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Digital Transformation – Baby Steps
- May 22, 2020
- Posted by: Admin
- Category: Blogs, Digital Transformation
For some companies, the notion of digitizing their entire business can sound daunting. Legacy processes become implanted deep within employees and users, and the sheer fact that a process has been proven over time can feel excuse enough to not take the plunge into the world of automation. Does this mean that digital transformation is a ground-up renovation to an entire business infrastructure or are there ways to transform in a less intimidating, yet still efficient manner? Below are some simple ways a legacy business can start to transform in baby steps.
Replace your Spreadsheet Processes
Sometimes the business world feels like it is run by spreadsheets. While these document formats can be useful for quick data management or simple table structure organization, there comes a point where a process can outmatch a spreadsheet. Here are some typical problems that accumulate over time:
- Version Control – Multiple users managing data in local environments can cause data to be overwritten or out-versioned.
- Security – Any time local documents are maintained, managed, and shared there comes an inherent risk. No ability to create access levels or password protection can quickly make company data volatile.
- Data Validation & Restriction – Reporting can quickly become difficult when many data points do not share the same data types across records.
- Scaling Processes – Some minor processes can quickly grow overnight and if there is a need to maintain large amounts of data in a small amount of time, a spreadsheet may not suffice.
The Power of Workflows
C2M® provides workflow-driven solutions that will avoid the issues above and replace any business process maintained through a spreadsheet whether small or complex. Processes can be maintained in a cloud environment protected by role-based accounts, so version issues and security threats can be successfully mitigated. There are also many features available to automate data validation and input so that ever-growing processes can be maintained and evaluated easily.
Implement Event Management & Notifications
While email and chat has become a very important aspect of successful business communication, there are many opportunities to improve on this manner of triggering process. Here are some downfalls to this legacy way of moving a business process forward:
- Concise Traceability – When a process is broken and in need of lessons learned evaluation, email systems are very difficult to search and find specific scenarios, users and time logs.
- Human Error – Leaving these communications up to humans can result in misrepresented data, delayed notification and even totally forgotten communication.
- Professionalism – Whether internal or external, notifications need to be clear, consistent, and professional. Without a standard format, this type of notification can be at risk of appearing unprofessional.
C2M® can support event-managed notifications, SMS and email, to help businesses communicate efficiently throughout their processes. Implementing this type of solution can be the first step to digitizing a manual process and in preventing some of the dangers outlined above.
There are many ways to begin the digital transformation of your company and they do not all need to be extravagant. Digital Transformation has rightfully become a necessity across many industries. Taking the first steps can appear daunting, but due to the growing number of legacy process hazards, taking baby steps in the digital direction is critical.
Client Says
We are implementing Plasma Ag Solutions across our network of locations. Plasma Ag provides several capabilities that stand out for our users such as Programs, Rebate management, and Inventory tracking. It is quite difficult to track margin information on crop protection products in our industry so our Owner Operators love the transparency the system provides. We utilize the system to professionalize our support to the network and it has become a bit success with all of them.
Several hundreds of our retail locations and joint ventures use Plasma Ag solutions as a part of their core operations. Plasma solutions provide very useful tools and deep insights to users – including tracking customer transactions and financial information. Their applications are tightly integrated with CRM, ERP, Accounting, and our other mission critical IT infrastructure and third-party systems. The dashboards provide rich analysis and insights that helps us adjust to the changing markets.
Plasma Ag solutions have been a tremendous asset to our operations. They offer powerful capabilities such as managing Retail programs, Products, Programs, local discounts, and wraps. Ability to track inventory at physical locations, calculating true and average costs, rebates and accruals on user-friendly and simple interfaces has helped us and our retail customers adopt Plasma Ag solutions quickly.
Our software, system and processes used to be an old struggling engine. Plasma team solved all that. With exceptional training and planning, their consultative executive team down to their support team executed the deployment with first-class speed and professionalism. Their platform not only removed all the pain points in my division, but also created a ripple effect benefiting my entire company.
It has been my experience that Plasma has the technical expertise, commitment, and work-ethic to deliver best-in-class solutions that allow business owners to fully realize business strategies and objectives. They work in a highly professional manner to ensure that the clients’ requirements and recommendations are fully realized. I would highly recommend Plasma for any web enablement initiative that you may be considering.
Plasma has been a smart choice for us as our online business partner. I don’t even consider our work with them outsourcing because Plasma management takes the time to truly understand our business and is able to direct its technology resources for the most efficient and quality output possible. I don’t think you can say that about many companies in their space.
Plasma has been a smart choice for us with our online requirements. I would recommend them to any company looking to better manage their online presence.
It has been my pleasure to work with the Plasma Team since August 2008. We have completed three major builds and multiple smaller projects in this time. I heartily recommend Plasma Comp to anyone needing a workable, practical and effective system solution. Plasma’s Q&A process was extremely thorough. They quickly understood what was needed and then worked the process with pointed and penetrating questions to ensure they had the entire picture of the finished product.
I think Plasma has come a long way in embracing our philosophy of becoming more agile, both leading and following in this area when necessary. The teams have been very open to change and have a great attitude. I have no complaints!
Plasma is a great vendor to work with. They took us from an email-based process to a fully designed, web-based workflow. They have dramatically changed how our devices are certified to be used on our network and they will save you time as well! One of the many processes in our current environment has saved us so much time; from four months down to a few days!
