Lights-Out Automation for the White-Collar Workforce

Are you running “lights-out?” The lights-out manufacturing methodology is in fact a philosophy that pushes for fully automated processes in production, where raw materials enter and finished products leave the factory with no human intervention. The quintessential example of lights-out automation is a factory that makes robots, run entirely by robots. In Manufacturing, there is a long history of gearing goals toward maximizing process efficiencies in this manner. But what about other aspects of your business? Beyond the shop floor… can other departments in your system advance to become “no touch” systems as well?

For example, let’s look at the business of paying bills! A necessary evil we all have to do, and an operational headache for many companies. Developing a workflow solution that automates and leverages business rules to confirm as many “no touch” payable approvals as possible can streamline the process. Recognizing that some human interaction is required, invoices that require review should be the only ones that are presented to the appropriate party for a decision, ensuring your Accounts Payable department/person isn’t wasting time on inefficient processes.

Is a lights-out approach right for your procurement and payment processing solution? Consider these questions:

• Do you find your AP department to be overworked?
• Do you miss available discounts because approvals are received too late to take advantage of favorable payment terms?
  Is review of information becoming redundant?
• If only some business rules could be put into place, could some decisions be automated?
• Could invoices with proper PO line item matching or those that fall within thresholds defined by the business be allowed to process through without human intervention?
• When a transaction needs to be audited, could rules be established to trigger alerts to automate the approval process?
• What if an executive does need to review something. It’s a significant time drain if all the proper supporting documents and information aren’t there. What if a workflow solved this?

Versatility in process automation can most certainly go beyond the factory floor. Are your executives in need of white collar automation? Don’t bog them down with repetitious non-value-added tasks. Financial transactions like Capital Expenditure Requests, Invoice approval, Purchase Order approvals, third-party commission processing and more can be accomplished with automated workflows.

CPS helps organizations implement business rules with Winshuttle to accomplish lights-out automation. Here’s a real-life example. When a client needed to submit a Capital Expenditure Request, rules were established to say, “if it’s a PC purchase and it’s under $1,000 in cost, your role can requisition five per year without approval”. A workflow was rapidly built that recognized the inputs, interpreted the business rules and roles, and was set to automatically approve and process. But if the purchase is $1500? The solution recognized that an approval is required and a person had to intervene.

Freeing you up from mundane tasks that are time consuming on standard billing is just one way you can stay focused on other important business tasks. Just imagine what the impact could be on your business when you repurpose all that wasted time! You’ll no doubt wish you had done this so much earlier.

Read how CPS helped a military supply company automate invoice processing to realize high throughput of no touch invoices to payables in SA. 
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