Using a Low-Code Platform to Manage Business Processes

What is a Low-Code Platform? A low-code platform is a software tool that lets you create applications with minimal coding. Instead of writing complex code, users can use simple drag-and-drop features, visual interfaces, and pre-built templates to build apps quickly. Low-code platforms are great for businesses because they allow people without advanced programming skills to create, modify, or improve software. This makes it faster and easier to develop solutions that fit specific needs while saving time and reducing costs. Challenges Related to ERP Systems At Novacura, we have over 15 years of experience in implementing and enhancing various ERP systems, leveraging our low-code integration platform. Throughout our work, we’ve noticed that regardless of the ERP system a company utilizes, there are common challenges that many organizations encounter. In this article, we summarize the key challenges related to ERP systems that our customers often face. Complexity for Users ERP systems are advanced and encompass numerous modules that provide hundreds of capabilities. However, they also introduce a degree of complexity, which can present challenges with ERP implementation. The wide range of available functions gives users flexibility but does not guide them in following the correct path to accomplish their tasks. As a result, seemingly simple tasks (such as creating a new customer in the system) may require several additional steps to be completed by the user before they can finalize the task. Users must be aware of these additional steps; otherwise, they will be unable to complete their work successfully. Limited Integration Capabilities Complexity is not the only drawback of ERP solutions. These platforms are primarily designed to serve as central points within the IT landscape. Other applications need to integrate with ERP solutions to communicate effectively. However, ERP systems typically do not provide ready-to-use connectors for third-party software. Instead, they offer APIs, leaving the integration to the other applications. As a result, connecting an ERP solution with a new third-party tool is not straightforward; customers cannot simply select a connector from the ERP marketplace, establish a connection, and start using it. Limited Customization Another issue with ERP systems is that they are designed for multiple companies across different industries within the same version. Although they offer a wide range of configuration parameters, they cannot be perfectly tailored to the specific needs of each organization. This creates a gap between the actual processes within a company and the fragmented processes supported by the ERP system. As a result, employees often resort to workarounds and begin operating outside the ERP by using Excel sheets, emails, and paper documents. Expensive Modifications To address the issue of relatively limited customizations, ERP vendors allow customers to create modifications to the software. However, these modifications often lead to complications and contribute to ERP implementation challenges. Since they are not separate from the ERP core, the entire architecture becomes more complex, making it difficult to identify and track all modifications. This is especially crucial during upgrades, as all altered components of the previous ERP version must be identified, documented, and typically rewritten in the new version. Mobility Modern ERP solutions, such […]

Most companies, even the most digital ones, have a paper trail embedded in their processes. These pieces of paper can be used in the field by technicians, in the back office, or even at the administrative desks. A large amount of time goes into preparing templates, printing documents, filling in forms, all just to have someone type them back into the system of record – if one exists. We’ve talked to the Director of Product Management Labs at Novacura, Paul Phillips, about his experiences and problems and potential solutions such as Form Recognizer, related to this type of work – relevant for all companies who utilize paper-based processes. Problem Paper trails are cumbersome, costly, and prone to errors no matter which person is executing the work. I’ve seen Job Safety Analysis forms in the field where the same form duplicated for the same job dozens of times. Instead of growing on the knowledge of the field technicians, each time the same job was performed, a brand new JSA was filled out causing loss in efficiency. Another example of this is during the pandemic, COVID vaccinations are required, I’ve seen back-office administration taking days-weeks documenting vaccination records of employees. This manual job can result in: Loss in efficiency Increased cost Poor data in the system of record (“fat finger” of data)   All these processes could be digitally transformed to significantly streamline the process. But digitizing a document to enter in a computer screen isn’t the only way to do it. Why does this problem exist? The quickest way to get any new process in place that requires documentation is to have a user fill out a form. The quickest way to get the form out to all the employees is to create a template in Word or Excel and have everyone print out paper copies. It is typically more time-consuming to digitize the process, but as we know this will streamline the data capture downstream. We often try to standardize a process through a document but don’t always take into consideration the amount of data we lose as an implication of not considering the data entry part of every process. How can we measure the problem? The best way to measure the problem is to describe an example and Paul describes: “In one of my old companies, we had just gone live with an ERP system, and we were trying to convert Standard operating procedures (SOPs) to Standard Jobs in our ERP system. To do this, we hired a temporary data admin to help us get the paper processes into a digital system. We brought this person on for 3 months and ended up hiring them full-time to key information in from paper to the ERP because of how time-consuming it was. Arguably we could’ve hired 2 more people to get it done quicker but it wasn’t in the budget. What came out of the process wasn’t the highest quality – due to the admins’ lack of process knowledge, came at a higher-than-expected cost and also had errors – as expected for any person who enters data all day long. At that […]

To be user-friendly today often means “to understand how it works without reading the manual”. But even if you understand how to use it, there might be a better way. This is the case for many of our customers when it comes to using their ERP systems, including those who use our BPM low-code platform, Novacura Flow.  The reason? – It works well enough, but most companies can get more value out of their ERP, MES and other business systems. At Novacura we want to train companies to get the most value out of their systems to create smooth and efficient business processes. Therefore we’ve put together a dedicated customer success team to challenge customers to improve their business processes. The importance of a customer success team A customer success team is important to engage in customer relations where it’s possible to share the vision to keep improving. Every company needs to help its customers succeed. By having a dedicated customer success department, we just make this strive clear to not only our customers but also our employees. It’s more than just supporting customers.  What’s the difference between Customer Success and support? Customer Success for me differs from support in the way that we are less reactive and more proactive. We challenge the customer into thinking about how they can improve, not just solve the problem at hand. At customer success, we see the customer’s problems as opportunities. We just love problems! Aron Igelström Novacura, Team Leader – Customer Success The customer success team of Novacura The team members have skills and experience in multiple areas, stretching from support and customer relations all the way deep down the product codebase. What’s it all about? For the Customer Success Team at Novacura it’s about enabling customers to utilize our product Novacura Flow and their other solutions in the best possible way. Why are we doing this? The main goal for the team is to improve the customer experience not only when it comes to our ability to propose solutions for our customer’s business needs and solving issues that need a broader skillset, but also by working proactively: Improving the quality of our internal processes and level of expertise. We will not only try to answer our customers’ questions, but we will also try to challenge their ideas to make them more successful and profitable. Aron Igelström Novacura, Team Leader – Customer Success What’s the benefit for Novacura customers? The customers will notice the work being done by the team in many different ways such as improved customer support and training materials. Most importantly, it will be noticed that when you reach out to Novacura for help with your challenges and questions, you can rely on us going that extra mile to come up with the best possible solution for your case. The interactions with Novacura will in a sense feel more like interacting with a smaller company than Novacura is, in a good way. The team will ensure that customers are realizing the true potential and value of using Novacura Flow. By connecting the inner workings of the company (from customer support, consulting and R&D), the customer will notice that we respond faster and more accurately to their questions. It will be apparent that Novacura knows that they succeed when their customers succeed. […]

If your company uses IFS Applications and has made—or plans on making—modifications directly to IFS, this article is a must-read. Custom modifications are often necessary to meet the unique requirements of each business. However, any changes made directly to IFS can quickly become a costly and time-consuming endeavor, especially when upgrading to the latest version, like IFS Cloud*. In most cases, companies will need highly skilled professionals to identify changes from one version to the next and then reimplement the modifications from scratch. In this article, we will summarize upgrade challenges that companies often face when making modifications directly to IFS, along with how you can eliminate those them with a low-code platform. *In our previous article, “Is it the right time to upgrade to IFS Cloud”, we present some pros and cons regarding the upgrade to IFS Cloud. We show why an upgrade to IFS Cloud is worth considering as well as how to approach it the right way. Challenge: ERP modifications make upgrades more time-consuming and complex When it’s time for a company to prepare for an ERP upgrade (and IFS Applications isn’t specific here!), there are a lot of challenges that need to be managed before you can start the upgrade. One of the more common challenges to address is how to handle custom modifications. A company has to: Identify all modifications (which might be problematic itself). Analyze and understand how current modifications work. Decide which modifications to keep (is the modification still used by our company?). Map modifications to the features available in the new ERP version (something that was missing in the past and was bypassed by a modification to the previous ERP version, might be available as a standard feature in the new ERP). Reimplement the modifications which is not a simple task since it requires highly skilled resources and a lot of testing (be mindful that changes can also impact other areas within the ERP system). In short: upgrades are complicated. There is a need for highly skilled resources, it takes time, and it can cost a lot! Many companies delay how often they upgrade because the process is so complex. However, not keeping up with recent releases can also compound the issue since it requires a bigger leap to upgrade to the latest version. The importance of upgrades with IFS Cloud IFS encourages companies to upgrade more often to take advantage of the latest and greatest version. With IFS Cloud, IFS promises to release upgrades at least two times a year. While this can make it easier, since you won’t have as big of a jump between versions, you will still need to repeat the upgrade routine often. Solution: Use a low-code platform to handle modifications outside of your ERP system Long before an upgrade project starts, you must make a fundamental change to your ERP customization strategy to avoid some of the upgrade challenges mentioned above. Our recommendation (based on our experience and proven by multiple implementations) is to manage modifications outside your ERP system by implementing them externally. We recommend using a low-code platform to create […]