The power of adaptable and flexible workflows

It doesn’t sound particularly exciting, but the adaptability and flexibility of your workflows can actually make a big difference to your firm’s success. This is especially true for companies working in professional services.

Service-based industries exist in a constant state of flux even in stable economic climates. Whether it be in the form of changing legal and reporting requirements, firm-level restructuring to meet client and market demands, the adoption of new KPIs as circumstances evolve, professional service organizations must be fluid to survive.

From simple workflows to fluid workflows

We all intuitively know that simpler workflows enabled by modern ERP technologies make performing routine tasks easier – and even remove them from the day-to-day responsibilities of your people through automation.

For example, our customer Ban Leong Technologies has used our systems to automate a large part of their financial data management and reporting structure. This lets them complete reporting 2 weeks earlier while still using a much greater range of data sources. Radically boosting accuracy, and giving more time to course-correct if necessary. Automation of core tasks also saves around $80,000 a year by freeing teams to pursue more valuable work while juniors oversee the reporting process.

But simpler workflows – and automated workflows – still have one crucial weakness: they’re static. If your circumstances change, even the simplest workflow might not be the one you need.

In most ERP systems, this poses a significant problem: once workflows are set up in the implementation period, it’s generally impossible to restructure them without submitting a change order. This means that your entire organization can fall behind in the period between asking for the change and getting it set up.

How ERPx makes adaptable workflows a reality

We’ve been working with PSOs for decades, and we’re always looking for ways to satisfy their unique and rapidly evolving requirements. In ERPx, we’ve introduced a powerful new ability to adjust your workflows in real time – giving you an unprecedented level of control over the way your organization makes use of its digital tools. All backed up with the industry best practices that keep you on the straight and narrow even if you need to completely transform your day-to-day working patterns in response to a change in circumstances.

This empowers you – and your people – with several advantages that can make a huge difference to your ability to achieve your goals, satisfy your clients, and grow your business. Including:

The power to make complex changes yourself

Low- and no-code updates make it possible for anyone in your organization to make big changes to the way workflows function: including setting up new automations in real time. This means you can adapt easily to emerging conditions and reduce the total burden and cost and change. Even if you do need to make big changes.

Single changes that change everything

Creating a new attribute in ERPx is easy – and applying it is easy too. Once you’ve built it, your new attribute can be flowed through the whole system to help you more easily manipulate data, expedite or change processes, or generate new reports. Without having to manually alter every workflow you want to be changed (or stress test to look for unexpected failure points.)

Your ERP grows and changes with you

The traditional model for ERP is something like a monolith around which the entire organization must structure itself. However, over time, your monolithic system can take on a perverse quality. While it’s supposed to make the lives of your people easier by providing a single repository of data and all the tools to leverage it, over time, as your requirements change and technology evolves, it’s not uncommon to find your firm is serving its ERP.

ERPx’s adaptability eliminates this weakness, allowing you to make big changes to the fundamental structure of your system – and your organization – on the fly through the simple application of drag-and-drop capabilities.

Give people the experience they deserve

Professional services organizations of all kinds rely on people more than any other resource. And in uncertain times, the most talented people can be the hardest to hold on to.

But the technology on which you base your company’s operations can help you to keep them coming back.

The primary way your people interact with your business in the modern day is through technology. And the performance, user experience, and functionality of the platforms you use now represents a real competitive advantage in terms of talent attraction, management, and retention.

See what ERPx can do for you and your organization

We don’t want you to just take our word for it. To discover how ERPx can transform the way your firm approaches transformation, check out this briefing note.