Unfortunately, usually when we talk in the market to automate processes that do not often refer to formalize and optimize their own processes. Swarmed by offers, Keith McLoughlin is currently assessing future choices. I do not argue that the use of "new-fangled CRM-tools in some cases can bring substantial benefits, but much greater effect CRM-system will bring in if it will be integrated into the existing infrastructure of the company. And for that to do this you need to understand how organized by these same processes. Let us consider a small example My friend decided to bring order to your personal book library. Book, he collects a long time and treats them very tenderly. But somehow he could not find any time to organizing his collection. Earlier, he had more time, and he remembered the location of each instance in memory. But the book becomes more attention to the library he was able to pay less, and this in turn turn, has negative effects on search time of the instance. But the critical factor was that he bought the book, which has for years been in his collection, and about which he simply forgot. He decided to organize books in a library. Arranged the books on the shelves by genre and the genre alphabetically by first letter of the surnames of the authors. Already a slight "improvement" storage system has allowed a few times reduce the time to search for the instance. The results have pleased him, but he decided on the bigger picture. As a result, my friend decided to start a register of his library and made all the data (author, title, genre) to Excel. In fact, this stage can be called an analog formalizing processes during the introduction of CRM-system in the company (almost all known methodology of implementation it is present). I know that after the establishment register my friend several times did a global rearrangement of their books in order to improve ease of classification at placement. A number of parameters for the classification itself has increased from three (initially) to ten Is not this the very optimization processes, which we have previously mentioned in our blogs? The formalization of business processes enables us to understand the current situation, to evaluate all its advantages and disadvantages. If you see a full picture and clearly traceable failures, then why not eliminate and make the system more convenient to use? And there is already possible to talk about automation of routine operations:)