Item: Appian
Rating: 1
Author: Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Appian

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

It is being used to automate our IT automated procurement processes. It allows the process of getting quotes from vendors to the approval person to be done much faster. We also use it to automate sending reminders to relevant employees to continue the tasks left unfinished in dev, test, and prod environments.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Automate processes like reminders
Keeping data secure
Process modeling

Cons

Most of the platform is hard to use
Difficult for new users
Little to no explanation on how to do things
Not very good at advice on use-cases
Not aesthetically pleasing, especially compared to its competitors

Return on Investment

Our IT automated procurement process has sped up time to get paid by a few days on every transaction
Our approvals are more organized as a result of being put in digitally
Managing our own tenant requires more than we have available, given the quarterly updates
Since we have business-critical functions running in the platform, we have to thoroughly review every note of every update. Because of this we skip half of the updates since we don't have enough time to review these changes four times a year.

Support Rating

I haven't used Appian support before.

Usability

I think what it does well, it does really well, but the platform as a whole is not very new-user friendly. As someone who works in IT, I can almost guarantee that someone who works on the business side would be completely clueless and not be able to derive any use from being the primary user of the platform.

Alternatives Considered

Microsoft Power Automate (formerly microsoft flow)

I personally think Appian will win the discussion of pricing between itself and Microsoft Power Automate currently, but since I don't feel as though the average person would be able to learn how to automate processes on Appian, I have to give the nod to Microsoft Power Automate and the rest of the Power platform. I believe it is far better for citizen development and overall ease of use. Unfortunately, the Power platform did have a recent data leak, so it is not yet considered suitable for using confidential data per my company's rulings.

Key Insights

Do you think Appian delivers good value for the price?

Not sure

Are you happy with Appian's feature set?

Did Appian live up to sales and marketing promises?

I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process

Did implementation of Appian go as expected?

I wasn't involved with the implementation phase

Would you buy Appian again?

Other Software Used

PowerApps, Microsoft Power Automate (formerly microsoft flow)

Likelihood to Recommend

It is well suited for business-critical automation, especially when sensitive data is involved. It is not good for citizen development. It is definitely more suited to pro developers who write code for a living. Quick apps are helpful for those not well versed in the platform. Automated reminder emails are consistently and frequently sent out looking very official and full of detail.

Appian Feature Ratings

Using Appian

Users and Roles

20 - Approving budgets and spending, approving the use of various forms of software financially

Support Headcount Required

3 - Strong coding background, maybe a CS degree, serious dedication to learning the platform as it is not easy or enjoyable to pick up the first time around.

Business Processes Supported

Automation
Reminders
Organization of the digital tasks occuring

Innovative Uses

Speeding up time to receive payment from vendors

Future Planned Uses

We don't currently know of ways to further use Appian in way that is simple, inexpensive, and highly effective

Likelihood to Renew

Business-critical functions are now performed on this platform; transitioning them to another system would be far too cumbersome of a task to do with our current resources