We recently spoke with John Rymer, VP and principal analyst at Forrester, about why it’s more important than ever to automate business processes that are no longer “good enough.”
COVID’s arrival in early 2020 exposed a fatal flaw in business as usual: many companies with the potential to be fully remote were still relying on processes that required being in the same place or physical access to files. For instance, Rymer says, “Doctor’s offices that use electronic health records can still schedule appointments, update patient charts, etc., but those relying on paper records can’t. Even offices that use online scheduling or other software still can’t function if all the patient data is sitting at the office in binders.”
Scrambling to get employees functional in home offices, businesses quickly realized they had to fix or digitize critical processes to stay operational. Other companies needed to react swiftly to the healthcare crisis by developing technology to support logistics and operations.In both cases, low-code approaches helped businesses rise to the occasion, fast.
A sales activity tracking management app to improve remote work capabilities.
Sales teams thrive when operating shoulder-to-shoulder in the office. Being together on the sales floor generates camaraderie, energy, and momentum.
Receiving real-time feedback from managers and peers provides the help reps need to close deals. But when being together is impossible, how do you maintain that sense of momentum? How can you keep a pulse on what your reps are doing? How can you measure their activity, hold them accountable, and quickly report on organization-wide activity? In just a few days, Skuid partner, LeanCog built an activities tracking management app in Salesforce Lightning, using Skuid.
With high adoption by reps, the app is giving managers actionable insights to better lead their teams and more accurately report on sales activities. While agility is a must when reacting to new work requirements, you can’t simply build an app and expect users to show up. First, learn how to accommodate your colleagues’ workflows.
“Adoption is crucial to the success of a digital strategy,”Rymer says.
“The apps that I’ve seen getting quick adoption and intensive use are founded on careful research into the intended user’s work.”
By combining that research with a low-code tool’s quick app-building capabilities, you can iterate on user feedback fast and give your colleagues the experience they need to do their best work.No matter where you begin, low-code tooling can accelerate your efforts. Leveraging a business platform like Salesforce as the backend along with declarative app building will help you move at warp speed.
An app for COVID test tracking and tracing, built in a day.
As businesses struggled to adapt to a global pandemic, new logistics and operations priorities emerged, requiring technology to meet those challenges. Suddenly, medical equipment, health supplies, and employees with particular skills were in high demand. Companies like Chrysalis, which serves people with intellectual disabilities in their homes, needed the ability to track and trace COVID-19 tests, quarantines, and recoveries.
With low-code tools, Chrysalis built an emergency operation center app almost impossibly fast, in about a day. Similarly, any company that needs an employee health reporting app could build that quickly, too. In addition to surging healthcare needs, new government pandemic programs also materialized and evolved almost daily. Lenders scrambled to react to requirements for administering loans and adhere to changing program guidelines. Companies that were already using low-code platforms were able to meet these needs in days and weeks.
Are you doing everything you can to keep the lights on?
With revenue down and budgets disappearing, many businesses are closing or dramatically reducing operations. If you want to survive and thrive, you need to digitize now, and do it as efficiently as possible. Companies already using low-code platforms are doing just that.
Rymer says, “For the right use case, such as urgent new COVID-19 priorities, use cases with uncertain requirements, processes that change a lot, and projects that build on existing data foundations (e.g. CRM) a low-code approach is less risky and more effective than coding.”
With a low-code toolkit, you can meet these remote work and logistics challenges by building apps at significantly lower cost and speed than with traditional development. If you’re wondering how this technology could help you, see how John Rymer answers four critical questions that anyone considering a low- or no-code app dev tool should ask.
