Excel, WhatsApp, paper and email — when does a business process become too complicated?

A small company may operate effectively for years with a few spreadsheets and a clear agreement. There is no reason to introduce a system simply because paper looks old-fashioned or because a competitor has an app. Digitalisation creates value when it removes a genuine bottleneck: lost information, duplicate entry, unclear ownership or slow status visibility.

A useful test is a simple question: can the responsible person see what has been received, who is working on it, what is overdue, which document is missing and what is ready for invoicing without calling colleagues? If the answer depends on several private messages, folders and employees’ memories, the problem is no longer simply the choice of tool.

Consider a field service. A client sends a request by email. The appointment is arranged through WhatsApp. The details are entered in Excel, the field worker receives a paper work order, and the signed confirmation is photographed on a phone. The office then prepares a report manually and re-enters the amounts in the invoicing system.

Each individual step may work. The problem is the transition between steps. A changed appointment does not reach the spreadsheet, a photograph of the confirmation remains on a private phone, and the invoice is delayed because it is unclear whether the work order is complete. The administrative burden arises not from the volume of the service, but from constantly reconciling versions.

The clearest signal is not the number of employees, but the amount of checking required to obtain a routine answer. If a manager has to ask three people whether a job is complete, status is not built into the business process. If a document is searched for by client name across several folders, the documentation lacks shared context.

Another signal is dependence on one person who ‘knows where everything is’. That experience is valuable, but it should not be the only control mechanism. If that person is absent, a report, approval or invoicing may come to a halt even though all the underlying data has already been entered somewhere.

If an existing form is simply moved onto a screen while the rest of the business process remains unchanged, the company has gained a digital form, not necessarily a better way of working. The real question is what happens after submission: who receives the task, how the deadline is shown, where an exception is recorded, which document is produced, and when the data becomes ready for reporting or invoicing.

Digitalisation connects the workflow from the initial request to the final outcome. This may include the client, location, employee, work order, checklist, attachment, approval, report and financial step. Not everything needs to be solved at once, but each part should use shared data rather than create new copies.

The business process should be documented as it is actually performed, not as it is described in an old procedure. The starting point may be a client call, a scheduled inspection or an internal request. Then record every step, person, tool, document and decision through to completion. Pay particular attention to points where data is re-entered or waits for approval.

A useful discussion includes the people who perform the work, not management alone. Field staff know where the form slows the work down, office staff know what is missing from the report, and the finance team knows which data is late for the invoice. Their challenges show what the solution must connect.

Digitalisation does not take the same form in every company. A system for mandatory records, a field-service platform and a network of digital screens connect different people and data. What they have in common is that they replace a series of disconnected steps with one clearer workflow.

Attempting to digitise the entire company in one project often obscures priorities. It is better to choose a business process with a clear start and end, sufficient frequency and a visible problem. This could be a work order from request to confirmation, or a daily checklist from assignment to the review of exceptions.

If a business process involves only a small number of cases, one responsible person, a simple form and infrequent changes, a well-organised spreadsheet may be a sensible solution. Introducing a platform requires time for preparation, training and data maintenance, so the benefit should outweigh that commitment.

However, simplicity must be distinguished from apparent simplicity. A business process is not simple if one person spends hours every Friday combining data from messages, paper and email. That work may not be visible in the form itself, but it is often precisely where digitalisation can deliver the greatest operational value.

For an initial assessment, choose one real example and follow it from request to completion. Record who is involved, where data originates, how many times it is re-entered, which document is awaited and how completion is confirmed. This material is a better basis than a general wish for the company to ‘go digital’.

S-Consulting Group approaches digitalisation through specific business processes: HACCP records, pest control operations, screen management and bespoke solutions. The purpose of an introductory discussion is to determine what needs to be connected, what can remain as it is and which scope makes sense to address first.