A service coordinator enters the same information into two systems. A manager spends an afternoon combining spreadsheets for a routine report. A frontline employee finishes their visits, then returns to the office to complete records they could not update while working in the community.
Each task may feel like a normal part of the working week. Together, they raise a useful question for not-for-profit leaders: how much organisational capacity is being absorbed by the way technology and processes fit together?
The cost is not always visible in an IT budget. It appears in repeated administration, delayed decisions, additional checking and time spent helping colleagues navigate systems. It can also affect how quickly people receive services and how much attention employees can give to their work.
Understanding these pressures gives leaders a practical way to improve the use of existing resources. It starts with looking closely at where everyday work takes more effort than it should.
1. Look for administration that happens more than once
Some administration is essential. Accurate records, appropriate approvals and reliable reporting support accountable service delivery. The opportunity is to identify effort that adds little value to those requirements.
Consider what happens when a service request moves through your organisation. Does information flow into the next stage, or does someone retype it? Are staff maintaining separate records because different teams cannot access the same system? Does a routine report require someone to reconcile several versions of the same information?
Repeated handling creates more than a time burden. Each additional step introduces another opportunity for information to be missed, entered differently or left out of date.
Useful questions include:
- Where is the same information entered more than once?
- Which routine reports require substantial manual preparation?
- What do staff have to check or correct before information can be used?
- Are separate records meeting a clear need, or compensating for a process that no longer works well?
The answers may point to a better connection between systems, a simpler workflow or clearer agreement about where information should be recorded. They can also reveal situations where an existing feature is available but has never been configured or adopted.
2. Consider how long it takes to find reliable information
Having information stored somewhere does not necessarily make it useful. Employees need to find the right information, understand whether it is current and know whether they are authorised to use it.
Imagine a manager preparing for a service review. The relevant material might be spread across an application, shared folders, email attachments and a spreadsheet maintained by one colleague. Before making a decision, the manager needs to establish which figures are current and why different sources disagree.
Similar difficulties can affect people delivering services. Time spent locating the latest procedure, checking a client update or confirming who owns a request can delay the next action.
For leaders, the question is whether the organisation has clear, workable arrangements for managing information. Who owns each important record? Where should staff find the current version? How are changes communicated? Can authorised employees access what they need in the course of their work?
Clear ownership and consistent practices can make a substantial difference. Any improvement should also preserve appropriate access restrictions, particularly where sensitive client or organisational information is involved.
3. Follow the delays between teams
A process can work reasonably well within individual teams and still become slow when responsibility passes from one group to another.
An approval might remain in an inbox because nobody knows the usual approver is away. A service request might arrive without the information needed to progress it. Two teams might each assume the other is responsible for updating a record.
Technology can make these handovers easier to track, but the underlying responsibilities need to be clear. Automating an uncertain process may simply move the uncertainty into another system.
Choose a recurring activity and follow it across the organisation. Look at who initiates it, what information is required, who makes the next decision and how everyone knows it has progressed.
Ask:
- Where does work regularly wait for a response?
- Can staff see who is responsible for the next step?
- Are approval requirements proportionate to the decision?
- What happens when the usual person is unavailable?
- How often is work sent back because something is missing?
This can reveal improvements that require little new technology. A clearer request form, an agreed responsibility or a visible status may remove repeated follow-up and help work move more predictably.
4. Make the effort behind workarounds visible
Capable employees often find ways to keep services moving when systems are awkward. They build spreadsheets, maintain personal checklists, remind colleagues about outstanding actions and use experience to spot errors.
That effort can be valuable. It can also conceal how much a process depends on particular people.
A monthly report may arrive on time because someone spends hours fixing the underlying data. A team may coordinate services successfully because one employee remembers information that is difficult to find anywhere else. From a leadership perspective, the outcome looks reliable while the effort required remains largely unseen.
A useful question is: what has to happen behind the scenes to make this process work?
Invite staff to explain where they compensate for difficulties and what would happen if the person who usually handles those difficulties were unavailable. Approach these conversations with curiosity. Employees should feel comfortable describing the reality of their work.
Bring operational staff and IT into the discussion together. The people using a process can explain its practical demands, while IT can help assess whether the difficulty comes from configuration, access, integration, training or the application itself.
5. Choose an improvement with a clear service benefit
Once everyday difficulties become visible, there may be more opportunities than the organisation can address immediately. Start with a manageable problem whose impact is understood.
Consider how frequently the task occurs, how many people it affects and what happens when it is delayed or completed incorrectly. A small inconvenience experienced occasionally may deserve less attention than a recurring issue that holds up service coordination or produces unreliable records.
Describe the desired outcome before choosing a solution. For example:
- Staff can complete service records without re-entering information later.
- Managers can prepare a routine report with less manual reconciliation.
- Requests reach the right person with the information needed to act.
- Employees can locate an approved procedure without asking several colleagues.
These outcomes make it easier to compare possible changes. The best response might involve simplifying a process, improving training, configuring an existing application or connecting systems. A new platform should be considered against the same practical requirements.
Test the change with the people who perform the work. Include any additional effort it creates elsewhere, such as administration, support or checking. An improvement should reduce the overall burden rather than transfer it to another team.
Understand what time saved is worth
Reducing avoidable work can create valuable capacity, but time saved does not automatically become a cash saving. A task that takes less time may allow staff to update records sooner, respond more promptly, reduce overtime or give greater attention to complex work.
Those outcomes can be meaningful for a not-for-profit. They deserve to be described clearly rather than converted into an assumed financial return.
Before making a change, agree on what success would look like. Depending on the task, that might mean fewer corrections, shorter turnaround times, more timely records or fewer requests for help.
Where the expected benefit is additional capacity, consider how it will be used. Several minutes saved across many small tasks may improve the working day, while a larger block of time could allow a team to take on a specific activity. The distinction matters when setting expectations.
Start with one recurring task
A practical first step is to ask two or three teams which recurring administrative task takes more effort than it should. Choose one example and trace it from beginning to end, including the systems, people, approvals and workarounds involved.
Agree on a small improvement, identify who will own it and decide how you will assess the result. Involve IT early enough to understand the options and any consequences for information security, support or other systems.
This gives leaders a grounded view of where technology and processes affect everyday capacity. It also gives employees a way to contribute improvements based on the work they know best.
For a not-for-profit, staff time is a resource that deserves the same thoughtful attention as other organisational investments. Reducing avoidable effort can help people maintain accurate information, coordinate services more effectively and give greater attention to the work your organisation exists to do.
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