Workflow can automate your Business Practices

Here’s a story: Soon after the release of Optix Workflow in May of 1995, a large metropolitan newspaper approached us with a problem they needed to solve – how to automate and speed up the processing of their print ads. Some ads were camera ready, some required in-house design and approvals, all needed to be invoiced, assigned to specific pages, and published. We configured a powerful system that included scanning, indexing, and workflow, powered by an IBM AIX server. Once we had completed in-house user training for their designers, they were turned loose with their shiny new Optix Workflow design tools to express the flow of print ad work through their organization. A few weeks later, they contacted us with some questions they had and our experts packed up their answer bag and went to visit. This is what we saw when we walked into their meeting room:

Holy flowchart, Batman! Did our tool do that?!

We were impressed. Really impressed. Our naïve concept of a typical business workflow was a half dozen steps consisting of a few people or departments – but those newspaper guys blew us away. We answered their questions and the impossible-looking workflow illustrated above worked just fine and got their print ads into the paper in record time. Alas, in 2012 ads in newspapers just weren’t what they used to be and they went on to other things, but hey – even 20 years later we still look at that chart and marvel. True story.

The moral should be obvious – if our Optix Workflow design tools could automate a workflow that complex back in 1995, just think what it could do for you after 20 years of improvement. And lest you tremble while looking at that awesome flowchart above, let us reassure you that the vast majority of common business tasks can indeed be automated in far fewer steps. Here’s a more typical (and recent) example:

Go with the flow.

This workflow represents the order processing flow of a major industrial food products manufacturer, including steps for credit approval, order fulfillment, price checking, shipping and warehousing.

If you are in a business that needs to move files of any kind from person to person or group to group, with definable processing rules, you might well be able to benefit from business process automation.

• Read more about the workflow design features of our Optix Application Generator here.
• Read how the University of Maryland uses Optix Workflow to streamline their Student Admissions process: