Empower Your Teams to Streamline Their Processes — Without IT

by Katy Beloof
​

Automation in the enterprise is transforming how people work. Yet rather than taking jobs away from workers, automation has the power to complement their work and help them be even more effective.

Respondents in Smartsheet’s Automation in the Workplace report estimate that the time savings from automation can add up to six or more hours a week – nearly a full work day for most employees.  Automation contributes to a decrease in data entry and processing errors that can erode the reliability of data, and reduce the time spent on manual tasks, freeing up workers for more meaningful, high-value tasks.
​
The softer benefits of this extra time – including the improved employee satisfaction that comes from replacing repetitive, mundane tasks with more interesting challenges and the added business value and innovation this new work can drive – might be even more remarkable.
​

But not every work execution platform makes automation as easy as it should be. Some work execution platforms say they offer flexible automation, but limit your workflows and processes to specific templates and use cases, without giving you the flexibility to automate all of your processes the way you want or to react quickly to unexpected changes — without help from IT.

Here are three things to look for to ensure your work execution platform offers the automation you need to have an impact on your organization.
​

1. Automation That’s Easy to Set Up — Without IT

While automating repetitive processes can save you and your team a lot of time, many  automation tools are complicated to use and make it feel like you’ve spent all the time you could have saved just setting up your automation. Others are so complex that you need support from your IT team just to set up the workflows.
​
With Smartsheet, it’s easy to set up your own automated tasks, even if you don’t know a single line of code. Smartsheet’s intuitive workflow builder takes the complexity out of setting up your own automated workflows by giving you prompts in plain English to help you set up and customize your workflow exactly the way you want it. Start by selecting your trigger for automation, add any optional conditions and then choose which action you want automated. It’s that simple.

2. Configure Your Workflows — Any Way You Like

Even if automation is easy for you to set up, your work execution platform may not offer the level of customization you need for your specific workflows.
​
Smartsheet automated actions let you eliminate routine tasks using easy-to-configure rules that enable you to create exactly the workflow you want, without being constrained by specific templates or use cases. From reminders triggered off of due dates, to automated approval requests, you can easily set up and customize all your automated alerts and actions. And while Smartsheet gives you templates to get started, you’re not limited by how the templates are set up. You can customize them to fit your processes and workflows.

3. Engage Stakeholders on Other Platforms

The benefits of setting up automated workflows in your work execution platform are compounded when updates and other information can be easily shared with others. Conversely, the time savings of automation can quickly be erased if you have to then manually share information across other tools and apps that aren’t compatible with your primary work execution platform.

Using Smartsheet, you can automate the task of sharing information. Seamlessly sync data and connect information across other business-critical applications. by having your team members and other stakeholders receive alerts, update requests, and approval requests directly to their preferred messaging app, whether it’s Slack, Google’s Hangouts Chat, or Workplace by Facebook.  
​

Save Your Team Hours Each Day

Your team doesn’t have to wait to start seeing these benefits. From budget and procurement requests to status updates to reminders, Smartsheet automated alerts and actions can save teams hours each day, decreasing the drudgery that can contribute to low morale, and reducing backlogs and bottlenecks that slow down results.
​
Learn more about automating your workflows with Smartsheet here.

Source: Smartsheet Blog
​

For Smartsheet Enquiry & FREE Business Trial