How Workflow Automation Tools Work for a Fully Remote Company

The advent of technology has gone a long way in improving methods of doing business. It has not only brought about change to ways in which we work, but it also facilitates effectiveness, especially for a remote company. You can easily do scan to PDF an important document and send to your team irrespective of where you are.

What is a remote company?

A remote company is an organization that has employees that work outside the traditional office setting. The office place is basically on a computer with an internet connection, and the employees can be from different parts of the world.

Therefore, for a remote company to work fully, the company needs necessary automation tools. These tools are required to boost the efficiency of the remote workers, and to also make sure the company runs smoothly.

For many years now, there has been a debate on whether remote working technology is reliable or otherwise. However, several companies are wholly reliant on them as they hire through them, while others are still in the testing stage.

Since technology keeps evolving, there has been a significant improvement in these automation tools when you compare them to the initial stage. So, this advancement has made running a remote company smoother.

Different software’s have been developed, commonly known as collaborative Software, and they minimize the need to micromanage employees. According to available data, employees that are allowed to work freely are more productive than those been micromanaged.

Now, here’s how workflow automation tools work.

1. Employs independent technology rather than human supervision

One essential quality that every remote company must possess is trust. You have to trust your long distance employees for the business relationship to work out. Many if not all employees desire to be given the freedom to do their job, and this has increased the efficiency of many employees today. With the workflow automation software, you can monitor the progress of all your employees remotely. The software is so comprehensive that it gives you a detailed report of achievement, accomplishment, and shortcomings of your employees without you having to do any serious supervision.

2. Keep your team connected all in one place

A remote company will function better when all employees feel connected to one another. This gives everyone a sense of belonging. Also, it fosters teamwork and boosts professionalism. The available workflow software has instant messaging capabilities as well as video call. So, you can do a video conferencing with all your employees at the same time.

Moreover, there are different workflow platforms for document sharing. You and your employees can securely send and receive documents, either it is scan to PDF or not. There’s also support to change a document from one format to another.

3. Stay on course

If you have your employees scattered across different locations in the globe, the probability of staying on course is low because there are many unfavorable factors in the way. However, keeping all your works (task, and schedule) in a workflow automation system will give every employee involved in a specific task focused and in the track. This is a very effective way to stay on course.

Let’s consider this illustration, if a project needs to submit at 03:00 PM New York time. Every involved employee will know the due time in their local time, so they can work towards submitting at the right time.

From the illustration above, we’ve seen that all members have the same understanding of when they need to submit. This is the ease workflow automation system brings to a remote company.

4. Highlight every task

There are times a particular task will be repeated unintentionally. However, with an automation system, every task will be highlighted, and finished tasks will be distinguished from the unfinished ones.

With the aid of a flow diagram, you will understand your business operations better. The chart will help you identify every task and give you a visual representation of your achievements so far. The Graphic Mama has some useful tips on this point about its importance.

Develop ideal workflow automation for your company, and make the working process more straightforward for your employees. This is an important step that has to be done with close supervision of an expert in the field.

5. Measure performance and improve workflow

The next thing you want to do after building a workflow automation system is to take feedbacks. You need this information to measure your performance and boost your workflow. You should keep a close eye on your automation system and keep improving it in other increase the efficiency of your employees.

Useful tools for remote companies

Now that you know how a workflow automation system can help your remote company, it is necessary that you know some valuable tools that can make the automation easy.

a. Slack

You can keep all your employees connected with slack.

The old way of connecting with employees is through the mail. However, the use of mail is fading gradually. Mail looks to formal, the arrangement and presentation of information, connecting all employees and so on.

Slack comes with instant messaging capabilities, connects all team members, and you can customize message channel for individual and team members. Instant communication of information among team member boosts the productivity of a company.

b. Process Street

This is another useful automation tool built to display and analyze the working processes of a company. It shows and arranges all processes in templates form. Therefore, all processes will be run and marked like a checklist when completed.

c. Air table

Air table serves as a database of the company that is accessible by every team member. It presents data in spreadsheet form, and it is easily understood with no required expertise.

The process of workflow automation has been explained. So if your company employs remote staff, it is good that you start using automation tools to facilitate the operation of your business. Any company can operate as a remote company since it is no longer necessary to hire staff physically.