How the Right Workflow Automation Improved Visibility and Efficiency
How the Right Workflow Automation Improved Visibility and Efficiency
A global enterprise processing hundreds of reports and reconciliations per month relied on manual approval workflows, which created significant inefficiencies and limited visibility. Through Denova’s Colleague-as-a-Service (CLaaS) model, an embedded business intelligence (BI) and automation consultant worked with finance stakeholders to rebuild the approval process completely.
The outcome was more than a scalable system. It transformed how the organisation manages month end approvals across its global operations
The Gaps in the Process
The organisation’s finance teams managed multiple financial reports across global entities every month, each requiring approvals based on location, entity and hierarchy. However, the underlying process lacked the structure needed to manage this complexity.
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- Manual Approval Management: Financial reports were submitted for review via email. For organisations managing dozens or hundreds of entities, this meant hundreds of approval emails sent every month with no centralised tracking.
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- Lack of Visibility and Audit Logs: Teams had limited visibility into who approved documents, when approvals occurred or where they sat in the approval process. This created confusion around ownership and made it difficult to track compliance.
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- Complex Approval Structures Across Entities: Financial reports often require multiple levels of review. Without an automated approval framework, managing these variations manually introduced delays, inconsistencies and a higher risk of error.
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- Broken Existing Workflows: What little automation that did exist was not functioning as intended, causing approval requests to stall for weeks and highlighting the need for a more stable and scalable approach.
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Automating the Approval Flow
Denova deployed an embedded BI and automation consultant who worked directly with finance and process stakeholders to redesign the approval flows in Power Automate and Power BI from the ground up.
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- Clarifying Process: With no documentation to rely on, the priority was structured stakeholder engagement — this process meant clarifying process maps, approval scenarios and entity-level differences before development began.
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- Designing an Approval Matrix: An approval matrix was introduced to automatically route documents to the correct approver based on entity. This matrix reduced human error and made the system easy to maintain.
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- Building a Centralised Report: To address visibility gaps, an approval tracking system was created. A Power BI dashboard was also introduced to monitor document status and key performance indicators related to approvals.
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- Embedding Data Governance: Role-based access controls were built into the Power BI report, securing that stakeholders only saw data relevant to their scope, in line with data security requirements.
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- Future-proofing and Documentation: Documentation and user guidance were created so stakeholders could maintain the system independently. Workflows were configured using a service account, ensuring the automation would continue running even if admins changed.
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The Colleague Behind the Work
Ryan acted as both Business Analyst and Data and Automation Developer, working directly with stakeholders and managing the full project lifecycle. Each workflow went through defined stages: process familiarisation, proposal, feasibility check, development, deployment, demo and documentation. Change requests were tracked and communicated, keeping stakeholders aligned.
Where technical constraints existed within the client’s environment, solutions were engineered around them without compromising the quality of the outcome.
“When developing a system, make sure to build a future-proof and scalable solution that will benefit the business in the long run.”
— Ryan, BI Consultant, Denova
Results of Automating the Process
44% Increase in Approval Rate
Balance sheet approval rates rose from an average of 20.71% to 65% following implementation, a 44% increase that directly reflected the quick adoption from manual email approvals to a structured, automated process.
Complete Documents Visibility
For the first time, the organisation could see the status, approver and logs of the approval. The Power BI dashboard consolidated these into a single view, including KPI tracking for on-time submissions and approval rates by entity.
Reduced Administrative Load
What previously required manual work for hundreds of approval emails was replaced by automated, structured notifications through Microsoft Teams and Outlook, freeing up significant time for finance stakeholders.
Approval Routing Fully Automated
The approval matrix removed the need for requestors to manually select approvers. When an approver changes, the matrix can be updated by the stakeholder immediately without relying on the developer.
Nine workflows are now live. All are documented and built on a service account, designed to be maintained by the client team without reliance on external support.
Lessons for Smarter Automation
Automation only works when process logic is sound
The approval matrix was the critical design decision. Without resolving the underlying routing logic, no amount of technical automation would have delivered consistent compliance outcomes.
Rebuilding from scratch is sometimes the right call
When existing infrastructure is too flawed to salvage, starting fresh with a clear process foundation delivers more reliable and scalable results than incremental fixes.
Future proofing protects long term investment
Solutions built without clear documentation, defined ownership or continuity planning create fragility over time. Designing for maintainability and continuity from the start protects the client’s investment well beyond the engagement.
User adoption is a design decision
The high rate of immediate system adoption was not accidental. A straightforward interface, clear usage guidance and professional notifications all contributed to how quickly the team embraced the new process.
HOW WE CAN HELP
If your organisation is looking to improve automation or governance in critical business workflows, Colleague-as-a-Service (CLaaS) may help strengthen your processes.
If that sounds interesting, it might be worth a conversation about what embedded expertise could look like for your organisation.
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