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Paper productivity gains.

It won’t come as a surprise to anyone that better control of your business documents is a sensible strategy for any business. We know that, it’s fairly obvious but do we really understand all of the benefits or indeed the costs of not managing paper.

Sometimes we just can’t see the wood for the trees!

 

Paper issues may appear trivial to business owners and that's because we’re so used to being so swamped in paper that we don’t see or understand the negative implication that poor management of paper can have. We’re complacent about paper because it’s always been there.

According to a survey by YouGov, the UK’s small and medium-sized enterprises waste more than £42.2 million per day in revenues looking for documents, something that could easily be remedied by creating a ‘paperless office’. Despite this, 65% of UK SMEs have still not taken this step.

 

All businesses can struggle with productivity, an area where small gains are huge victories. Big business have the power to make significant infrastructure investments and also have people focused purely on process improvement.

Smaller businesses however have the potential for much bigger productivity gains which can be delivered much quicker due to their agile nature. Productivity improvement does not have to come with big financial investment, smaller businesses should focus on small process improvements and therefore managing paper better has to be top of the pile.

Make sure you set the right expectation, work towards a "Less Paper" office rather than a "Paper Less" office - isolate each paper process and improve it. Document scanning and management has got to be one of the easiest ways to introduce process improvement.  

A bit about compliance.

Regulatory compliance is not optional for your business but it might not be the burden that you think it is. 

"Take advice, know your obligations and make provision. Why take a risk."

Managing your business documents digitally will not automatically make you compliant with the increasing burden of regulatory rules and document retention requirements but it will make it easier.

The cost of compliance both in terms of effort and the risk of failure should you be fined can be greatly reduced by the better management of your documents and making them digital is without doubt the best way forward.

Whatever your business obligations are digitising your important business documents will allow you to:

1. -          Increase your information security
2. -          Reduce costs associated with document storage and document retrieval.
3. -          Enable you to quickly and easily present documents on demand.
4. -          Develop and execute document retention policies.
5. -          Easily audit your records.

“Technology cannot make you compliant but the right technology will help you”

Make sure you have the right scanning and document management technology to take care of your business documents but the lesson here is that no amount of technology will make you compliant – the only way you can be compliant is to have the correct policies, procedures and most importantly the people who understand them.

Can my mobile phone help me better manage my paper?

Is there really an app for that? Well that depends on what you need to do. You might think that just because there are many scanning apps available for your smartphone and tablet that (scanning) taking a picture using your device camera is the answer to the more efficient management of paper. I say taking a picture because it really is a different technology to the traditional document scanner (I should write about that another time…. It’s on the list!).

Check out this great review and comparison by PC Mag.

The Best Mobile Scanning Apps of 2016 - PC Mag

So is this really the answer?

As I said the answer really depends on what you want to achieve. The cloud makes apps like Evernote Scannable and CamScanner very useful tools. For a start they have cool technology that takes the best picture (scan) of the document possible given the condition of the document and the environment, there are no “user” chances been taken here!   And secondly you’re already on the doorstep of the cloud where magic really does happen. Some of these app’s now come with OCR (check out my acronym page) which makes them searchable, they really have come a long way.

That’s all great I hear you say but what are the drawbacks?

As long as your need is for casual scanning when you’re on the go then there really are no drawbacks but as good as they are smartphone app’s are not a solution to managing your business documents. Likely you'll just have far too many pieces of paper and you really don’t have the time to take a picture of every single one.

If you have a strategy for better managing paper then you need the right tools for the job. Taking individual pictures of pieces of paper is so time consuming that the novelty will have worn off after a day or two. What you really need is a sheet fed scanner that can just scan multiple documents freeing you up for your real job.

But what about when I’m out and about?

Well why not, but don’t forget there are plenty of small wireless scanners available now that will scan directly to your mobile device. Mobile scanning apps are you are also limited by the camera in your mobile phone and of course your device battery life.

That said some of the mobile scanning apps are great for business card or receipt capture and if that’s all you need then why not!

The last word.

Your mobile phone can do a bit of everything now. I would suggest that a mobile scanning app is a great back up for your real scanning solution just in the same way as you wouldn’t rely on your mobile phone camera as the only way to take your vacation photo’s or instead of using the sat nav in your car.

Scanning apps are great for adhoc capture but they really earn their worth when they are integrated into other functions like recording the label on a great bottle of wine or for reading QR codes.

Maybe Scanning just got easier!

Maybe Scanning just got easier!

Imagine that all you had to do was put your paper documents in a scanner, press a button and everything would be automatically scanned, cleaned, cropped and rotated. That would be amazing right? Well, thats been a reality for some time now.

But imagine if all of that happened and your documents were automatically sorted in the cloud and despatched to the relevant cloud service. Crazy stuff, I know but just take a look at this video.

Fujitsu ScanSnap Cloud has the answer!

There is no excuse now for you not to manage your documents. All you have to do is get them as far as the scanner and let the magic happen!

The paper burden in Small Business.

Sound familiar?

There’s paper everywhere but I can never find the information I need. Come on what have I done with it! Argh...I must have thrown it away, or maybe I left it at home. I’ll have to go through this pile again! It must be in the filing cabinet, maybe it’s in my car. Really guys how much time do you have for this!

Scanning Paper

It really isn’t rocket science but please do take some care, you need to have a strategy! If you just scan paper you’ll be moving the problem from being a visible burden into an invisible and potentially disastrous situation.

So what should I do!

Set aside an hour or two, grab a cup of coffee and think! Think about the paper that you have now. Where does it come from, what do you do with it, how long do you really need to keep, but most importantly does it actually have any value?

Right what now?

Don’t try and fix the problem all in one go, you lived with this for long enough so give yourself time to get your strategy right! Start with the really important stuff.  Think small steps. 

I’m ready what do I do now?

Slow down, you’re not ready yet. You have to spend some money, it’s not for free. The good news however is that it doesn’t have to cost the earth. There are many different products and solutions but to make it easy here are two choices.

Simple

Yes, this will be for most of you, as you don’t have time for complex and you are the IT department. Buy a ScanSnap, it’s a full solution. Don’t take my word for it (SPOILER ALERT – I do have an interest here) go to AMAZON in any country and read the reviews.

Slightly more Complex

Ok, first of all set aside time for some real research. Assuming you already have a computer you need to buy just two things, a scanner (don’t buy a flatbed scanner – life is far too short for that) and some Document Management Software. Relax, it doesn’t have to be too hard you’re not an intrepid explorer going where no man has gone before but you do have to invest some time here. If you’re in a paper intensive line of work, accountancy, legal, medicine there are plenty of packages available that are customised for your environment, we’ve just narrowed the search considerably already. If not then google is your friend!

Little Steps again.

Whichever way you decide to go, don’t forget small steps. Focus on developing your strategy for different types of documents. Why don’t you start with your expenses and receipts then move on to customer correspondence, Rome wasn’t built in a day!

Take the first little step today.