Smile Train, a non-profit organization that provides support for children with cleft lips and palates, was facing challenges with its paper-based invoicing system. The manual process was slow and inefficient, making it difficult for the organization to ensure that invoices were paid on time. This was crucial for Smile Train as it works with a multitude of vendors to purchase everything from brochures and t-shirts to software and IT infrastructure support. The organization needed a solution that would improve communication, efficiency, and accuracy in its financial operations.

Owens Group, a renowned courier and transport service operating nationwide in the UK, was looking to digitally transform their ordering system and internal workflows for approving incoming invoices. They wanted to make common business processes easier and faster for employees, improve control and traceability, reduce dependence on paper documents, and improve the transparency of their processes. They also wanted to give employees easier access to documents and data, and needed to be able to see where orders were in the system at any given time, so that they could view, approve or cancel related documents digitally via laptops, phones and tablets. The goal was to increase efficiency in the procurement and finance departments.

KLEiN Umformtechnik, a leading sheet metal manufacturer in Europe, was facing challenges in managing its administrative processes. The company specializes in products with complex requirements that international competitors do not have the expertise to make. In addition to mass-produced components, KLEiN also supplies customers with highly specialized tools. About 75 percent of their business comes from the automotive industry. Renowned appliance manufacturers such as Miele and Vaillant are also part of their customer base. In 2018, the company's management team decided to modernize all of its administrative processes. An important goal for introducing the DMS was to support their distributed workforce at two locations 500 kilometers apart. The company needed a solution that could automate processes, reduce search times, and increase transparency.

Liftasud, a company specializing in the distribution and installation of heating, ventilating, and air conditioning systems, embarked on a digital transformation journey in 2018. The company aimed to become completely paperless and digitize all documents across all departments, including sales, accounting, purchasing, administration, and distribution. The project involved digitizing various types of documents such as customer and supplier invoices, quotations, customer inquiries and orders, invoice-related documents, contracts, and applications for vehicle registrations. The challenge was to implement a solution that could handle the digitization process efficiently and integrate seamlessly with their existing Sage X3 ERP system.

Megatiendas, a Colombian supermarket chain, was initially using DocuWare for document archiving. However, the company was facing challenges with the high volume of receipts. Invoices were not transmitted on time or were lost along the way, leading to payment delays, cash discount losses, and supplier problems. The process lacked transparency. A new Columbian law made electronic invoices mandatory, prompting the company to evaluate various document management systems.

Tui Ora, the largest community-based health and social services provider in the Taranaki region of New Zealand, was struggling with inefficient paper-based processes and complex SharePoint workflows. The organization's services are all referral-based, with initial patient information coming from various sources. However, the existing system was complex, expensive to maintain, and lacked visibility, preventing continuous improvement. The organization was under pressure to make every dollar count and find new ways to save time and money. The ICT team identified that improving the way processes and paperwork passed through the organization would be one way to increase efficiencies.

Abingdon & Witney College in Oxfordshire faced the challenge of managing a wide range of part and full-time courses delivered to 14,000 students across three main campuses and six satellite sites. The college's operations were hindered by a disjointed environment that undermined efficiency and visibility. The college relied heavily on paper-based processes to fill the gaps between its various systems, leading to delays and inefficiencies. The lack of deep integration meant that paperwork often went missing, and processes had to be restarted. The college sought to emulate the seamless integration found in the commercial sector, but the lack of an integrated operating system that manages Finance, HR, and Payroll made this difficult.

Grant Thornton, a rapidly growing professional services firm in Ireland, was facing inefficiencies due to paper-based processes that relied on printed forms, Excel spreadsheets, and intermittent email correspondence. The company was experiencing bottlenecks and general inefficiencies, particularly highlighted in their Job Appraisal process. At the end of a client assignment, trainees would fill in a form, print it off, and hand it over to their manager who would rate them on each task, before passing it over to an administrator to manually enter into an Excel spreadsheet. The firm’s attempts to integrate add-on applications to improve workflow with Microsoft SharePoint had been unsatisfactory.

Aon, one of the world’s largest insurance brokers, was looking for a tool to customize workflows, quickly and easily, replacing legacy processes with automated processes that save time and money. Different business units had their own way of recording and sharing information, usually a combination of Excel spreadsheets and paperwork, increasingly at odds with the IT department’s digital transformation strategy. They wanted a single data repository, a central location supporting highly automated processes that were transparent and auditable, ticking boxes around compliance, which is front and center in what an insurance company does.

McKinley Irvin, one of the largest divorce and family law firms in the US Northwest, was facing challenges with its paper-intensive processes. The firm was growing rapidly and needed a more efficient and cost-effective way to manage its processes. The firm's existing processes were slow and hard to track, diverting employees from focusing on clients. The firm was looking for an automation platform that could support office-type processes and replace manual tasks.

TOUCH Community Services, a non-profit organization based in Singapore, was struggling with inefficient manual processes for HR and finance forms. The forms were a mix of word documents, spreadsheets, and paperwork, and the approval process was time-consuming and depended on local and centrally-based managers. The organization has 300 employees across multiple locations, making the logistics of getting anything done quickly a challenge. For example, a training request process was done manually in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, making it difficult to track and not always up to date.

Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) is a globally operating institution that was awarded HEI status in 2013, which presented an opportunity to leverage the latest technologies and design its IT infrastructure from scratch. The decision was taken to become a cloud-first organization, building an environment on Microsoft cloud services, including Microsoft 365®, SharePoint Online®, Skype for Business® and Azure®. However, there was a need to introduce Digital Process Automation (DPA) solutions, replacing paper-based processes that were inefficient and made compliance a challenge. Several BPM products were trialled before LSTM came across FlowForma Process Automation. A successful workshop used real examples of existing workflow requirements, and convinced management and IT that they had found the missing piece.

Vestergaard, a global health company, was struggling with a complex contract lifecycle that spanned across multiple departments including finance, legal, compliance, and sales. The process was non-sequential and time-consuming, relying heavily on email communication. Documents were often duplicated and hard to locate, making it difficult to ensure all necessary actions were taken and all relevant parties were informed. This resulted in considerable delays and confusion in concluding contracts, and they were not always compliant with internal procedures.

Aberdeen Radiation Protection Services (ARPS) was facing challenges with its paper-based processes that were error-prone and inefficient. The company's 70 meters had to be recalibrated annually by a third-party to ensure they were compliant and fit for purpose. The process of tracking and bringing devices in for their yearly test was largely paper-based with a ring binder used for detailing what meter was on which rig. Scribbled notes were often added if a project was extended and it was easy to make mistakes. Worse still, meters that cost between £2,000 to £5,000 occasionally got lost. Excel® spreadsheets were shared by email with clients, but there was no central repository so up-to-date information was hard to find and access. This was becoming an issue and impacting on revenue. ARPS knew it needed to improve its processes and initially went looking for a document management system.

Eurofound, a Dublin-based European Union agency, was facing challenges with its internal HR review procedures due to significant EU changes to the way employers assess employees. The agency needed a Process Automation tool to support a HR team of six people and a workforce of 110. Compounding the need to meet new regulatory requirements were issues around the application Eurofound had been using for electronic forms. The InfoPath software was being discontinued, and its limited features struggled to deliver the workflow functionality that the agency was looking for. The agency was looking for a solution that could replace the ageing form-building application and meet the increasingly regulated HR procedures.

The customer is a large oil refinery in the UK, employing around 800 people and occupying nearly 1,900 acres. The size and complexity of the site presented many logistical challenges, especially for business processes around Health and Safety, HR and Finance. The company had been using Microsoft SharePoint® as a solution and had been migrating non-project documents into the repository for years. This brought to light hundreds of historic processes, particularly around Health and Safety and HR, that were very inefficient. They were almost always paper-based, depending on printed Microsoft Word® documents, spreadsheets and questionnaires. Typically, they would be handed around the site in face-to-face exchanges that could involve dozens of people. To improve and streamline workflows, they began looking for a business process tool that could supplement SharePoint, digitalize paper-based forms and bring new efficiencies to the business.

The client, a global pharmaceutical company, was facing significant challenges with their artwork management process. Artwork error was identified as the biggest reason for product recall in the pharmaceutical sector. Changes to artwork had to be approved by regulatory authorities within a finite amount of time, and the manufacturer was under pressure to meet different timescales in different countries. Prior to the implementation of FlowForma Process Automation, artwork was approved through numerous telephone calls and emails, typically involving up to 10 people across multiple countries. The process lacked clarity, timelines, alerts, and traceability, resulting in poor management and group oversight. With increasing industry spot checks and rigorous inspections, the client needed to gain control and visibility of the process.

Ergo, a four-time winner of Microsoft Partner of the Year Ireland, recognized the importance of building its own IP early on. In 2008, the company started building its own IP with a product called Fenergo. At that time, the company had a turnover of €20m and 140 staff. Today, Ergo is an IT Solution Provider with global reach, headquartered in Dublin with 400 employees and turning over €60m annually. It has been successful in spinning out two product companies, Fenergo and FlowForma. While working on a software development project in late 2012, Ergo recognized an opportunity to develop a new product from a solution it had created for a customer. Neil Young, Ergo’s Software Solutions Practice Lead at the time and now FlowForma Managing Director, approached the Ergo Board with a proposal to develop IP for a business process management tool that would work on the SharePoint platform.

With new directives in operation across the NHS designed to relate pay rises more closely to performance, the workloads on HR departments has increased significantly. Thousands of healthcare workers requiring individual performance appraisals create administrative challenges that can only be met through technology. Both hospitals were looking for a streamlined, online system that would make self-assessment possible. It had to be easy to use for a wide variety of individuals and it had to come in at a competitive price. With more than 10,000 users in each of the two hospitals, the cost issue loomed large. Previous processes linked to databases on legacy systems would incur per user license fees that simply made the investment – for what was fundamentally an administrative task – prohibitive.

Nipro Europe Group Companies (Nipro) is part of a global conglomerate led by Nipro Corporation Japan, that runs a wide-range of medical-related businesses, including medical device and pharmaceutical packaging divisions. Nipro’s regional headquarters in Belgium is responsible for a global footprint that spans Europe, Africa, the Americas and Russia. Departments like marketing and HR had a challenge when it came to sharing workflows across 26 different sites employing 3,500 people. Whether in paper form or as email attachments, there was much information shared – which inevitably ran the risk of documents getting lost or emails falling through the cracks. Even when Nipro went from paper to digital, each different site often had different approaches - an email could contain a spreadsheet, word document or PDF. A move to Microsoft 365 and SharePoint Online advanced the pursuit of standardized workflows, but there was still the need for a process automation tool, ideally a ‘no code’ solution that everybody could use, rather than an IT driven service.

Dresser Natural Gas Solutions, a leading provider of measurement, piping, and instrumentation solutions, was faced with the challenge of migrating legacy document processes that were key to the company’s engineering operations. The company had a brief window of time to set up its own IT systems after being divested from a larger group. The legacy IT platform required replacement and the company had only 4-6 months to deliver a new solution. The old processes were heavily coded and hard to change, which posed a significant challenge. The company needed a process automation tool that could be implemented quickly due to the time constraints.

Morgan Construction, an oilfield construction company, was facing challenges with their employee onboarding process. The company relied on a shared Microsoft Excel spreadsheet to manage and track the onboarding progress of employees. This method was time-consuming, susceptible to human error, and was no longer an efficient tool considering the volume of individuals that were being onboarded at a time. The spreadsheet could not show the team up-to-date reporting nor could it efficiently organize the 200+ employees tracked in the spreadsheet. The team needed a solution for providing timely and accurate reports to executives and client sites to ensure they were kept up-to-date on the status of when employees and contractors would be available for the next job.

Ergo, a leading cloud and IT managed service provider in Ireland, faced a challenge in onboarding new clients due to its diverse business units each having their own systems and methods of engagement. Sales, Finance, and the IT Service Management (ITSM) function each used different systems, leading to inconsistencies in the way contracted services were onboarded. This resulted in multiple versions of fundamental information such as contact phone numbers and potential ambiguity around services, commercials, and governance. The lack of a single source of truth risked impacting the customer experience and posed a potential obstacle to Ergo's growth.

Maverick Corporation, a full-service infrastructure engineering and construction company, was facing challenges with its paper-based processes and Excel for managing different types of work with different pay rates. The company's telecoms infrastructure division was working with up to 13 contractors on 5G network rollouts in Colorado and Michigan. The remote sites were not conducive to paper-based processes, leading to inevitable delays in processing paperwork. The company was looking for a digital solution to save time and money.

Sullivan Engineering, a New York-based civil engineering firm, was struggling to scale and meet market demand due to error-prone paper processes and process knowledge trapped in people’s heads. The company’s 60 full-time employees run and execute multiple construction contracts simultaneously, which was becoming increasingly difficult with their existing systems. The company spent three months searching for the best platform to digitize their processes and eventually chose FlowForma due to its no-code solution.

The Canadian oil and gas services company was in a transition phase and was looking for ways to scale without having to expand its workforce. The company was relying on manual processes involving Excel and email, which were neither scalable nor efficient. The company had to choose between hiring more people or looking to technology to reduce human error and provide a platform for growth. They chose the latter, prioritizing a solution that could automate processes and free up people’s time.

CVB, a joint venture of Costain, VINCI Construction Grands Projets and Bachy Soletanche, won the £605m tender to build the east section of the Thames Tideway Tunnel in London. The project was complex and multi-site, and the challenges were compounded by the impact of COVID-19. The over-dependency on paperwork was problematic on construction sites as physical forms could get lost or information could be recorded wrongly. With the added risk of carrying COVID-19, there was even more reason to look for a digital alternative. Compliance with building regulations was also more challenging with paper trails. A clearer view of processes would also make it easier to improve them.

The hospital, a large European healthcare institution, was facing challenges in maintaining high standards of clinical care within financial constraints. The IT team was tasked with enabling clinicians, nurses, and doctors to do their jobs more efficiently. A significant part of this was replacing inefficient paper-based processes. Forms generated at the point of patient care in one part of the hospital needed to be accessed by administration in another, leading to the risk of errors or lost paperwork. The IT team was passionate about digital transformation but was restricted by funding, forcing them to find ways to work around ageing IT systems that were too expensive to replace.

The international humanitarian aid agency faced challenges in maintaining internal communications due to the remote and often internet-limited areas where they operate. The agency relied heavily on email and Excel for document sharing, leading to issues with version control and transparency. The agency needed a solution that would provide a single version of a document in a process that everyone understood to be the definitive record. The implementation of Microsoft 365 and SharePoint provided a single document repository, but the agency needed business process software to improve workflows and retain document integrity.

The client, a leading global food producer, was using an old unsupported workflow system (Lotus Domino) for a variety of business processes that integrated with the company’s ERP system. The platform was nearing end of life and was no longer supported. When its parent company decided to migrate to the cloud with Microsoft 365, a new solution was needed to support workflow around a number of critical business processes, including Supplier Returns, Sample Requests and Product Change Requests. There were typically between 50 and 75 employees actively using one or other of the workflows on a regular basis across a wide range of departments, including finance, sales, production and purchasing. It was important that whatever replaced Lotus Domino was intuitive to use and capable of replicating tried-and-tested processes that were embedded in the business. A bonus would be a future-proof platform for further digital transformation.