As we face yet another period of change, as business leaders, our ability to adapt to change and preparedness to be agile in our response to opportunities or threats has never been more key to our success.

To achieve this we need to have sharpened our business processes to the optimum so we have spare capacity to adapt to new opportunities.  

In the business world in the UK we are told that our workers are not as efficient as some of our European cousins.  I find that hard to believe, but if we accept it at face value, ok there are plenty of ways we can improve our Productivity and Processes and we see good examples of companies doing that in the UK and USA, every day. However we are also aware that there remain many companies who are still using the tools prevalent 20 years ago which struggle to collaborate, never mind do it on any platform and it be intuitive and easy to work with.

There are many business leaders who are embracing change and helping their workforce to find smarter ways of working. Yet many are still using the same old tools because they are familiar and not because they are the best, which is dramatically limiting the scope of their progress

Recommended Productivity and Efficiency Tools

As a company we are focussed on helping companies to improve their processes, making sure their workers (users) of IT solutions have the best and most intuitive tools to work with. Let us share our recommendations of great software that could help your company make a step change in Business Process improvement…. They are…. Below and all offer a free trial.

The range of Cloud based solutions grows daily but we recommend Smartsheet instead of Excel and Task lists/to do lists that don’t join up and collaborate.

Appsheet which offers the ability to build cost effective Mobile Apps in a day or two, that work on any device and deliver the exact solution you seek by conditional logic. Collaboration for the masses! Costed in £100’s not 10’s of £1000’s.

Data produced by these work management Apps should be viewed in Graphical dashboards so good decisions can be made, based on Real Time Results. Microsoft  Power Bi is one of those Graphical Apps that reads data from any Spreadsheet, so your management finger is on the pulse of your business ready to act on what you see.

For many workers travelling to work or to a meeting is the tradition, rather than best practise. Since our company started working with companies around the world, we have had to embrace the video conference and screen share world.  These tools have improved dramatically, speeding up decision and delivery times, and cutting down on travel time and costs and reducing our carbon footprint.

We currently recommend Zoom.us for conferencing and screen share but equally acknowledge that Skype, Webex, GoToMeeting and Join.me among others achieve good results. Alas Face time is still one to one… at the moment.

If we manage the changes that are affecting us, then we can seize new opportunities as they are presented.  In order to achieve this our Business Processes need to be fully optimised, allowing us to create in our organisations a culture of continuous innovation, safe in the knowledge that our Key Performance Indicators are telling us what we need to know… in Real Time.

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Smartsheet, an intuitive work management tool, has led the way here in recent years, yet many Excel users have yet to discover the benefits. Those that have, have discovered ways to save 20 or even 40% of their Admin time. Project planners have often used MS Project, which, like Excel struggles to provide easy collaboration on any platform on any device, which Smartsheet  provides easily.

What are the true benefits of using Smartsheet?  See “The Forrester Total Economic Impact of Smartsheet” Infographic

Our experience has shown that businesses that migrated their complex Planning processes into Smartsheet found that it was capable of about 80% of what they required and did it far better than traditional systems. Smartsheet’s latest feature updates mean that it is now capable of over 90% of typical requirements, removing the need for more expensive and complex systems. Often, what Smartsheet is not best at, can remain in Excel, e.g. for in depth data analytics. The difference being that Smartsheet gathers all the data from collaborators really easily and can deliver it to an Excel dashboard in real time. So, all the reasons for not moving forward have now been removed, which can be a significant contributor to the Productivity of any organisation.

Project Migration and the Change Management of working practices that comes with such migration has many rewards that are quickly accessed.  All that is needed to implement and benefit from this Migration is a team of consultants that understands Microsoft Apps and Smartsheet really well, such that the best tools are deployed and Workflows re-designed to suit more collaborative working practices.

Implementing Smartsheet and associated Symbiotic apps like ProofHQ,  Docusign,  OverDRIVE etc., are virtually instantaneous and inexpensive. Licenses can be provided on a trial basis while the evaluation of benefits takes place and purchases made on an annual renewable basis, which reduces upfront costs dramatically compared to traditional IT system replacement.

What are the key processes that Smartsheet can address better?

• Time and Task planning in Projects of a specific duration and ongoing activities that are not called Projects, yet share many of the challenges of Projects in getting work completed on time on budget.
• Human Resource Planning is now intuitive and easy to set up for most business sizes.
• Improved Project Information provides visuals like the Critical Path i.e. the tasks that will delay project completion if not finished on time.
• Sharing of project information and associated task management is easier than ever before with integration with such as Outlook and Gmail. Tasks updated within an email browser, so speeding efficiency.
• Security: Smartsheet System administration provides far better security of Data and confidential information by ensuring important data is not emailed as an attachment ( and potentially onwards to the wrong people) but permission is granted to View, Edit and Update sheets. Access to which can be removed at the click of a mouse should the need arise. So dramatically improving data security and the need for Version control, there being just ONE version, the LIVE one.
• Creating online WebForms that collect answers and data from those you need feedback from has never been so easy and is cited as the single biggest time saver in Admin office. Say goodbye to Paper Forms, Postage, Transcribing info from paper to spreadsheet, say hello to instant alerts and data analysis.
• Integrating Smartsheet with your other Applications has been dramatically upgraded and now API 2.0  offers a whole range of opportunities to link applications together to remove even more steps from your traditional processes by automating your workflows and updating data in several places with just one entry.

Book your place for our Getting to Grips with Project Management in Smartsheet course or Smartsheet Discovery Day delivered in London, Southampton and Leeds or on your premises for up to 8 people or Arrange your Free initial Consultancy to discuss your Training or Consultancy requirements.  We’d love to hear from you!

The post What Smartsheet’s latest Product Updates mean to Businesses appeared first on SmarterBusinessProcesses.

Servicing clients such as NHS Highlands, Queen Mary University, and Top Rank Boxing, our client base extends round the world.  See Testimonials and Use Cases

The common theme for all these organisations is that they have maxed out on Excel spreadsheets but need to plan more collaboratively and develop Smarter Business Processes that remove unnecessary repetitive activities.

See more about our Favourite Four Technology Pillars for Business Efficiency and Success

Smarter Business Processes chose Smartsheet, OverDRIVE, ProofHQ and DocuSign as the best of the rest examples of how  cloud based technologies can resolve real world problems, be rapidly implemented, intuitive, enjoyable to use, and yet be sensibly priced.

Talk to us about Managing Changes within your organisation – request demos or free trials  We’d love to hear from you.

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