No matter the type of business you're in, managing workflows is key to success. But bottlenecks will inevitably slow your business, reduce your productivity and cost your company money. Spotting these bottlenecks and addressing them with the right tool will make processes run smoother, improve the performance of your team, and achieve your goals more often. Here are five common workflow bottlenecks and how to solve them with workflow management tools: 

  1. Poor Task Visibility 

One of the most common workflow bottlenecks is the lack of visibility on what teams need to do and when. If teams don't know when to expect work or what will be asked of them, delays are almost guaranteed. Another cause of this is a reliance on old tools of communication such as emails or spoken words. 

Solution: A workflow management tool such as Aproove provides visibility into not only tasks and deadlines but also the entire timeline of a project. Team members can log into these dashboards and see who's responsible for what and when. 

  1. Inefficient Communication 

These gaps can lead to miscommunication, confusion and errors, and slow down the process. Communicating gaps can happen when people don't receive messages, when instructions are unclear, or when there are too many conduits of communication. 

Solution: Software such as Aproove enables live and asynchronous communication within and across teams. By providing a single place for messages and tying into workflow systems, these tools ensure that questions, status updates and other communications within teams can happen in real time. 

  1. Manual Data Entry

Manually entering data is a time-consuming process that has a high possibility of errors, and it can lead to bottlenecks in the workflow. It is inefficient to use a legacy system for data input and tracking, since data entry errors can delay both the data input and the workflow. 

Solution: Automation tools can save time and prevent mistakes from data entry. These create a chain of events across several platforms by automating additional steps. 

  1. Unclear Accountability

If no one is supervising a task, it can become a forgotten one. If people don't know who's accountable for a given piece of work, it can get delayed, perhaps leading to a missed deadline. 

Solution: With workflow management tools, there is no ambiguity about who is responsible for what. Tasks can be assigned in Aproove to keep everyone on track so nothing gets missed. 

  1. Resource Allocation Issues

Allocating too many or too few resources often creates bottlenecks, with some teams drowning in work and others starved of it. 

Solution: Work management software is highly useful because it gives the status of resource utilization that teams can use to assign resources in proportion to their current level of engagement and project needs. 

Workflow management tools such as Aproove can help you to set up a system that works for your marketing team, and swiftly eliminate any bottlenecks that slow you down!