Are you a digitally aware organization? 

Then perhaps you agree that it’s better to start the digitalization process with something that delivers value here and now — rather than wait for something that might (hopefully) yield large value in several years. But what really gives immediate value? And how do you begin the digital journey in your organization?

Here are 6 tips to help you on the path to automated case processing:

1. Don’t leap — take small steps in the right direction

By starting small, you achieve gains all along the way until you are ready to automate.

Many, however, want to immediately digitize and automate entire business processes. Ideally, everything should have been digital yesterday — and preferably all processes at once.

Does that sound familiar? Then you also know that in practice, this is often hard to pull off. And there are good reasons for it. In almost all cases, it is because of one of these two challenges:

1. How do you build digital processes when the digital data basis is not available — or trustworthy?
2. How do you build automatic processes when there are no established digital rules for making automatic decisions?

2. Use the opportunities as motivation

If you can’t immediately answer the questions above, it’s easy to get discouraged. But it is important to see the opportunities — not the obstacles. The digital gains may very well be just around the corner, and so it’s important to dare to take the first step.

It’s about being proactive — seeing the opportunities before they become necessities. With a solid digital foundation, you and your organization will be better equipped to implement advanced technologies and leverage the full potential that future automation brings.

So where should you begin the journey?

The starting line is found under tip number 3 👇🏻

3.  Start with data capture

By beginning with structured data capture, you lay the foundation for a more agile and efficient organization in the years ahead.

In other words: start the digitalization process by getting full control over data capture in your organization. 

That way, you get the information structured immediately and have it stored for later use — ready when both the organization and the process are ready to take the next step in digitalization.

4. Reuse the data

Once you have captured the data, you can reuse it to improve other services. But why is that so important?

Sharing and reusing data is crucial for offering seamless services. This way, users do not have to repeat information about themselves that the public sector (or your organization) already knows.

Data reuse thus contributes to:

• Value creation
• Increased efficiency
• Coherent services

5. Make necessary changes to the way you work

A business process before it is digitized is not the same as after. We call this a digital transformation.

This is an important point because it tells us that a business process is not static — it changes over time. There are several factors that affect these changes, for example a need to become more efficient, or changes in the environment.

It is therefore absolutely crucial that you are adaptive, and willing to change the way you work — both in terms of the systems used and the people involved.

If your data basis is not good enough, the risk of failing to maintain your business processes over time increases. You may easily revert to old routines.

A weak data basis may stem from:

1. Poor quality
2. Lack of necessary rules to make decisions

Therefore, pay special attention to these points when working on data collection so that you continue to move step by step in the right direction — and do not end up walking backwards.

6. Force unstructured data to become structured

Some organizations want to use AI to structure unstructured information, such as emails and letters. It will often be cheaper and easier to eliminate email as a channel and instead offer digital forms. Then you get structured data immediately and can use AI on other, more demanding tasks!

The tips in this article tell you how to get started with structured data capture. But you may wonder: why is this so important?

Why should you always start with structured data capture?

The purpose of capturing and structuring data is to ensure sufficiently good data quality so that you can carry out automatic processes without requiring manual registration.

In some cases, where the data foundation in systems contains gaps, some choose to:

1. Launch expensive projects to improve system data quality.
2. Use AI to interpret the data and enhance it along the way.

This is not always the best solution, because you may risk that interpreting the data takes too long, and becomes too costly.

Are you still updating your data foundation manually?

Then you should begin structured data capture immediately — in order to take the step toward digital and automatic processes. By capturing, structuring, and handing over the information to your systems from the outset, the quality improves immediately.

We have good examples of customers who started updating their domain systems by using form tools. Then they expanded with new digital and automated services because they saw they could trust the data.

Never forget: the future belongs to the proactive!

The small steps you take today may be what ensures your success tomorrow. Good luck!