Why it's time to transform the way we process routine tasks

Kallik’s CEO Gurdip Singh, explains why he feels enterprise labelling creation, approvals, and distribution ought to be much more of an engineered process.

We all want to see core business process systems made more intuitive, convenient and user-centric. But in reality, most improvements in heavily-regulated industries, where inaccurate or non-compliant labelling is laden with risk, tend to be designed to meet regulatory or internal system needs as opposed to better serving the people who work with them.

However, if a nearby sector — global banking — can modernise its heavily-regulated processes, no facet of business operations in any enterprise, and in any market, should be seen as off limits for transformation. And the market won’t wait afterall; in 2020, the public is increasingly savvy and demanding with little patience for technology that doesn't work smoothly and efficiently.

Accustomed to smartphone, tablet and fast broadband/4G, all of us, in our business and personal lives, are used to being able to access the information and resources we need to complete tasks on demand, instantly. As soon as a new need or desire surfaces, like the current need to work from home en masse, we expect the technology to step up in order to satisfy it, essentially.

Enterprise business applications have lagged behind the curve here, though. However, if banks and insurers, with their historical addiction to forms and paper, can digitise their workflows into simple and intuitive mobile versions, then why not other complicated enterprise processes?

An urgent case in point is enterprise labelling.

Getting smart

The life sciences industry could benefit significantly from similar innovation. Both the financial services and life sciences industries are heavily regulated and traditionally conservative in their approach to technology change. Yet, at the same time, both face disruption, considerable competition, and pressure to deliver improved productivity, speed of turnaround, and cost efficiencies. Change is required.

One area that is apt for transformation, for a range of operational and compliance reasons, is global labelling management, with all its labour-intensive complexities. A move to create a co-ordinated, streamlined and automated set of processes that can be tracked and managed would be a huge boon.

From the label creation process, to labelling approvals and even distribution, including that of electronic/online information for patients, there is actually enormous potential to do things in more streamlined ways. If the life sciences sector is serious about delivering a more user-centric experience (not just superficially, but in team ability to execute duties more intuitively and easily), this could be a real game-changer for firms.

Will your users end up trying to work around your process?

The context here is that always available cloud and the convenience of mobile devices has made it far easier to be able to execute transactions away from the office, at any time of day, and from any location. User experience has been the true disrupter in this space, more so than even the always-available world. Analyst group Gartner recently predicted that, by 2023, 40% of white collar workers will run their business application experiences and capabilities in the same way as they run their music streaming services - seamlessly and on demand.

This trend might not be quite so straightforward in practice in a specialist area such as labelling management, nonetheless the trend suggests that companies need to make a greater effort to modernise the way tasks are carried out. Otherwise, there is also a risk that employees will be frustrated and find their own workarounds, which could disrupt internal processes around information management and process consistency. They might leave the company altogether, compounding already significant talent shortages. The urgency to alter user experiences through digital process innovation is a message that life sciences firms would do well to take notice of – in particular as it is within their control, and in their interest, to transform the way that hard-working teams process critical but routine tasks.

The good news is that with the right software and controls behind the scenes, app-driven labelling management could empower label creators, approvers and distributors, driving up the safety, quality, consistency and speed of all forms of market-facing information, in a way that matches how people instinctively work. Other benefits will soon also accrue naturally — from intelligently determining which mandatory elements need to appear on a label to how the impact of any changes of circumstance might cascade across global operations to being able to visualise finished output and assess exceptions and process approvals in real time.

The verdict’s clear: Life science leaders ought to make user-oriented improvements a priority in 2020. In this way, they will push boundaries, drive progress, and accelerate time to market. Being willing to view and act differently is the beginning of that process.