The following is a summary of a session at Converge 2024, the RoboHead User Conference.
Results Preview
- Efficiency: With RoboHead talking to the rest of their tech stack, WWE’s team has more time to focus on creative work.
- Scalability: Automation enables the team to handle a massive volume of projects without adding unnecessary complexity.
- Collaboration: Simplified processes ensure everyone is on the same page, reducing errors and improving outcomes.
Why Automation Matters for WWE
When your organization tackles more than 20,000 projects in a year, even small efficiencies add up to significant time savings. For Tom Barnouw and the creative team at WWE, these savings came through automation—leveraging RoboHead to connect their technology stack and streamline workflows seamlessly.
About WWE’s Creative Operations
Tom Barnouw, WWE’s Director of Digital Workflow, has spent 18 years supporting the company’s extensive in-house creative services and photo department. From managing in-ring talent assets to producing merchandise and many other tasks that go into their worldwide entertainment organization, WWE’s creative team is responsible for thousands of deliverables annually, making efficiency a critical component of their success.
The Challenge: Managing Complexity at Scale
With tens of thousands of projects per year, WWE’s creative team needed a system to reduce manual work and eliminate bottlenecks. Their existing process required multiple tools to handle requests, approvals, file management, and project schedules. While effective, the manual steps were time-consuming and left room for confusion.
The Solution: Connecting Tools Through RoboHead
WWE turned to RoboHead, their project management solution, and paired it with middleware integrations to streamline workflows. Here’s how they achieved it:
- Linking Talent Requests to RoboHead
WWE manages in-ring talent operations through a custom mobile app, handling tasks like travel, social media, and time-off requests. Tom’s team linked this app to RoboHead using a middleware tool called Workado.- Talent and brand representatives can now submit creative requests—like new merchandise designs—directly through the app.
- Requests include forms and images uploaded directly from mobile devices, making the process seamless for users.
- Routing Project Approvals and Scheduling
Once requests are submitted via RoboHead, the approval team reviews them. Approved requests are automatically converted into projects within RoboHead, complete with schedules and team assignments. - Streamlining File Management
WWE also automated the connection between their file server and RoboHead using RoboScript. Once requests are approved in RoboHead, a Project folder is created where they manage files, subfolders are also created and a link to access is made available in RoboHead.
The Results: Efficiency and Clarity
By automating key steps in their process, WWE’s creative team has seen significant time savings and reduced confusion.
The results are clear:
- Efficiency: With RoboHead talking to the rest of their tech stack, WWE’s team has more time to focus on creative work because everything is centralized in one place.
- Scalability: Automation enables the team to handle massive projects without adding unnecessary complexity navigating to the server or duplicating work.
- Collaboration: Simplified processes ensure everyone is on the same page, reducing errors and improving outcomes.
“It saves a tremendous amount of time and lessens confusion on what needs to be done,” said Tom.
The new system also improved team morale.
“When the group is used to doing it a manual way, and then you kind of put this thing together and show them how it works, you become pretty popular pretty quickly. It’s rewarding to put these in place.”
Takeaway
WWE’s creative team is proof that with the right tools and integrations, even the most complex workflows can be simplified. By connecting their tools through RoboHead, they’ve not only saved time but also created a system that supports their creative vision on a global scale.
