Six Benefits of Workflow Automation in Data Integration

A quote is associated with Bill Gates, ‘Automation applied to an efficient process can magnify its efficiency. And, automation applied to an inefficient process can magnify its inefficiency’.

Automation is all about:

• Getting more done
• With minimum resources
• And with least cost

In short, automation is a way of improving business efficiency and increasing business profits while decreasing costs. If done rightly, workflow automation is a valuable tool for any business.

Workflow Automation is the design, execution, and automation of processes based on workflow rules so that tasks, data, or files follow an automated route based on pre-defined business rules.

Workflow automation helps reduce and even eliminate the time that needs to be spent on repetitive processes. This means everyday work gets done faster, and employees spend more time on their primary tasks. Workflow automation can save thousands of hours every year in large enterprises.

By automating workflows, organizations can make significant improvements especially in tasks handled by employees. These include:

1. Fewer Errors & Complexities

Errors are evident. Even large organizations with sophisticated processes can’t escape errors. Most errors occur because of human negligence or mistakes. Since humans are crucial to working, these errors can be reduced by using workflow automation.

Workflow automation can create processes that reduce the chance of human error. These workflows include checks that ensure quality before the final work is delivered. 

1. Reduced Risks & Redundancies

A wrong sales pitch, a broken marketing funnel, or an error-prone product – all can lead to risks for the business. Clients can become unhappy, leads can get lost, or meetings with potential clients can go awry. Workflows ensure that such issues rarely occur. 

Most workflows include proper checks that allow humans to review the processes before they are automated. Moreover, automatic handling of these repetitive tasks ensures that employees spend more time improving business-critical skills and less on menial tasks that can be taken care of through automation.

1. Improved Transparency & Accountability

It is important to track all tasks so that efficiency can be measured. However, without having workflows, tracking tasks is not possible. In some cases, individuals are tracking their own performance and the tasks are not transparent to all. This can lead to problems during the employee evaluation period. 

Workflow automation systems allow easy monitoring of data for a wide range of projects. Managers can check at-a-glance about the various processes running behind the scenes and can point out any anomalies that exist.

1. Decrease Business Costs & Arrears

Workflow automation removes redundancy and employees can focus on activities that bring results. They become more productive and result oriented. Where two or more resources were working on a single project, by automating repetitive workflows, resources have more time to focus on projects that really matter. As a result, business overhead costs are decreased, and all employees put their efforts on growing the business bottom-lines.

1. Achieve Scalability & Business Growth

The best part about workflow automation is that it makes the organization completely scalable. Consider data integration. With the right team, companies can get insights about their businesses, but they all come at a cost – time and money.

With automation processes, they can get far better insights FASTER! They don’t have to spend money on hiring more ETL experts because data integration tools come pre-built with transformations that can prepare the data for business intelligence purposes.

1. Improves Strategic Planning

Workflow automation can help revamp business processes completely. By automating tasks and increasing data consolidation, it becomes easier to measure the progress of various departments within the organizations. C-level executives can make the right decisions by having a top-down view of the whole organization and observing how each department is progressing. They can easily check the top-performing products and those that are lagging. As a result, they can make the right data-driven decisions.

Final Word

Many workflow automation software exists to improve agility in any organization. But for automating workflows for a data integration project, the best software available in the market is Astera Centerprise Data Integrator. It offers all the tools one will need to automate data integration processes from data mapping, workflow scheduling, and job monitoring. Moreover, Astera Centerprise offers over 40+ connectors for integrating both modern and legacy applications to a data warehouse. Get it today at Astera.com.