Every organisation works with different processes that are closely linked together. When one process doesn’t go according to plan, the whole organisation is affected. Organisations therefore have the vital responsibility to keep the control over internal processes and ensure they are optimised. Digitalisation and automation can help improve the processes in your organisation and monitor them better.
The transition to data-driven working places enormous demands on an organisation, both from management and financial experts. Applying data science and machine learning often sounds like a huge challenge. A first step in the process is to develop clear and attractive dashboards using approachable business intelligence software. With the tools currently available, it won’t take you long at all to convince yourself and your organisation of the power that own data has.
Value
Process optimisation is about adapting business processes to achieve lower costs and greater efficiency. This can provide a financial advantage and thus give a competitive edge. Thanks to business intelligence software, it is now much quicker and easier to visualise big data in dynamic dashboards and reports. Visualisations then lead to insights into an organisation’s processes and performance, which can be used to detect patterns and predict outcomes. Moreover, it allows organisations to identify where the bottlenecks are more quickly, or where performance is going well. This gives the assurance that you can respond well in time, make the necessary changes and improve profitability. Moreover, you can give your employees more on value-added tasks if administrative repetitive tasks are automated. The added advantage of this is that they stay motivated to contribute to the organisation for longer.
Process optimisation: a roadmap
Displaying processes in clear dashboards and reports sounds wonderful, but what steps does your organisation need to take to make it work?
- Identification processes
The first thing to remember is to think carefully about what information might be relevant in your organisation and what goals your organisation has. Moreover, when it comes to process optimisation, it can help to consider which processes are potentially inefficient and so important to the organisation that improving them will have a significant effect on the organisation’s bottom line. - Data inventory
Next, it is important to take stock of what data are needed to achieve the intended goal and whether you actually have the data. The key here is to pay attention to the reliability and completeness of the data. The next step concerns the unlocking process. One of the many advantages of BI tools is that data from different sources (Exact Online, Excel, accounts) can be imported and compiled into dashboards. Finally, validation plays a role. The question then is whether the outcomes are correct. - Process description
Of paramount importance parallel to the data inventory is understanding how a particular process runs. Value Stream Map is a helpful flow chart that clearly shows the key steps of the process. - Analysis
The acquired data is used to build visualisations in dashboarding tools. Depending on industry and operations, they can display specific critical performance indicators (KPIs). When you look at the supply chain, for example, a logistics dashboard can be created that shows signals and correlations such as arriving too late at certain destinations. And for sales-related analyses, you can look at the number of transactions and return shipments. A management dashboard can also be created to gain a better understanding of how well different employees perform in an organisation. Whatever the purpose, the aim is to identify bottlenecks and steps that can save money, or to show where repetitive work leads to inefficiency in performance. - Optimisation
Once you know the bottlenecks, you can improve processes and procedures. It depends on the process which optimisation route to take. An effective optimisation tool is Robotic Process Automation (RPA), which lets machines take over repetitive, manual actions in the process. One must always remember that optimisation is a process that requires your continuous attention. - Monitoring
You can safely say that optimising your business is a continuous process. Improvements have to be analysed and adjusted where necessary. It is therefore essential that dashboards include real-time visuals. This allows you to track the effects of improvements and make decisions based on realistic insights.
Dynamic, automatic and interactive
A key advantage of BI tools is that dashboards can be automatically updated as more data becomes available or are added. This also holds true for adjustments. The story of your data is told through interactive visualisations that can be filtered at staff, supplier, customer and product level. Whatever industry your organisation operates in, dashboarding helps you display and analyse business processes in order to optimise them.
Accessible
Smart technology makes BI tools such as Power BI very easy to use. It takes hardly any effort to apply filters and asking questions is easy. Setting up a report or dashboard does require expertise and knowledge. However, dashboards are easy to use in situations where relevant data can be filtered with a single click. This makes dashboards the ideal analysis tool for different departments within an organisation.
Expertise
The team at Joanknecht works at the intersection of finance & IT and creates comprehensive reports consisting of multiple dashboards, where data from different sources are unlocked and merged. Dashboards are updated and modified through an automatic API connection.
We provide greater insight into your organisation’s financial position and apply process optimisation to future-proof your organisation. Our Integrated Finance team is ready to answer all your questions and help optimise your processes.
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