Elite Business Ventures (EBV) was a high-volume compliance and safety solutions provider with over 65 employees and millions in annual revenue. Known for brands like OSHA4Less, EBV served tens of thousands of customers in regulated industries across the United States.
A 2017 study from Pew Research found that more than 70% of the U.S. is scared that robots are going to take over our lives. And, while we can’t perfectly predict the emergence of a Skynet singularity, we can say with some certainty that technology is set to take over the repetitive, dehumanizing elements of our jobs instead of putting us out of work.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is a strategic priority for 84% of businesses, and in some cases has been used to improve sales team efficiency by over 50%. Even I’ve used AI in the past to generate hundreds of relevant hashtags for social media posts at the click of a button.
It was once the stuff of utopian science fiction and huge enterprises, but now practically anyone can take advantage.
For this post, we will dive into 20 different applications of AI in the real world:
Workflow documentation could have saved me from drowning in paper.
I was in the process of presenting an English lesson. A mapped-out complex presentation. You will have given your fair share of presentations if you work in a team-driven business. You’ll know a plan is required to help you be efficient, avoid error, and be impactful. In short: optimized.
54% of companies believe mapping complex processes is challenging when automating workflows.
Workflow documentation can help to edit, track, and store the documents that shape your workflows. Process Street has created this article to help you understand the topic:
Understanding quality and seeking to improve it is arguably the core purpose behind undertaking process improvements. Hence the creation of the Deming cycle.
But where did this philosophy of process improvement come from?
One key person is William Edwards Deming – sometimes referred to as Edward W. Deming. He’s principally a statistician, but one could even call him a philosopher of science.
Deming’s goal was to reapply the scientific method to business processes, and has left us with two main variants of his thinking: PDSA and PDCA.
In this article we’ll outline:
Deming’s approach is not just about improving processes, but about improving a whole business.
In a recent meta-study from the British Medical Journal, researchers found only 2 out of 73 studies had applied PDSA in a way which fully met criteria. Commenting:
To progress the development of the science of improvement, a greater understanding of the use of improvement methods, including PDSA, is essential to draw reliable conclusions about their effectiveness.
And that’s why we’re writing this article!
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As there are so many different types of recurring work happening in every part of your company, it can be difficult to keep track of what’s working and what’s not.
You can often spend too long looking for answers to questions like these:
“Which processes in the Sales team run smoothly and which take longer than they should?”
“Who in the Underwriting team completes their tasks on time and who misses their due dates?”
“Have we reduced the time it takes HR to complete the onboarding process, for new Account Executive hires in particular?”
“How many different processes is the IT Helpdesk team involved in, and how many tasks have they completed in the last 30 days?”
“How long does it take the Customer Success team to onboard a customer, and which onboarding tasks take the longest to complete?”
Wouldn’t it be useful to have a custom-made dashboard so you can get answers to these types of questions with one, quick glance?
Well, with the launch of Process Street BI Integrations, now you can.
To find out how you can export, store, visualize, and utilize all your Process Street data in the way that you want to, take five minutes to read through the following topics and find out:
Let’s get started.
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If the United Nations Environment Programme is to be taken seriously, the current generation is the last generation with a realistic chance of kick-starting the processes necessary to halt or reverse the looming global crisis of climate change.
“We are clearly the last generation that can change the course of climate change, but we are also the first generation with its consequences,” Kristalina Georgieva, the CEO of the World Bank.
As humans, we tend to focus more on the things we need to do than the things we’ve already done. This so-called “Zeigarnik effect”, named after Russian psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik, means our minds are often swimming with all of the tasks, responsibilities, and mental notes that we think we should be focusing on. That’s where Prioritization Matrix can help!
All of these tasks and projects that need doing, this mental to-do list, without a clear hierarchy of importance can make it difficult for us to stay focused and actually get things done.
One way to combat all of this Zeigarnik noise is to note down everything. Make an actual to-do list. Studies have been done, and it has been shown that the very act of noting down tasks can quite simply “make you more effective”.
But, even with a to-do list, before you actually get anything done it’s necessary to have a clear idea of your priorities.
Sounds simple enough, right? Unfortunately, figuring out what to prioritize can be hard. It’s a complicated process that involves weighing up cost against value, effort against time, and for a lot of businesses, will likely involve many different stakeholders.
The solution is to work out a process for determining what to prioritize.
In the book The Balanced Scorecard, by David Norton and Robert Kaplan, it is noted that 90% of organizations fail to execute their pre-set strategy.
This is a concerning statistic when you consider that, for a majority of companies considered successful, an emphasis is placed on having formal and pre-established systems to inform, manage, and meet their strategic obligations.
In this sense, can we not infer executing business strategy = business success?
To bridge this gap between strategic ambition and business performance, Process Street has created a Strategic Planning Template, which you can use – for free – right away!
By executing the steps given in this template you will not only develop good strategy, but the delivery of this strategy will also prove successful.
Click here to access our free Strategic Planning Template!
But to accommodate this template, you need to have a solid understanding of strategic planning itself.
In this article, I’ll discuss what strategic planning is, the different strategic planning models – with an emphasis on the Cascade Strategic Planning Model -, why strategic planning is important, and more.
Click on the links below to read through:
Let’s jump straight to it!
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Ecommerce is a massive sector, with a projected value of $4.5 trillion by 2021. However, without the proper ecommerce processes in place, it’s more than easy to fail before you even get close to selling your first product.
And have you ever heard:
“That’s fantastic! Have you thought about selling those?”
We’ve all had a moment of inspiration for our own online store. Whether (like me) you took up a new hobby (crochet) and showed your project to a family member (my gran) or you stumbled across a cheap source for a certain product, the lure of online sales is difficult to ignore.
“… data from Statista anticipates a 246.15% increase in worldwide ecommerce sales, from $1.3 trillion in 2014 to $4.5 trillion in 2021. That’s a nearly threefold lift in online revenue.” – Aaron Orendorff, Global Ecommerce: Statistics and International Growth Trends
That’s why we here at Process Street have put together this ecommerce processes pack. These templates will provide you with detailed instructions on how to do everything from setting up an online store to listing products, designing a logo, and promoting your content.
Better yet, every last process is completely free!
So, what are we waiting for? Let’s start selling!
Are you in need of some workflow examples to make your teams smarter?
But what makes a team smart?
Several things do, but powerful workflows are one critical ingredient which makes teams smart.
Teams that use workflows don’t set goals and simply hope to reach them; they create checklists (workflows) to make sure they reach their goals.
No wonder 50% of businesses that use workflow management systems say the results are substantial.
It’s incredible.
Teams that use workflows are super organized and able to perform daunting tasks — no matter the long processes involved.
But what types of workflows should you be using this year?
It’s different for every organization; workflow systems are not always one-size-fits-all. But these nine Process Street workflow examples should give you inspiration for how you can build important systems to run your business with.
