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Today's economic environment is certainly a major challenge for faith-based organization to navigate and survive. Which direction do you move? What do you adjust to maintain the delivery of critical services with reduced revenue and funding? How do we provide for increasing demand for transparency and accountability, while seeking ways to both produce and to demonstrate successful outcomes?

Technology is changing many things in the world. For instance - the convergence of the web with transitional accounting systems is changing for the better with automated purchasing/payable workflow systems. These systems can save your sanity and business/organization. Think of a system that provides a sophisticated workflow engine with configurable rules, routing and approval functions.  You can control who gets to see the right information at the right time and ensure approvals are documented and timely.  Further, these new systems have an easy-to-use requisition or purchasing interface where documents are controlled through the workflow process.

I have seen many non-profit organization that think they are controlling spending by sending piles of supporting documents around to multiple approvers and cheque signatories. What is really happening is lost documents and approvers/signatories signing without understanding completely what they are signing off on. It is simply too much paper. Sometimes it is even worse in construction companies, where project managers are also involved, documents end up on the job site or are delayed because the managers are not back in the office for weeks at a time.

With an automated purchasing/payable workflow you can regain control, replace your manual invoice approval with a more paperless process. You will reduce your administration cost and ensure prompt payments with quicker approval of invoices. Further, you can find supporting documentation when you need it instead of searching through piles of documents and file cabinets.

We need to use technology when it makes sense. Automated purchasing/payable systems make sense. These systems enable organizations to tightly control & manage their spending. For all companies and especially for non-profits this is critical. The time has come to help save our sanity and seriously look at automating our purchasing/payable processes.