5 Reasons your Business should go Paperless. Including: How to get started

Transcription

1 5 Reasons your Business should go Paperless Including: How to get started

2 The concept of a fully paperless office has existed since the 1960 s, back when paper dominated the landscape and was crucial to the operations of all businesses. However, despite having entered the digital era, the concept of a paperless office has still yet to take hold with the overwhelming majority of businesses throughout the UK and Ireland. In fact, it has been calculated that the average office worker uses 10,000 sheets of paper each year, of which 6,800 are wasted. Paper is undeniably cheap and you may think why would I need to go paperless when paper is such a plentiful office resource, but each single use of paper contains a hidden and unexpected cost. Studies have shown that the use of paper can cost upwards of times the cost of purchasing the paper, with the final cost of paper including storage, copying, printing, postage, disposal and recycling. "small to medium sized business in the UK alone waste the equivalent of 70 million per day looking for documents" The cost of paper doesn t end their either. Further studies have shown that the average organisation can spend $20 in wages to file an individual document, $120 in wages searching for misplaced documents and $220 to recreate a document (PwC). Add this to the statistic, that up to a third of businesses are ordering more paper now than they were 5 years ago, and it becomes clear that organisations could be incurring hidden costs due to their reliance on paper. In the face of such costs, it may be surprising to learn that at present there is minimal desire from UK businesses to reduce their paper usage or run a paperless office in the next four years. However, technology is helping to change the office landscape like neverbefore. The 9 5 office day is evolving; more employees than ever are working from home or requiring the flexibility to work from almost any location yet the expenses and problems associated with paper are costing business millions every year. So, there are hidden costs to using paper and yet businesses are no closer to that 1960 s concept of a paperless office. Why should any business or organisation embrace paperless technology and what advantages would an investment in a paperless office bring?

3 5 Reasons 01 Accountability & Security In utilising a paperless solution, any business can make significant improvements to the accountability and security of their documents. In a fully digital office, access to and control of documents are handled by a Document Management System. Such systems can easily handle document version control, automating financial records management and retention processes to ensure compliance with industry and governmental regulations. The access to and handling of sensitive company information can be forcefully controlled and maintained with user access rights. This controls what information and documents individual employees can access, by restricting access only to those with a need or right to access it. Passwords and digital encryption of files also provide additional levels of security to important or confidential information. "at any given moment, up to 5% of an organisation's files are currently lost or mislaid" Paper files represent a security risk to any business, either from the theft of information or through the accidental loss or misplacement of important documents. The removal of paper files from an office and into a cloud based storage system ensures that the environment where sensitive information is accessed can be strictly limited to the office environment and that such documents cannot be removed from the premises. 02 Cost Savings At a basic level, introducing a paperless office into any business will result in savings that will be instantly visible. Removing the need to print or copy pages brings a reduction in paper and ink purchasing costs, but this is just the tip of the iceberg. Going digital eliminates all the hidden costs that come associated with paper usage. This includes savings in the storage of documents, postage, shredding and recycling of paper. " 52 per employee could be saved just from the removal of paper"

4 On top of this, organisations going paperless can make significant long term savings by doing away with the unnecessary storage of documents in filing cabinets and other office furniture. A Document Management System will mean that businesses will no longer have to pay the hidden costs of storing paper documents on their premises and can utilise the vacated space for other more productive uses. 03 Improved Accessibility In embracing a paperless office, businesses commit to capturing digital replicas of all their old paper records. This process turns those documents from static records to fully searchable dynamic files. Employees no longer need to waste time manually searching for the correct document or searching in different locations for related information. A Document Management System will dramatically speed up searching times, allowing employees to focus on the important aspects of their jobs. "if paper based records were destroyed in a natural disaster, 7 out of 10 businesses would fail within 3 weeks As well as improving document search, a digital paperless office will help an organisation s documents work for them. Documents are accessible anywhere anytime when stored in the cloud and allow for a more flexible form of working, ensuring employees can carry on their work when working for home or out on the road. Having files securely backed up to the cloud also ensures that in the event of a natural disaster or fire at the company premises, all files will still be accessible and recoverable following the event. 04 Improved Productivity In the fast paced digital era, working with paper based files can significantly slow down the productivity of a business. The handling of stacks of paper, search for physical documents or copying of information all contribute to a slowing of productivity and represent an inefficient use of employee time. As well as this, large volumes of paper increase the likelihood of mistakes being made due to human error. A Document Management System enables business and its employees to access documents and communicate digitally, reducing wasted hours searching for documents and enabling the efficient sharing of information across departments and employees.

5 Singular documents are also retrievable by multiple employees, allowing staff to complete task and concentrate on high level tasks, crucial to business performance. "without effective content management, an employee can spend an average of 18 minutes searching for a document" With quick and easy access to digital documents, organisations can also reap the benefits of improved client and customer service. Response times to queries can be dramatically improved with streamlined access to information that is instantly shareable with other colleagues where necessary. 05 Environmental Impact In recent years, organisations have become increasingly aware of their impact on the environment and reducing or eliminating a company s reliance on paper is an excellent way to help the environment whilst helping to boost or improve the overall image of an organisation. The impact on the environment from going paperless is clear to see. Less paper means less trees are cut down to produce the paper and with environmental considerations becoming a key factor in forming customer decisions, running a paperless business could provide a significant advantage over the competition. "storing one terabyte of information on a hard drive could save upwards of 50,000 trees" For even just a few businesses to give greater consideration to their corporate social responsibility can have a positive impact on our environment. Creating paper requires a lot of natural resources and reducing paper usage will help to improve our impact on the environment. This is put into stark contrast when you consider the current cost to the environment when creating paper, with: One sheet of paper using 360ml to produce 40% of global wood pulp going towards the production of paper The reduction of 400 reams of paper a year equivalent to a 1.25 acre pine forest absorbing carbon for a year

6 How to Get Started The benefits for any business deciding to go paperless are obvious to see, with the opportunity to reduce costs, improve security and productivity whilst having a positive impact on the environment. However, whilst achieving a paper free office sound easy, just how does a business get started and what steps do they need to take before embracing a digital, paperless future? The decision is a big step and whilst there is an initial cost in the set up, the benefits will begin to be felt almost immediately. If your organisation is considering going paperless, then there are several different measures to consider and actions which can be taken to help ease the path to a digital future. Promote a think before you print attitude in your business. Encourage employees to only print pages they need, instead of a whole report and to only do so when absolutely necessary Encourage all communications to be sent electronically and documents to be revised on screen to avoid the need for hand written notes Set up a version control system to help catalogue and index documents appropriately Recycle any unused or waste paper to encourage desk to remain paper free Digitally scan commonly used and shared documents to remove the need to create copies Before going paperless it is important for any business to analyse their daily paper consumption to get a firm idea of how much paper they use and the costs associated with this. Following this, there are numerous measures which a business could implement to help reduce their paper usage. These include: Print on both sides of a piece of paper computer and printer defaults should be set to double sided and could help to halve your paper costs

7 How We Can Help! If your business has implemented any of the steps above and would like to make any of your processes, departments or offices paperless then we can help! At Mallon Technology, our document capture solutions (insert link) help organisations, on a daily basis, to effectively manage and maintain their physical and digital records. Our comprehensive range of services can help you streamline your business process, back up your critical data or help to manage your documents. We are also the sole providers, on the island of Ireland, for DocuWare, an end to end solution for handling all the processes associated with a document management system. DocuWare can help any organisation simplify every task relating to paper documents, converting s, invoices, contracts and all other documents into valuable resources and business intelligence insights that will support your organisation in achieving its paperless goals. To learn more about how DocuWare or our Document Capture services could benefit your organisation reduce or eliminate its paper usage or to arrange a demonstration, please get in touch with us at: info@mallontechnology.com

8 Published by: Mallon Technology Union House Union Street Cookstown Co. Tyrone BT80 8NP Mallon Technology