How to get C-Suite buy-in

The final stage of getting workflow automation for your team or organization is getting the final approval from the executive team or C-suite. You need to have a case to bring to the higher-ups at your organization to prove what you already know; that workflow automation would help your company be more efficient, competitive, and employee-focused.

You know it’s true—your inefficient processes impact productivity, efficiency, and perhaps even competitiveness and employee morale. But now – you have to prove this and make your case to get budget approval or get someone on the executive team to sign off or even join a demo with you. This blog will cover key points to include when making your case to get buy-in for workflow automation.

First, start by sharing the five reasons to automate:

1. You want to reduce business risk.

This will be a big point to bring up when sharing the benefits of workflow automation. Regardless of their seniority, no one wants to have processes in place that could put their organization at risk.

Workflow automation increases the accuracy of information by limiting options in dropdowns. Accuracy is crucial when dealing with legally-required information. Automation also allows your organization to be 100% compliant, giving you the peace of mind that workflows are going as expected and process outcomes are correct in every case.

2. Customers will receive better service.

With automation, the task moves into their queues only when all the information they need has been entered into the system correctly, delivering quick and accurate results for your customers.

3. You want to increase speed and efficiency.

In an automated workflow, employees know their responsibilities and when deadlines must be met. The system provides alerts and reminders to keep the process moving. These alerts flow to both employees responsible for a task and a manager overseeing the operation. Your organization becomes more predictable and focused because everyone understands what to do and when.

4. You want to improve employee morale.

Each automated process boosts employee morale and permits more time for employees to focus on your business’s real, value-added work. They can accomplish more with less effort and less support.

5. Manual workflows take up the team’s time and energy.

Have you ever had a request/approval weighed down in an email chain that causes delays and confusion? Does someone on your team waste time re-keying information from paper records or disparate systems? If you’re living with a manual workflow, you’ve likely experienced one or both of these mishaps and frustrations.

eBook: Making the Business Case for Workflow Automation

Another tool you can use to make your internal business case for bringing workflow automation software into your organization is our free eBook, “Making the Business Case for Workflow Automation.” It is a template for providing a persuasive and concise business case that gives appropriate detail to approvers.

A quick summary of the sections in the guide is as follows:

• Overviewing the current process and how it currently works

• Includes a section for the issues in the current process and how automation will help. In this section, you can refer back to the beginning of this blog for five examples of the benefits of automation.

• Plan a demonstration schedule and include different groups relevant to the specific workflow.

• A temple to providing a cost outline. Share the cost of the subscription, number of users, services, budget, etc.

Again, this is a template for you to fill in and bring into your discussion. Having it filled out to share with the team as an agenda will be beneficial.

ROI Calculators

Nutrient Workflow has made it easy to calculate the savings that automation would make for the specific raw numbers to bring up in your meeting. Our website has three calculators: Savings per request, process cost savings, and a productivity gains calculator. See how much you could be saving with just a few clicks. Here is an example of the process cost savings calculator:

Despite ongoing advancements in workflow automation systems, manual workflows are surprisingly common in large and small organizations. Automation may make sense for your department or business unit, but upper management may need to be educated to approve the adoption of workflow automation software.

By raising awareness, sharing how current processes work, the benefits of implementing new software, and staying persistent, you will have the right tools to get the final approval. If management still has questions, contact our team for additional help addressing their unique concerns.

Toni Buffa

Toni is a member of the Nutrient Workflow marketing team and writes for the Nutrient Workflow blog. Toni lives in Colorado and loves animals of all stripes.