What is Workflow?

Workflow is simply the movement of documents and tasks through a work process. Most often, workflow includes documents that need to be routed through a task or process because documents are the vehicle by which information moves through your organization.

The concept of workflow is simple to understand, but difficult to implement without the right tool. Automation of workflow is handled through various software types.

Workflow Optimization

One way to increase operational efficiency through workflow optimization is to move consecutive processes to simultaneous processes. Building a process that will require former consecutive steps to occur at the same time is a simple and effective way to incorporate process improvement into most business processes.

Another way to increase operational efficiency through workflow optimization is to automate manual processes. Not all manual processes can be automated and many automated processes will still require manual intervention, but something as simple as automating the routing of documents after a manual step can reduce time in processing documents thus increasing workflow efficiency. The increase in workflow efficiency can often equate directly to higher profits as labor costs are reduced.

One of the most effective ways to increase operational efficiency through workflow optimization is to take manual, consecutive processes and convert them to automated, simultaneous processes. This allows each process improvement opportunity to be combined to provide the highest level of process improvement through