Streamlining the Business Process in NetSuite

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Lately, all I hear in the news is "Down grade in credit rating", "Recession" or "High unemployment rate". You most likely know them by heart by now. As a business, all these negative economic news would mean tightening the budget belt and trying to figure out where to cut cost.

If your company is using NetSuite or any other SaaS based CRM/ERP tool, this is a good time to revisit all the business processes you have implemented using the system.

I always like to say that tool itself will not save company money or enhance productivity. It's how you use the tool that will get you there. (Obvious point I am making....)

Types of business process I am referring to:

• Lead to Customer process.
• Drip email marketing process.
• Sales order processing.
• Billing process.
• Customer relation process.

List goes on... 

Here are some things to look for when you are revisiting your business processes.

• Process flow diagram:
  Have you created process diagram for each of your business processes used in the System? If you don't have it, you really need to create one. Directors and Project Managers can tell you everything about what the processes are but it's worth nothing when the system doesn't reflect them.
  
• Identify automation points within the process
  Use the tool to do the work for you. There are some steps in the process where human intervention is inevitable but there are overlooked steps that doesn't require it. Making sales calls to customers most likely will not be a good candidate for automation but starting a drip marketing campaign is.
  Here are something that I can think of to automate using NetSuite:
  - Auto generation of Sales Order, Proposals or Invoices
  - Conversion process
  - Record creation process
  - Ongoing billing process
  - Subscription renewal process
  - Daily accounting process
  
• Identify unnecessary or potentially new steps
  If you already have process diagrams for each of the business processes, revisiting them will give you a fresh look.
  
  For some departments or projects, business requirements change frequently. This will give you a chance to compare with current requirements and remove or add in steps you no longer need. This will better streamline the process.

Perhaps it's not your job to do this type of work. If you are NetSuite Admin or developer, does this SOUND like your job description? Probably not. But wouldn't you want your company to save money and keep providing the things you enjoy???