If spreadsheets and shoe boxes are the nemesis of accounting software, so flowcharts, Word and “trust me” are the mortal enemy of process mapping software…
Auckland-based software company Promapp, launched in 2002, has built a solid Australia/New Zealand customer base of 300 organisations for its cloud software that provides in-field support for workers in a range of sectors.
Founder and CEO Ivan Seselj, said that the system can be set up to act as an “online guide” for employees, stepping them through best practice related to a particular process. But he acknowledged that 300 organisations was only a tiny fraction of the potential user base for the product, saying that most organisations still tended to cling to flowcharts in Word documents to steer staff.
“They are squandering an opportunity for competitive advantage,” he said.
Unlike workflow software which was deployed to automate a process, he said process mapping systems were designed to support human processes. “This is bread and butter know-how that we might previously have left to someone saying ‘trust me’.”
Promapp allowed enterprises to crystallise in software the best way to perform a process, and then make that stepped approach available via the cloud and mobile devices to workers going about their daily tasks.
Used by A/NZ blue chips including Coca Cola Amatil, which provides workers on the factory floor with access to the system via tablet computers, and McDonalds in New Zealand, the system has also been deployed by more than 50 councils in Australia and New Zealand. Councils have also worked with Promapp to create a library of 1000-plus work processes that are freely available for other councils to use.
Promapp is considering how it can extend the concept of process libraries to other sectors. At present companies are provided coaching by Promapp then largely left to design their own work process maps.
Seselj said that the major benefits of the tool were consistency and efficiency – even for complex processes which can be broken into a stepped process. Promapp can also be integrated with product guides, for, say, service applications so that workers are stepped through a process – but also provided access to additional technical information needed to complete a task.
While many of the users of the system are large companies, the subscription nature of the product means that it can also be used by smaller outfits. Seselj said that monthly use fees ranged from hundreds to thousands of dollars a month depending on the number of users.
