of big data tools. Another trend in the development of business process automation is the attention to big data and related business intelligence. They are in demand by large companies, since specialized expensive equipment is required to process big data.
5. Real-time data analysis. Business automation systems will evolve towards real-time transaction processing, resulting in fully synchronized operations.

Key areas and business process automation software

One of the main conditions for business automation is the use of a process approach by an enterprise. This term is understood as an approach that defines the consideration of the company's activities as a network of business processes that are inextricably linked with its main goals, objectives and mission. The process approach, in contrast to the structural approach prevailing in many companies, is focused not on the existing organizational structure of the enterprise, but on real business processes, the end result of which is the creation of a service or product.

The process approach helps to increase the flexibility of the business, reduce the response time to market changes and improve the performance of the enterprise.

Each business process in a company consists of a set of individual operations with an order of execution determined by technology or instructions. The necessary characteristics of a business process are routes and rules, as well as inputs, outputs, consumed resources, participants and owners.

Before proceeding with the automation of business processes, it is necessary to carry out work on their isolation and description, as well as classifying them as main or auxiliary processes. This is a rather lengthy procedure, in practice it requires the participation of all departments of the company in close cooperation.

The types and number of business processes are individual for each company. All differentiated business processes can then be integrated into several main areas, for each of which automation can be carried out both as a whole and as part of a separate process:

1. Management:

* strategic management;
* economic security;
* legal support;
* Management Accounting;
* budgeting;
* Information Security.

You can use the program system "1C: Enterprise", the control module of the SAP R / 3 system.

2. Marketing and sales:

* management of marketing activities;
* PR;
* management of advertising activities;
* sales management;
* customer relationship management (CRM).

To automate this area, software is often used: CRM systems - Megaplan, 1C: Bitrix24, Clientbase.ru, advertising management - EFSOL: AMS Advertising Management, SiZiF, site management (CMS) - Bitrix, UMI. CMS, NetCat, HostCMS, AMIRO.CMS, DataLife Engine (DLE), etc.

3. Production:

* management of production processes;
* enterprise inventory management;
* material supply management;
* management of production equipment;
* logistics system.

Software products: Kraft systems, USU, AVA ERP production module, VOGBIT, Sage, Super Warehouse, Warehouse and Sales.

4. Quality management:

* quality management system (QMS);
* quality control of products and performance indicators;
* work with claims.

Software used: Indicators Administrator, FINEKS: Quality Management, Master: Quality Management, Wonderware MES Software/Quality, ProdX.

5. Personnel management:

* recruitment;
* training and development of personnel;
* personnel accounting;
* motivation and pay

Software products: E-Staff Recruiter from Datex Software, 1C: Payroll and HR Management, Oracle/HR Management, Pharaoh, BOSS-Kadrovik.

6. Finance:

* Accounting;
* tax accounting;
* financial planning;
* management of settlements with clients;
* calculation of wages of employees of the enterprise.

Automation software: "1C: Accounting", "1C: Salary", "AuditExpert", "Master Finance Analysis", "Fingrand".

7. Organization of the company's activities:

* document flow;
* Secretariat.

Software products: "1C: Document Management", "E1 Euphrates" from Cognitive Technologies, "Master Doc" from Master Group, QPR 2014, Open Text.

ERP: a new stage in the evolution of automation systems

"Island" automation of individual business processes of the company sooner or later becomes ineffective, since attempts to combine several different automation systems into a single whole most often fail. When implementing the "island" approach, the goal of increasing the overall efficiency of the enterprise is usually not set.

In contrast, the integrated business automation system is a system for managing the financial and economic activities of the company and ensures the maintenance of operational, managerial and accounting records in general.

The concept of an integrated enterprise management system - ERP - was developed in the late 80s of the last century. In the early 90s, it began to gain popularity as control systems began to appear that could implement this concept. The ERP system is based on the principle of creating a single information space that helps to track all information about business processes in all departments of the company in real time.

ERP systems are built on a modular basis, and their structure implies the presence of separate blocks that are responsible for a specific process. Thanks to this principle of organization, it is possible to refine and expand the functionality of the entire system as new technologies appear, changes in legislation or customer needs.

Most ERP systems include the following groups of modules:

* logistic;
* production;
* marketing
* providing;
* marketing;
* other.

In Russia, ERP systems appeared only at the end of the last century and were originally used exclusively by large companies, but today they are being implemented at enterprises of any size.

After the implementation of an ERP system, a company can stop using numerous disparate programs for working with finance, warehouse, office, and logistics. This, in turn, will allow the business to significantly reduce the cost of IT support.

In 2016, according to the rating of the consulting company Panorama Consulting Solutions, the top three leaders in the global ERP systems market included SAP with a 20% share; Oracle -13.9% and Microsoft - 9.4%. Further, in descending order, the following companies are located: Infor, Epicor, Sage, NetSuite, IFS, IQMS, Syspro.

The leader in terms of implementation speed was Oracle, and in terms of payback period - SAP.

In Russia, according to the analytical center TAdviser, the most popular ERP system in 2016 was "1C: Enterprise" (see Fig.). Among the most demanded software, one can also note such products as Galaktika ERP, SAP ERP, Microsoft Dynamics AX, Microsoft Dynamics NAV.

Rice. Diagram of applied software products for business automation in Russia

How to choose a software product

When choosing a business process automation system software, there are two ways to go:

* use of a typical product;
* development and implementation of individual software.

On a note

A standard (boxed) product will cost the company less and is also somewhat easier to implement. But we must not forget that not every typical software can be re-profiled for the individual characteristics of the enterprise, since in a number of programs the possibilities for additional settings are limited or even excluded. The same problem exists with cloud services.

In order to choose the right specific program, it is important to answer a number of very serious questions:

1. What business processes are planned to be automated?
2. Will the functionality of this or that program correspond to the tasks assigned to it?
3. Is it possible to customize for a specific business practice?
4. Is it possible to quickly change the system without discontinuing operation in case of changes in business processes or business conditions?
5. How easy is the system to use?
6. Is it possible to integrate the system with existing services or automation programs?
7. Who and how will provide technical support?
8. How much will the implementation and technical support (ownership) cost?

Since it is practically impossible to answer these questions independently and at the same time, it is advisable to get advice from vendor companies (software developers). In addition, you should talk to business colleagues, as their experience sometimes helps to make a choice. However, it is important to understand that opinions in the business community can be very subjective, due to the specifics of the industry, the size of the enterprise, limited experience with various ERP systems and, as a result, the inability to see the whole picture and compare all products in relation to yours. conditions.

As for whether to automate individual processes or install an ERP system, it all depends on the specifics of a particular enterprise.

Software cost and implementation costs

It is very difficult to answer unequivocally the question of how much business automation will cost for a particular company, since the cost of specific software depends on several factors, including:

* tasks, which the software is designed to solve;
* type of program: typical or custom;
* resources required for implementation;
* number of workstations connected to the system.

For example, the price of a license for the popular integrated program "1C: Enterprise" for 100 jobs is 432,000 rubles, for 50 jobs - 187,200 rubles, for 20 jobs - 41,400 rubles.

The cost of automation also consists of several components:

* the cost of the system itself, including the cost of the "box" or rental payments in the case of using the "cloud" version;
* the cost of setting up an automation system and staff training;
* the cost of regular technical support.

Indirect costs should also be added to the price of automating business processes, for example, the time spent by the manager and key users on participating in the project.

Automation of business processes is gaining more and more popularity in the modern market. This is due to the fact that automation mechanisms allow, first of all, to reduce the costs of any production, and, consequently, to make the business more efficient.

Historical background and systems implemented today.

The beginning of the use of ERP systems can be considered the 60s. Then these systems were mainly used for the control and management of inventories, and the systems of that time completely copied the traditional approaches to these operations.

In the 70s, the focus shifted towards MRP (Material Requirement Planning), systems helped to draw up calendar plans taking into account the capabilities and needs of assembly units, the necessary raw materials and components.

In the 80s, the concept of MRP-II appeared, the main task of which was to optimize all production processes. Initially, MRP-II was an addition to MRP for planning the work of shops and distribution within the plant. Later, financial management, personnel management, engineering, project management, etc. were added. In fact, MRP-II is the progenitor of ERP systems.

The CRM systems that appeared at the same time were used exclusively for direct marketing in order to quickly obtain information about the client with whom the manager or seller communicates (mainly by phone) and save information about the history of communication. The development of CRM systems went smoothly, they gradually grew in terms of functionality, in the 90s they not only provided opportunities for collecting, saving and managing information about the client, but also provided personalization functions: various bonuses for certain clients or groups.

Standard business process automation systems in a global sense can be divided into two large layers: the first of them is expensive systems for large companies, such as SAP, PeopleSoft, Oracle, Siebel, or some Microsoft products. These systems are very functional, they can be flexibly configured and adapted to almost any business sector. You can automate a solid number of business processes of the company: marketing, sales, production and many others. It should be noted that the cost and timing of implementation, as well as the price of ownership, are beyond the power of medium and small businesses (abroad, the terminology is slightly different: there a company that employs less than 300 people is considered a small business).

The second is systems that are affordable for medium and small businesses. As an example, 1C and industry systems can be cited. Here the market is more dynamic, the cost of one implementation is much lower than the prices in the first group. Companies applying for the development or implementation of a system clearly understand the tasks and achieve maximum returns. have not yet managed to open thousands of branches across the country and seriously bureaucratize. Consequently, the business processes occurring in them can be reengineered without undue resistance.

Of course, the market is much more diverse and, if desired, systems can be further divided into groups and subgroups.
In Russia, systems from the first "layer" for large businesses, as well as industry-specific systems and proprietary developments for medium and small businesses, have gained particular popularity.

Possible problems and solutions

It should be noted that companies may face some difficulties in implementing and further working with the system. As a rule, these problems are not critical and are easily fixed.

Most often, these are difficulties associated with the habits of employees. When implementing a system, many employees, especially the "old school" may resist innovation. Moreover, sometimes the installation of the system is preceded by routine work on accounting for balances, inventory, revision of existing data and transferring them from the old accounting system to the new one. The need for such work is not always clear to employees, and motivation plays an important role here. It happens that a company naturally gets rid of employees who are not able to move to a new system with it.

Another difficulty is related to the fact that it is not always possible to judge with certainty the optimality of a particular process. An employee may (out of habit) express dissatisfaction with new work patterns, but in some cases this dissatisfaction may be justified and a correction of the process is necessary. In addition, ideally, a feedback system should always be implemented in the process automation system so that a clear violation of the process is not only noticeable, but also reflected in the employee's performance. For example, if a sales manager works with contracts in the system, it is logical that the progressive percentage would be calculated in the same system on the basis of paid invoices (under the contracts of this manager). And this is achieved only by an integrated approach to automation. In this case, for example, it is necessary that the functions of invoicing and payment accounting are also integrated into the system.

Forecasts for the future

You can continue to argue about the need to automate the business, but the fact of a significant reduction in costs at the enterprise is obvious. For example, with the help of such a system, manufacturing enterprises can qualitatively increase control over purchases and warehouses, improve the coordination of the work of the logistics department, and thereby directly reduce their own costs.

If we talk about forecasts in this area, now enterprises are increasingly ordering partial or full business automation. Moreover, if earlier any automation was considered a super-expensive pleasure, now small and medium-sized businesses have received an alternative in the form of applications based on web solutions. Such developments are gaining popularity, and the capabilities inherent in this platform can reduce the time and cost of both development and implementation, and ownership. In my opinion, the automation market will grow, and in the direction of small and medium-sized businesses, because. not everyone can afford to order SAP or even Microsoft Dynamics, which is often positioned as a solution for small businesses. In addition, for highly specialized organizations, the cost of implementing such solutions is even higher.

DocsVision

DocsVision is a universal workflow and business process automation system developed on the basis of .Net technology and closely integrated with the Microsoft platform and applications. The system includes applications "Office work", "Process management" and "Administrative office work", tools for developing applications and business processes, as well as software gateways in Microsoft Dynamics AX, Microsoft SharePoint Portal and 1C:Enterprise 8.0. Solutions built on the basis of DocsVision allow you to effectively organize work with electronic documents and the execution of business processes related to information interaction. The system provides opportunities for registering, storing, moving, executing and searching for documents, as well as for creating formalized automated business processes and monitoring their progress. Working in the system, each employee receives a task on time to complete his stage of work and prompt access to all the necessary information, and the manager has the opportunity to control and manage the process. The system operates with the information stored in it and interacts with other IT systems of the enterprise, providing information unity and integration of systems when performing end-to-end business processes.

Specialized media quite often talk about the automation of businesses, as well as the exit of these businesses into a completely new space of independence and independence. Although, if you ask a specific question, what is actually “business automation” in the substantive meaning of this term, most likely, it will be difficult to find a clear or, at least, unambiguous answer. In any case, it was not possible to find similar answers from different specialists from different companies, that is, they work in a very narrow area, to this question.

The point here is not at all that the meaning of the term “business automation” denotes some new phenomenon or is interpreted too diversely.

The reason for such a wide variety of opinions lies in the fact that in each particular company this concept will have a different meaning and a completely different degree of real impact on the business.

Our company has been providing since 2003 and has enough experience to try to answer important questions about what business automation is, what automated business systems are used by companies today and what benefits they provide in reality, in a highly competitive market, we will talk in this article.

The specifics of business automation

Any business community, any business training or economic forum on a national scale, to a greater or lesser extent, addresses the issues of business automation, at the same time warming up the interest of a wide audience in this concept, while building a labyrinth of meanings around its final meaning. No one does this on purpose, it's just that the concept of business automation is so multifaceted and broad that no event is enough to consider it in its entirety. Hence the confusion, skepticism, and occasionally the “deification” of such a routine history for many companies as “business automation”.

But all the many-voiced choir agrees on only one thing: business automation today is in any case an increase in its efficiency. But the choice of means and ways from the arsenal of automated systems in order for business efficiency to still increase, fundamentally depends only on individual characteristics, therefore, it gives a huge number of scenarios for implementing this concept in practice.

If we nevertheless try to give a more concise definition of the concept of business automation, then the main thing here will be the creation of a certain infrastructure in the company, the continuous use of which will significantly increase the productivity of the business and its individual units. That is, the specificity of business automation is manifested here in that for each type of business this concept can include both classical and completely individual components.

For example, installing a license plate scanner with a fixation camera at the entrance to a paid parking lot instead of a security guard with a notebook - this is the automation of a small business using a specific example. Based on this example, the conclusion suggests itself that the individuality of business automation is due, first of all, to the specifics of a particular business, and not to market trends.

Automate business to improve work efficiency

If the business plans include development, geographical expansion, possible entry into new segments or any other option for the company's growth, sooner or later the business is faced with the fact that manual control “devours” time so much that the working day can stretch for twenty-four hours, which, moreover, are sorely lacking.

Undoubtedly, the specifics of the development of private entrepreneurship is such that any business, to one degree or another, began with manual control and continued to practice it until a certain size was reached. It is clear that manual operations and control "eyes" at all stages of work do provide a certain level of efficiency, allowing the business to solve its main task: to make money. But at the same time, it is important to understand that without automation, there will be no opportunity for significant growth in the future.

At some point in time, it becomes clear to a manager who is really involved in the business, and in the case of small business automation, his role is most often taken by the owner of the company himself, it becomes clear that the company is operating close to the limits of manual productivity.

This is still, in principle, a normal situation, and with the right development at a certain point in time, any company should reach such a ceiling in order to make the right decision about the need for structural changes that relate to automation.

On the face of it, such work of the company does not look like Brownian movement; rather, on the contrary, it looks like the work of a conveyor, where each participant in the chain does the same action infinitely many times and without any assessment of their own effectiveness. The latter is not surprising: with a mechanical approach to operational work, where the proportion of manual labor or thoughtless performance of some functions is so huge that the staff simply does not have time to think about how to optimize their work.

Here we can make a reservation that the staff may not have been initially thinking and proactive, but it is not their responsibility to figure out how to increase efficiency through automation, since a line specialist simply does not have the competencies or powers for this, and, moreover, should not be by definition. This is the work of the management team, so when a manager sees that “literally everything” is done by hand and the loss of any link from the chain of manual labor instantly paralyzes almost half of the company, he begins to think about business automation.

If a business grows organically, it, like a child, will point to the new needs of its existence, sooner or later saying: "Automation is needed."

Since each business is inherently individual, it must be initially taken into account that the introduction of automation into the practice of a particular company can be very different from the usual (or rather, the most common) approach on the market.

Therefore, you should not expect that specifically for your company with its specifics there is already a ready-made working solution that is easy enough to install on the computers of users and managers in order to reorganize inefficient processes into a super-productive automated management complex.

This will definitely not happen, as templates never work well - this rule applies to almost all branches of business. In addition, in order to automate a business, you need to know the “internal currents” very well, which is possible only after serious analytical work by the most important specialists of the company.

Organization of the automation process in the company

Any serious project related to changing the internal structure of the company, especially one that will directly affect the efficiency of the enterprise, always begins with a lot of preparatory work. It doesn’t matter what size an enterprise is: a holding with a branched structure or a micro-firm that has turnover that does not exceed the threshold of a simplified taxation system - any enterprise automation process in the classical sense will follow the same scenario.

As a rule, the enterprise forms a working group of key specialists to start analyzing all the processes taking place in the company in order to identify the least optimal ones. In slang, such areas of work are often called "crutches" - they seem to work, but are extremely inefficient. As a result, a list of questions and problems is formed, which actually reflects the real picture of the current state of the company and allows us to formulate a list of tasks that need to be solved through automation. After that, each task should be described in detail and considered in order to identify the entry and exit points, as well as the necessary resources to achieve the planned effectiveness.

Next, a solution is selected to optimize and automate the considered area of the company's work, while meeting the requirements of the existing infrastructure. Here you can resort, for example, to an IT solution, a certain production product, or, say, technical modernization.

At the final stage, the responsible persons develop an internal control system for the built-in automated process and implement an efficiency assessment, which is also necessary for the operational control of deviations from the norm, allowing to improve the automated process and increase its actual productivity.

Benefits of Business Automation for Companies of Any Size

The tangible results of automation are manifested in different companies in individual, unique patterns. Some companies significantly increase the speed of their work, increase, for example, throughput and, accordingly, turnover, profits and, in general, expand their business through automation.

Others receive tangible benefits in the field of organizing their own production - the labor load on the production unit is reduced, the production potential and the dynamism of the production process are increased.

Automation is necessary in the work of personnel performing a set of certain repetitive functions: salespeople, operators, controllers and other similar specialties. Even for employees in whose work independence and variability are extremely important (creative and intellectual positions), the automation system allows you to set a certain standard of productivity, at least in terms of the amount of working time spent, discipline control and the implementation of some special plans for each profession.

Naturally, any company that keeps records will be forced at a certain stage to invest in its automation, since the number of accounting and analytical operations will significantly exceed any possibilities for their manual processing.

Technical solutions in the field of automation for small, medium and large businesses are applicable at almost all levels of operational activity, allowing you to influence not only private structural areas, but also the company as a whole.* In addition, business automation is not only a system for improving efficiency, in part it is also “insurance”, if such a comparison can be made, which allows the business to become more secure and stable, both in relations with the external environment and in internal matters.

*In almost any company, automation will inevitably affect the segment of mass operations that affect the company's revenue indicators: merchandising operations, supply chains, inventory management and capacity management.

Automation almost always touches finance sooner or later, especially in matters of cash flow distribution, cash flow control and receivables control. And even in this seemingly narrow area, if you carry out, you can find specifics and a fairly large number of differences in their capabilities. If we consider programs as the basis for automation in general, then it is easier to group them by types and groups.

Automated solutions are an effective tool for recording and monitoring business metrics in dynamics. They make it possible to control operational work, deviations of financial and resource indicators, as well as set up consistent work with external partners. Such solutions include all kinds of accounting / financial and management accounting programs. For large companies, integrated solutions are rational, which have not only vertical, but also horizontal interconnections, and when automating small businesses, it is preferable to choose solutions for specific areas and operations.
Automated solutions allow you to control and flexibly adjust business capabilities to specific volumes and tasks. Taking throughput as an example, an automated solution can signal the need to increase staff or replenish inventory, and can also adjust the load based on the achievement of the planned KPI per structural unit.
Automation systems in the client sector also allow you to effectively manage the process of customer relations (Customer Relationship Management): schedule, increase in the frequency of calls, average checks, visits, repeated calls and other customer service metrics.
A large group of technological solutions for automation is associated with an increase in the productivity of personnel in terms of the rejection of manual operations and mechanical work. Such implementations tend to have a positive impact on the payroll and headcount, by eliminating inefficient processes and creating a system in which each staff unit works, focusing on results. In general, this group not only increases the productivity of a particular employee by eliminating routine actions, but also simultaneously reveals his competencies, allowing him to realize his untapped potential. An important positive feature of this group of solutions for business automation can be called "foolproof", namely, reducing the risk of a catastrophic impact on the business of carelessness, negligence, and simply banal employee fatigue, which is called the "human factor".
Technological complexes that allow to organize the work of personnel with information in the most efficient way. These include all kinds of systems for the preparation of documents, the formation of operational applications, contracts. The big advantage of such systems is the ability to configure access rights to various information for specific employees and secure storage of such information, which, firstly, must be protected from deliberate or accidental deletion, and secondly, from theft.
In general, various technological solutions can greatly simplify business processes and business chains in a company. Automation makes processes clearer, more consistent, and more manageable. The logic for the implementation of each process (both managerial and production) is formed, which strictly follows the scenario planned by automation, in case of violation of which, management immediately receives the necessary signal.
The capabilities of the company's analytical complex due to the automated solution significantly increase compared to manual analysis. A company can allow more users to access analytical data by limiting the rights of each of them and giving the ability to control only the necessary metrics. Thus, the depth and consistency of analytics increases, which means that operational control of key performance indicators increases.

Of course, automated solutions have a positive impact on business not only in the issues listed above. We have already noted that company A can see the effect of automation in one thing, and company B in a completely different one. Therefore, it is worth paying more attention to the specifics of your business than to analyzing “how others do it”. At the same time, you should not concentrate on generally accepted practice, shifting the focus to key issues and business features, the automation of which will significantly affect the overall efficiency of your company. Automation just for show is a waste of your time and resources, so it is extremely important to understand for what (specifically formulated) purpose such a project is consistently developed, prepared, implemented and developed.

The price of business automation

There are a lot of offers on the market today that are somehow related to business automation, and until the company itself has decided on the processes that need to be improved with the help of their automation, there is no way to even roughly predict the budget. No one can unequivocally name the price of automating a single business at once. Therefore, if, as a result of automation, a business wants to increase the productivity of a business process, while having a rational budget for an automation project, it is worth starting, as mentioned earlier, with internal analytics. This stage will save the business effort and money, as it will make it possible to draw up a clearly formulated terms of reference, with which you can continue to work and. based on which, you can control the results of work on automation and integration.

Choosing a Business Automation Partner

You can implement an automation project in any business with the help of your own employees, an external expert or a contractor company. It all depends on the volume of the automated area. Let's take a closer look at each option:

Own employees represent the seemingly cheapest automation option, which may be somewhat the most thoughtful, but will definitely be the longest.

At the same time, one must understand that the introduction of automation will take working time, which employees will “bite off” from their production tasks. In addition, the hallmark of such "home" automation is that they become work and move into the operational phase. Very few cases of success of such projects are known, in all the rest they ended either in the complete collapse of the automation program, or in the choice of another method of implementation.

It can be noted that this option seems acceptable due to the guarantees of the preservation of information and trade secrets, as well as supposedly controllable costs (although in reality this is the main delusion), but against the background of automation terms calculated in years and guaranteed hierarchical confusion, this advantage loses their weight in making a decision.

An external expert (or a small team of freelance experts) plus in-house employees for small businesses is definitely the most correct option, which looks like the best solution in terms of price / quality ratio. The main goal is to give experts sufficient power over your staff, without downplaying the importance of the participation of internal specialists in the automation process. That is, the future user of the system tells how the process works and what task is inherent in its automation, and the expert develops an implementation scheme and selects a solution. If everything goes right, then the staff will formulate all their desires, and at the end they will receive the closest in functionality, but at the same time a balanced expert decision.

The risks of this method of implementation will, of course, be possible obstacles in communication between consultants and internal customers, which can develop into real hostility, which can significantly reduce work productivity, as well as the company's dependence at a certain stage on the involved expert. In order to mitigate these risks, it is important to be very careful in the selection of a freelance expert and to regulate the roles and powers of each party at the initial stage.

The contractor for the implementation of an automation project can be a large or small IT company that either offers its own developments or implements a boxed solution modified to fit the needs of the business. In terms of price, this implementation method will be the most expensive, and also not without obvious weaknesses.

A small company is severely limited in resources and its potential, since it actually stands at the intellectual level of one or several experts who manage young specialists. On the one hand, this can give very good results due to involvement, but on the other hand, on the contrary, result in a mediocre implementation according to the template.

However, if a business needs a small, personalized solution, then it is more likely that a small company that will deal only with this project will be better able to handle it. The involvement of a large contractor will be justified when there is a large amount of work to be done, and a limited staff of specialists from a small firm will objectively “not pull” it. At the same time, it should be noted that in financial terms and in terms of performance, working with a large company will provide greater security for the customer's business, and will save time and resources.

Results of business automation

The era of information technology, on the one hand, imposes new requirements on business in terms of speed and flexibility that are impossible without automation, and on the other hand, it gradually reduces the cost of solutions that allow businesses to undergo modernization and grow compared to "manual" companies. Eventually, markets will come to certain standards, and companies that do not enter the new era of efficient automated business chains will simply die out like dinosaurs unable to adapt to changing conditions.

On the contrary, those companies that already understand the importance of business automation in general and individual business units in particular are highly likely to become more competitive and sustainable, as they will be able to use the freed up resources for growth and development, and not frantically fight for a place in the sun. .

But with all this, I would like to note once again that a clear understanding and formulation of automation tasks before the start of the project will help in choosing the way to implement the project.

How to implement automation in the enterprise.
How to choose or develop software.
How to choose an automation system supplier.
What automation systems are on the market.

Automation of business processes is the best opportunity to reduce costs, increase profits and bring the enterprise in line with modern trends. Find out how to choose an automation system for your company.

Business process automation system

For mailing, a neutral text is formed, in which the name of the client is substituted. Regardless of whether a male or female name is substituted, the meaning of the text should not change. To avoid templates, the mailing list can be composed in the style of letters that were sent out manually before the introduction of business process automation.

When planning mailings, you should pay attention to the limitations of the mail server. On paid servers there is a limit on the number of letters per hour, on free servers - the limit goes by the minute. If the maximum number of letters is exceeded, the mail account is blocked. To avoid such situations, the mailing list is divided into several parts - this must also be taken into account when automating.

Computing

Every company works with computing. In the simplest case, this is a formula of the type "Cost * Percentage = Price" or "Quantity * Price = Check Amount".

Sometimes there are complex formulas. Sometimes companies create their own software systems - for example, for the calculation of plastic windows. Automation of the computational process will allow you to fill in all the required fields and carry out all calculations practically without taking into account the user - he will only need to enter the initial data, on the basis of which the work will be carried out.

Ultimately, this will minimize the number of errors and speed up the work of users.

Making report

It all depends on the needs of the enterprise. For example, a retail enterprise requires reporting on the receipt and consumption of goods, inventory balances, write-offs, profit and loss reports, etc. And not always a suitable solution is in the finished software package.

Software products for automation

Having decided on all the questions above, you will get an idea of \u200b\u200bwhat kind of program you need. Next, you have two paths:

Use a generic product.
Develop and implement your own software.

Any existing information system can be used to automate some business process. For example, ERP systems are used for IT support of the production process, CRM systems are actively used in sales.

There are three classes of applications that were originally developed to automate business processes. Let's consider them in a little more detail.

Business Process Modeling Systems

These systems are very often used in modern business. With their help, you can describe, document and accompany any business processes taking place in the company. Since ordinary language cannot always be used for formalization, specialists have developed specialized languages called notations. With their help, you can conduct a more formal reflection of the business processes of the enterprise.

Today, numerous methodologies (RUP, SADT, etc.) and accompanying software are widely used for modeling. Small and medium-sized companies use the standard Microsoft Visio application for support, large companies develop their own software package, the ARIS Toolset level.

Worlflow Systems

This system was developed over two decades ago. In its classic form, it should contain the following services and applications:

A service that launches and executes business processes.
Complex of visual display of stages.
The necessary infrastructure for storing templates.
A user's place through which he can access various necessary functions and data.
Means of control over the implementation of business projects.
Means that provide the interconnection of individual workflow systems with each other.

BPM systems

BPM stands for business process management systems. They have been developed relatively recently, as an extension of the systems of the previous class. Their distinguishing feature is that one set may include tools for modeling, implementation and further maintenance of all necessary processes.

The BPM system is based on data flow management. She took this from the Workflow class. In addition, BPM may include a number of additional subsystems:

Transition from modeling to implementation. It is also possible to use reverse engineering: after the implementation of the business process, its model is updated.
Description of statistical metrics - collection, analysis, presentation. In most cases, such a subsystem is part of the overall data collection and analysis system.
Business process analysis, orBPA. It analyzes the efficiency of the company's personnel, the efficiency of business processes, capacity utilization.
Simulation. In this mode, you can evaluate the effectiveness of using a particular business process in advance, without the participation of employees, users, etc. It is enough to set pre-known statistical indicators.

To date, there is no unified system for automating business processes. Each company makes its own adjustments necessary to attract potential customers.

How to choose an automation program: Adobe Systems case

There are many different programs on the market, but a comprehensive comparison of their functional and technical features can take years of work from the best employees. Even commercial studies that involve the description and comparison of existing solutions by independent experts do not clarify the situation.

Therefore, the magazine "General Director" suggests using a proven methodology for choosing an automation program.

Cost of Automation

It is quite difficult to determine in advance how much the automation of business processes of an enterprise will cost. The cost of software is made up of several factors:

Tasks that need to be solved in the course of work.
Software type. It can be a standard program that is used in all enterprises, regardless of the scope and form of ownership. Or it could be a specialized program that runs exclusively in that enterprise or in the enterprises that produce this product or service.
Resources, which are necessary for the implementation of the software. If you're planning to create multiple spreadsheets in Excel or make a small database in Access, you won't need to buy a new computer. It is enough to store the database on the main machine and provide a timely backup to avoid problems. If you are building a powerful database of corporations for several cities and countries, you will most likely need to equip a server. Similarly, with the human resources necessary for implementation: one person can make a base on Excel or Access in their free time from their main work.
Number of seats to connect to the database. For example, the classic program 1C: Enterprise for 20 places costs a little more than forty thousand, for 100 places - already more than four hundred.

In addition to software development costs, the cost of automating business processes may include the following components:

Associated costs: rental cost in case of using the cloud version, the cost of a dedicated server, etc.
Costs associated with setting up the system and training employees. You can develop an online course, you can hold a small seminar among the employees of the enterprise and explain how to work in the new conditions, who has what access, how to use the database and various additional functions.
Technical support cost. Sometimes things break. Or needs improvement. There are new operations that need to be automated. There are new employees who need to be trained. It is almost impossible to calculate all the nuances in advance, but you can keep your own specialist on staff who will “lead” the automation of business processes, or negotiate with the developers.
There are also indirect costs.- for example, the time spent by the manager on drawing up the terms of reference, explaining, monitoring the implementation of the task.

How to choose a vendor for business process automation

A vendor in this context is a supplier that offers you a turnkey business process automation solution. It is necessary to approach the choice of a partner carefully. First of all, a list of necessary functions is compiled and the market is monitored. From the hundreds of companies on the market, select a few whose offerings are ideal for solving your problems. After that, contact representatives of companies from the sample and specify what exactly and under what conditions they are ready to offer you, according to your needs.

If the vendor already has experience in developing and implementing business process automation systems in companies with similar specifics and size, then this is a plus. Customer reviews from the Internet can be put aside for the time being, if possible, it is worth talking directly with the developer's clients. It is also worth paying attention to whether the vendor provides training services for employees of your enterprise, technical support during the service life, on what conditions all this is done.

One of the main factors is the speed of implementation of the system. Most of the promoted systems are difficult to implement, poorly adapted to specific business tasks. The introduction of some software systems may require the most radical measures, up to changes in the organizational structure of the enterprise.

When choosing a vendor and software, you need to consider all factors. In some cases, the best way out is to order an individual development, which will initially be created for your company.

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