KanBo deep integration with IT and business systems

Every system your company utilizes has its own unique language and integrations act as the translator between these different systems to bring them all together.

As different systems deal with different kinds of operations and data, it is necessary to bring all their knowledge in one place to reap the maximum benefits. This is where IT integrations come into play. System integration solutions are utilized to boost the flow of information and improve business operations.

As the world becomes more and more connected, our systems also need to be more centralized to build better workflows and streamline operations. When it comes to data analytics and business intelligence, integrated systems reap much better insights to make your business competitive. Businesses need to approach system integration with a smart strategy that is simple yet effective.

The question isn’t whether to adopt system integration, the question is how soon can you do it?

What is the importance of the integration of systems in large companies?

Modern businesses rely heavily on the flow of information that is handled by multiple systems. System integration brings together all the different sub-systems, ensuring that everything works together harmoniously. Through integration, businesses can boost productivity, efficiency, and ensure accurate data analysis. Here are some reasons why system integration is important for large companies:

• Facilitates communication between distributed systems.
• Makes it easier to overcome software and hardware challenges through connectivity.
• Integration can accelerate information flows.
• Minimizes operational costs.
• Boosts productivity and improves the quality of business operations(Learn how KanBo ensures deep integration here).

What are the benefits of system integration for an organization?

Accelerates Flow of Information

Multiple systems used in your organizations may be using the same information. This can create a lot of redundancy as you enter the same data in multiple systems, wasting time and money. Integrating systems allows information to be available more quickly, resulting in faster decisions.

Maintains Consistency

Integration ensures that the available information is updated in every system without having to manually update it one by one. This maintains the consistency of information without the hassle.

More Cost-Efficient and Effective

System integrations allow you to save money on creating an entirely new system from scratch.

Unlocks new Insights

Organizations can utilize business intelligence systems to combine data from multiple systems to give you a bird’s eye view of our organization. This can unlock new insights that can help make informed decisions and give you an edge over competitors.

What is the role of the ERP system in system integration?

ERP stands for Enterprise Resource Planning, a high-end software solution that streamlines and integrates business operations, processes, and data flow. From machinery and money to workforce and material, all the resources of an organization can synergize under ERP software. The role of an ERP system is to unify all data and processes in an organization. The main ERP tools available are related to finance, manufacturing, and human resources. ERP provides all the benefits of system integration including increased productivity, data analytics, and insights, boost incoordination, and improved business processes.

Why integration is needed?

As your business grows, so do the systems that you require for your day to day operations. There is a need for some form of integration between disparate systems to give you a concise view of your business processes, resources, financials, and more. In the modern world, it is more important than ever before to derive meaningful connections from available data and utilize them to make informed business decisions. Effective business intelligence is only possible if all your systems are integrated into a unified place. Hence, integration is an essential aspect of business systems and a powerful tool in any business’ IT arsenal.

Why data integration is important for business?

Better Decision Making

Easy to understand, real-time data can be a powerful tool to help you stay proactive by availing opportunities, identifying bottlenecks, and predicting growth trends.

Enhanced Customer Experience

Integration of data allows you to get a complete view of customers, their buying habits, and trends over time. This can help you improve customer experiences in the future to retain loyal and happy customers.

Streamlined Business Operations

Data integration can help you stay on top of all your business functions, from procurement to the supply chain, manufacturing, and more.

Boosts productivity

Data integration unifies data sources, ensuring you’re not wasting time gathering data from different sources. This boosts productivity as all your data is consolidated at your fingertips.

Helps Predict Future Trends

Integrated historical data can help you forecast and predict consumer demands and trends, helping you make better decisions to stay one step ahead of others.

What are the different types of integration?

The three main types of integrations are:

Enterprise Application Integration (EAI)

As the name suggests, this integration is service-based, meaning that it connects different services. This is done by gathering data from different services and then conducting further actions based on your workflow.

Data Integration (DI)

Data integration combines different databases and reporting services in one consolidated place. This gives you a single point of access for all your data needs.

Electronic Data Integration (EDI)

Electronic data integration is all about the paperless exchange of documents and electronic standards, making it a core business to the business process.

How large organizations can integrate IT and business systems with KanBo?

Large organizations can benefit from KanBo’s out of the box integrations that connect deeply with your choice of everyday tools. Here are some of KanBo’s simple and robust integration features to get you started:

Microsoft Outlook KanBo Add-In

KanBo integrates naturally into your Outlook workflow, allowing you to create, edit, and comment on KanBo cards through Outlook. With this add-in, KanBo works in tandem with Outlook to give normal work emails a new and more useful dimension.

Here are some things the KanBo Add-in for Outlook allows you to do:

• Create KanBo cards, to-do lists, comments, and notes using your emails.
• Assign users, add, or change the due date, labels, list, or status of a KanBo card from Outlook.
• Edit and extend KanBo cards using the information in emails.
• Add email attachments to KanBo cards.
• Choose a card template to apply as you turn your email into a card.

KanBo App for Microsoft Teams

Businesses that use Microsoft Teams can utilize KanBo to build the perfect work management ecosystem. The two platforms join forces to give employees a significant boost in productivity through increased transparency, improved quality of information, and clearly defined work contexts.

KanBo and Office 365 Groups

Office 365 Groups are the foundation of Teams and Channel found in Microsoft Teams. KanBo efficiently utilized the pre-existing Team/Group structure to access and store documents.

Here are some ways in which KanBo integrates with Microsoft Teams:

Authenticating Users

KanBo uses the same Azure Active Directory that Microsoft Office 365 uses to authenticate users. Microsoft Teams can easily control the accessibility of KanBo boards as KanBo can inherit permissions from Teams.

Document Sharing

Document sharing is simplified as KanBo can access and attach documents stored within Teams to KanBo Cards and vice versa without any duplication.

Read all details about the KanBo App for Microsoft Teams.

SharePoint Document Libraries & OneDrive

KanBo sources can include document library, SharePoint websites, site collections, or Office 365 Groups in SharePoint, may it be online or on-premises. Without the need for any duplication, KanBo allows you to bring your OneDrive or SharePoint documents into the KanBo board. KanBo uses external event handlers to notify users about document changes inside cards. KanBo provides the flexibility to provide several document sources for one KanBo Board and one source can be used in several KanBo Boards. To ensure total alignment with other platforms, KanBo does not override any permission settings on the documents from Document Libraries.

Custom Actions for Microsoft Power Automate (former Microsoft Flow)

You can utilize Microsoft Power Automate’s visual workflow builder to create over 100 customer actions in KanBo. (Full list of Actions and Triggers is here) This can help you:

• Boost productivity with time-saving workflows.
• Build quick and secure automation at scale without any coding experience.

KanBo’s Nintex Integration

Nintex makes automation easy throughout the organization with a simple drag-and-drop, code-free design for all experience levels. With more than 60 Nintex KanBo custom actions at your fingertips, you can create and publish workflows on the go.

With Nintex integration you can:

• Create a Board a KanBo Board Template
• Mark a To-do list item as complete
• Upload a Document to a KanBo Card
• Send a comment into the Card Activity Stream
• & much more.

Combined with Nintex, KanBo provides a unique opportunity for users to simplify and automate their workflows for maximum productivity.

Egnyte Integration

KanBo and Egnyte combine to form a scalable and secure content infrastructure for KanBo’s documents using a single sign-on with Active Directory or other authentication providers. With KanBo’s Egnyte integration, you get:

• Automatic creation of folders in Egnyte for storing board documents and synchronization of KanBo board user permissions to Egnyte.
• Support for all document operations including upload, download, and edit in Egnyte, etc.
• Version changes are displayed in KanBo’s card activity stream.
• Egnyte’s search results in KanBo’s powerful search experience.
• Work capabilities in KanBo cards from any Egnyte folder utilizing the document sources concept.

Import Data from everywhere to build Centralized Context

KanBo helps you perform data integration by allowing import from multiple data sources. This can help you boost collaboration, centralize scattered data, and increase real-time visibility. KanBo can help you unify data from your ERP, CRM, and database systems into KanBo to turn them into actionable and powerful sources of information.

Here are some powerful capabilities KanBo offers for data integration:

• Upload your information to KanBo from a CSV, Excel, or google sheet.
• Save up on time and reduce errors that occur during the sorting and filtering process by adding data to KanBo cads.
• No manual copy and pasting needed to replace data from third-party applications. KanBo can automatically merge or replace it through its data importer that works with excel files or any CRM, ERP, LDAP, database, or PM tool that exports files as .csv.

Conclusion

System integration is much like fitting different pieces of a puzzle to form the entire bigger picture. While each piece is important in its own right, bringing them all together can unlock new, never before seen potential. While this can seem highly complex for businesses with a ton of systems, approaching it with a clear strategy can help you overcome challenges and come up with an integration solution that suits your business.