What, When, Why, and How of Document-Centric Workflow
Key takeaways
- Document centric, human centric, and integration centric are the 3 main types of business process management approaches.
- The BPM approach chosen by the business is mainly based on the nature and scale of operations.
- Document centric workflows take inputs from multiple people and automatically create a document that is approved by multiple stakeholders.
- Email approval is predominantly followed in document centric BPMs.
- Automating the approval step in document centric BPM streamlines the process and accelerates approval of documents.
What is a Document Centric Workflow?
A document centric workflow is a business process management approach that is focused on managing documents required for business operations. The main aim of document centric BPM is to create a document after several inputs and approvals from multiple stakeholders. A document centric workflow aims to simplify the review and approval process of documents required by an organization. This blog explores document centric BPM, the need for a document centric workflow, and how to choose the right document centric BPM solution for your organization.
Table of Contents
BPM software aims at automating process management by integrating processes and technology. BPM techniques are based on continuous business improvement, but also enable ad-hoc actions. Processes can be long or short, the longer the process the greater the documentation and dependencies.
Different Business Process Management Approaches
Different types of BPM are practiced by organizations, based on the business type and scale. A good understanding of the types of BPM helps businesses to channelize their processes toward a clear goal and optimize their operations.
1) Document-centric BPM: This type of BPM is suitable for organizations where documents play a crucial role in business operations. The sole purpose of document-centric BPM is to create a document after several inputs and approvals from stakeholders. The most common use case is the creation of a contract or a legal document. A document goes through multiple stages and stakeholders before reaching the final stage. Document-centric workflows take inputs from multiple people and automatically create a document that is approved by everyone. Some examples of document-centric BPM are e-signatures, image processing, approval workflows, reviews, and automatic report compilations.
2) Human-Centric BPM: Business processes that require human intervention would require a human-centric BPM. This type of BPM balances human intervention and automation accurately. There is flexibility to manage tasks and create workflows between people. This type of BPM has a visual user interface that helps humans interact, understand, and take action to keep the process running. The best example of human-centric workflow is the hiring process in HR.
3) Integration-Centric BPM: Integration-centric BPM focuses on integrating organization-wide business software with department-specific solutions. Integrating business software with department solutions enables seamless data exchange between networks of tools. Manual entries are reduced and hence work is executed faster and more accurately. Sales marketing and finance workflows are examples of integration-centric workflows.
More About Document-centric BPM Workflows
As mentioned in the above section, document-centric workflows are aimed at creating a document based on multiple inputs from stakeholders. A contract or a legal document is created by a document-centric BPM. Before it reaches the final stage, a document goes through multiple stages involving multiple stakeholders. At the final stage of the document-centric BPM, a document is created and approved by everyone.
There is no need for a template when you have a document-centric BPM. Users need not worry if they have input the information in the right line of the document when they have this BPM. This BPM is predominantly used in procurement, contract management, accounting, and law. In all these types of businesses, there is a constant circulation of key documents.
Documents are approved through emails in a document-centric BPM. Emails are the most common way to initiate document approvals. Most document management tools come with simple workflow features to support document approval needs. In case the document management and workflow tool is not capable of handling complex workflows, a document-centric BPM would be highly effective.
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Need for a Document-Centric Workflow?
Using a document-centric workflow optimizes and improves business processes. It gives businesses a deeper understanding of the document flow that is used in the tasks. A document workflow provides a holistic visualization of the document flow and eliminates any bottlenecks in the task flow.
The most common activities that happen in a Document-centric workflow are:
- Scanning of images
- Document Review and Approval
- Transcription inscription documents for various systems
- Electronic-form filling
- Signature gathering
- Overview and reports
- Document-driven decision making
Although document-centric BPM is steeped in paperwork, it should not be used solely for documentation and approvals.
Choosing the Right Document-Centric BPM
Documents play a crucial role in any organization. The reliability and consistency of the document creation process have a direct bearing on the business performance. The document-centric tool must:
- Be able to design and model processes intuitively and effectively
- Issue automatic alerts and notifications to reviewers and approvers
- Provide real-time tracking of the document status
- Display document status on dashboards
- Ensure traceability, accessibility, and transparency of information flow within the workflow
Cflow is a no-code BPM that can automate key business processes within minutes. To know more about Cflow try it for free.
FAQs
Do all approval processes need document centric BPM?
Not necessarily. Processes that involve the creation, review, and approval of documents require document centric workflows.
Can document centric workflow be combined with Integration or Human centric BPM?
Yes, document centric BPM can be combined with other forms of BPM when the need arises in organizations.
Which type of business can benefit from document centric workflows?
Procurement, contract management, accounting, and law are some of the types of businesses that can use document centric workflows.
What should you do next?
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