Strategic Automation for Growth-Stage Companies
Companies that have reached the growth stage have solidified their initial offering, and have maintained a steady client base. As their focus shifts from establishing their brand towards scale, they’re balancing several priorities. Scaling a business is expensive and requires efficient investments in technology, people, and processes.
In most industries, automation can be a game-changer that maximizes a company’s capabilities. When used strategically, it can optimize repeat tasks and free up time for creative work. Learn how growth-stage companies can leverage automation and develop strategies to superpower their growth and manage risks.
1. Assess Your Readiness for Automation
Automation may top the business section’s headlines, but it’s anything but new. Your organization may already have automated tasks, rules, and alerts. Conduct an audit of your organization’s current automation utilization and identify opportunities for integration. Document workflows to formalize processes, which can identify time-wasting bottlenecks and redundancies.
While tedious, this step is critical to your ability to grow effectively. Automation can take the human element out of our tasks, it makes little sense to be inefficient automatically. Map out high-impact repeatable tasks like customer onboarding, invoice generation, and customer service resolution. Gain clarity on processes and identify cost centers and work types with the highest volume. This reveals areas that could benefit from upgrades like accounting software to reduce human error and manage repeat tasks.
2. Determine the Highest Value Workflows Worthy of Investment
While in the growth stage, your goal is to maximize revenue-driving functions. Tasks that directly impact revenue streams and customer retention generally offer the biggest return on investment. Analyze the human capital required for key workflows to assign a dollar amount to tasks. This can help weigh the cost of investment and the cost of automation training.
Some automation tasks do work that humans can’t do efficiently. For example, email nurturing sequences that deploy based on engagement are too high-touch for humans. Similarly, abandoned cart reminders capture customer data and present promoted ads, and deploy an email series as appropriate.
Collaborate with relevant vendors to establish an equation to weigh your investment and initial setup and long-term maintenance or subscriptions. Prioritize workflows that help you grow, improve speed and resolution, and delight your customers. Customers who are well taken care of are more likely to be loyal and promote your brand.
3. Integration is Key
Be methodical in your assessment of potential automation processes and tools. Some tools are shiny and seemingly offer beautiful data sets and automation. However, if they’re so unique that they lack integration capability, you will create more problems.
Software isolation can lead to siloed data and manual work that diminishes potential value. Scalable tools that integrate with your existing tech stack and offer out-of-the-box functionality are best. Customization capabilities are nice but will require custom updates into perpetuity.
Platforms that also boast robust training and support modules will be helpful long-term. Utilizing software training modules ensures consistent, updated information. Plus, collaborating with others in your industry can result in higher adoption levels in your organization.
4. Hybridize Modernization to Maximize Efficiency without Sacrificing Service
Technology and people can co-exist, even in a tech-heavy environment. Oftentimes, there’s a good amount of fear and resistance associated with automation. The widespread availability of artificial intelligence brings much to question and may already fuel staff concerns. Keep resistance at bay with open communication and candid engagement with your entire staff.
Facilitate open discussions with the shared goal of efficiency and maximizing potential. Remind your team that the tasks that caused the most frustration and are repetitive Steel valuable time from their day. With a hybrid approach to modernization, empower your team to focus on building relationships and connecting customers with solutions. Automate tasks to improve speed and accuracy, while prioritizing personal connections and empathy where it matters most.
5. Employee Engagement is Critical to Successful Automation
Involve front-line employees in the exploration of automation and selection of tools. Establish a cross-functional team to help facilitate adoption and champion process improvements. Mitigate risks by identifying the potential for misinformation, training gaps, and backsliding into manual work.
Align business goals and individual success with timely adoption and utilization of automation. Develop company-wide internal messaging to celebrate the advantages automation can provide. Assess employee sentiment through regular, anonymous feedback requests and adjust your plan accordingly. Celebrate project milestones to acknowledge each phase of your efforts, which amplifies the importance of your initiative.
6. Develop Metrics and Milestones to Audit and Adjust Processes
Evolve your monthly reporting and metrics process as you integrate automation. New information will be available to analyze, apply, and influence your work. Data will arrive sooner and with more elements to model, so build in time to adjust.
Sometimes, the vast amount of data can inundate teams still adjusting to new processes. Test your automation and model data in alignment with continuous improvement best practices. Review your strategic plan and underlying tactics to pinpoint data worth analyzing. Collaborate with leaders to determine the most actionable insights that help guide growth. Make data widely available using dashboards and on-demand reports to improve transparency and informed decision-making company-wide.
Scale Smarter with Relationship-Centric Automation
Strategic automation maximizes a growth-stage company’s abilities and can unlock untold potential. Approach automation deliberately, establishing clear goals, gaining input from the enterprise, and with consideration for growth-driving activities.
Adopting cutting-edge technology may encounter resistance from the organization. Integrate change management best practices into your automation adoption to improve outcomes and maintain momentum. Focus on clearly defined goals in alignment with your organization’s purpose. When automation is aligned strategically, it can inspire innovation and be a catalyst for growth.
