Three top priorities of companies today
Among many compelling findings, the study found that the most resilient, future-ready firms report significantly lower innovation barriers regarding new technology adoption and “letting go of the status quo.” This would, for example, make it faster and easier to innovate and adopt process changes needed to support new business models, respond to disruptions, meet new customer demands, and more.
Resilient, future-ready companies with higher revenue growth also create more positive process changes – for example, in areas such as scenario planning, data sharing, collaborating with customers and partners, and improving employee experiences. This is being done in part by greater investments in automation. The study found that companies confident in their resilience are more likely to invest in automation to improve business processes (43% of leading organizations versus 37% of the lowest-performing companies) over the next 12 months.
They also have a higher probability to plan process changes with objectives such as:
- Improving customer experiences (52% versus 41%)
- Improving employee experiences (45% versus 37%)
- Increasing process efficiency (47% versus 37%)
This suggests that future-ready, resilient companies are more willing to invest in improving their business processes as a way to achieve important business goals such as increasing customer satisfaction and boosting efficiency.
The study also found that the most future-proof companies have a stronger disposition toward improving processes and decision-making by deploying intelligent technologies (51% top quartile versus 41% bottom quartile). When it comes to technology improvements, when looking into all survey participants, 46% consider intelligent technologies as a top driver for growth. Further, the most future-proof companies have a stronger disposition towards using them than those less future-ready.
In addition, the findings revealed that data accessibility – which is enabled by investments in new data technologies and solutions – plays a key role in building resiliency and future readiness. As shown in the figure, companies that demonstrate the strongest data accessibility are well on their way to possessing higher levels of responsiveness and future-ready proficiencies.
Innovating business processes: The path to resilience and future-readiness
Lowering innovation barriers. Proactively creating positive process changes by investing in process automation and intelligent technologies to achieve business goals. Harnessing data more effectively to drive better decisions and customer and employee experiences. These are just a few of the things that the most resilient, future-ready companies do differently – and they all share one common thread: they all touch your business processes. Because when you can continuously adapt, improve, automate, and innovate more intelligent business processes with speed and confidence, you can change how your business runs as needed. You can respond to disruptions and opportunities with speed and excellence. Your business is resilient and ready to adapt and respond to whatever the future brings.
Want to learn more about how to make your business more resilient and future-proof – and how to bring discipline, data-driven insights, and collaboration to continuous process transformation? Download the new paper from SAP, “Resilient, Future-Proof Businesses Are Process Centric: Key Insights from the SAP Insights Research Center.”