Say Goodbye to Manual Approvals: Automated Approvals for a Hassle-Free Process

Have you grown tired of losing money in business due to waiting for processes or assignments to be approved? If so, you are not alone. Studies into Cost of Delay (CoD) metrics show that almost 80% can be attributed to waiting times while figures additionally show that U.S. organizations lose an average of $1.7m per year for every 100 employees due to wasted time.

Now is the time for your business to regain control of the situation by saying goodbye to outdated manual approval processes and hello to automated approvals. When you do, it will transform your business forever.

The problem – manual approvals are now outdated

An approval process is defined by Indeed as “a type of workflow which comprises a series of steps that a work must pass to be approved”. They are needed for a wide range of business assignments including but not limited to; budgets, invoices, project outlines, and marketing strategies.

When work is sent to an individual or department, one of two things happens;

• They approve the work, which allows it to move on to the next step of the project workflow.
• They reject the work, which then sends it back to the previous step where the necessary edits are made.

At a glance, manual approval processes may not seem like a major issue for your business. But what happens if a workflow needs to go through 7 steps and there is a 24-hour delay at each stage? Suddenly, you have lost a week to poor communication. In addition to direct financial losses, it will often cause workers to feel disengaged with their work, which inevitably has a detrimental impact on productivity.

While asynchronous and manual approval processes were used for many generations, they simply do not work in the modern world. Now is the time to evolve with automated workflows. Manual tasks and manual data entry will increase the risk of bottlenecks, unclean and insecure data.

Organizations, now more than ever, are scattered across multiple sites. In fact, nearly 20% of the U.S. workforce is based primarily at home. An increased need for collaboration further underscores this point. Unfortunately, manual approvals can be a hindrance to productivity, causing delays, distractions, and a negative effect on profit. To stay competitive in today’s market, it is key that businesses leverage a automation tools to develop management system to streamline their processes. Templates, purchase orders, accounts payable, and accounting software should be part of this system to ensure maximum efficiency.

The solution – automated approvals

If you want to keep every employee informed about what is happening within the company at any given moment, introducing approval workflow automation is an essential investment. You’ve already seen the benefits of automation software in many other aspects of business, so this news should hardly come as a surprise.

Whether it’s a startup or a major organization, automated approval processes will deliver stunning results. Here’s why; 

You’ll save money

Every business decision should be made with financial management and implications in mind, especially as the threat of a recession still looms large. The automation process will promote cost-effective workflows by minimizing delays, eradicating human errors, and ensuring that all information is complete.

Better still, you won’t have to pay employees to manually manage the data. Whether it saves you from hiring additional staff or it enables current employees to focus on more important tasks, this will translate to a boosted bottom line.

You’ll build a better environment for your employees

Automation solutions are shown to increase productivity in almost all industries. By streamlining approvals with automated workflows, you will allow employees to avoid tedious and repetitive tasks. This will subsequently free up more time for innovation and other tasks that actively drive the company on.

Furthermore, it removes the frustration of waiting ages for another department to confirm an approval while having data in a centralized location promotes access at all times. This creates a better work situation. And happy employees will work better.

You’ll protect your business

Automated approvals will deliver a plethora of immediate benefits for your team, which can protect your business indirectly through lower staff turnover rates. However, automated workflows can additionally protect the company and its operations by guaranteeing compliance with all relevant data regulations.

Moreover, centralized data stored in a secure cloud setting will provide an additional layer of security. And the accuracy of the protocol will save you from mistakes that could potentially harm your reputation – as well as cost time and money.

You’ll create a standardized scenario

Another potential issue with manual approval processes is that some members of staff may take a slightly different approach. Miscommunication costs businesses in many ways, affecting budgets and project outlines along with other items. A truly standardized protocol can put an end to this.

Automated document approvals don’t only promote quick progress from one step of the process to the next. They also deliver the consistency needed to keep operations running in the smoothest possible fashion.

You’ll gain peace of mind

Perhaps most importantly, the knowledge that you have automated approval processes in place will provide reassurance as you look to keep pace with your competitors. Falling behind due to such a simple problem would be nothing short of a disaster.

Get the Knack of automated approvals

When choosing a software provider to deliver automation solutions, you should only settle for the very best. After all, it’s no exaggeration to state that the future of your business may depend on it. Knack’s dedicated workflow solutions are reliable, cost-effective, scalable, and built with modern businesses like yours in mind.

It is an all-in-one tool that can be used for budgets, invoicing, and any other relevant project that undergoes an approval process. Knack integrates with your business operations, promoting a smooth transition from manual approvals to automated workflows.

So, what can Knack actually enable you to do? Here are just some of the possibilities offered by the automated approvals features;

Keep everyone in the loop

By now, it should be clear that quick and transparent communication is the main driving force for wanting to upgrade your approvals processes. Knack keeps everyone in the loop at all times to ensure that tasks progress as you desire. Some of the key attributes to consider are;

• Knack is mobile-friendly, meaning you can reach all users across all devices.
• Notifications and emails are automatically sent to relevant users when they need to accept/reject a step.
• You can define schedules to update records and keep tasks moving along.
• Status indicators can provide visual notifications of what tasks are on schedule and which ones need attention.

With Knack’s automated workflows, the days of falling victim to delays or failed communications can be a thing of the past.

Manage every aspect of approvals in one place

The value of good organizational skills cannot be emphasized enough and switching to automated documents approvals via Knack is the answer. You can create defined life cycles by setting up automated approvals that move the process along at the quickest speed without compromising quality. It supports you at every stage by;

• Submission processes – as soon as someone submits data via forms or other integrated methods, relevant parties can view and edit the data.
• Dates – setting due dates and deadlines for individual steps or entire workflows can motivate teams and promote smooth operations.
• Approvals – in cases where multiple levels of approval are needed, assigning individual records ensures that all approvals are made without introducing ambiguity.

You can also set permission levels for individual users thanks to Knack’s intuitive and intelligent tools. This puts you in full control over who edits, rejects, or approves submissions while ensuring that each step is managed in one place.

Record everything

When taking the manual approach to approvals, it often becomes a case of only knowing where things currently stand. Knack’s automated approvals provide optimal transparency by recording every step in the approval process. If any aspect causes unforeseen hold-ups or needs to go back to the previous step, you can facilitate this with ease. The records let you;

• View users’ histories to see who made what changes throughout the process.
• Check the record history to see previous changes following rejected steps.
• Edit records if errors are made or information becomes outdated.

In turn, this can help you prevent disputes and find quick solutions should any issues surface. It also serves as a significant motivational tool, particularly as you can see the output of each individual and deliver praise as necessary.

The final word on switching to automated approvals

If you have resisted automated approvals and persisted with manual methods until 2023 without falling behind, a round of applause is in order. Nevertheless, you should not let this trick you into ignoring the fact that approval workflow automation is the future.

Knack allows you to build custom an internal approval software that will automate approval flow solution that will help streamline your approval processes in real-time, allowing your team members to save time and money by automating tedious and time-consuming approval flows. With Knack, you can quickly and easily set up automated approval flows and get back to what matters most – running your business.

With tools like Knack, you can save time, money, and your sanity while simultaneously building improved business operations. If this sounds good to you, get in touch to find out more today.