Perhaps it was the cost of running all those printers, or having to replace the packets of paper. Or maybe you felt it was the best choice environmentally.

It’s a great idea to fully digitise your office environment. Yet have you given much thought to the amount of work that you need to do to completely sacrifice your paper systems?

If it were easy, every office would be paperless by now.

Questions to consider:

• Years of archives need to be preserved in a digital format, so scanning is essential. Ensure you have enough resource to take on this manual task before you start.
• Once documents are available on the cloud, how are your employees going to gain access? In their default format, scanned documents are not readable by machines. This makes them difficult to search for on your computer.
• How will your current customers respond to your paperless ethos? Will you need to educate them or incentivise them in your new ways of working?
• Do you need to provide contracts on paper with a wet signature ie with a pen?
• How will you ensure your new record keeping is compliant with government requirements? You need to hold onto purchase information, invoices, bank statements and accounting records. Yes, you can replace these with digital systems, but what about the till rolls and petty cash books?

The truth is that paper consumption has been on the increase throughout the digital age. People still sign contracts by hand. Employees prefer to print emails and articles out. Bosses still give out physical agendas in meetings.

Here is what other authors have said about the paperless concept:

“Unfortunately, the transition from paper to electronic document management has not solved the issue of content chaos and the ability to quickly find the documents we need…. It’s time we wake up from the pipe-dream of the paperless office, and put our energies towards creating a pragmatic “paper-light” environment that can be achieved relatively quickly in any organization.” Greg Milliken, M-Files Corporation writing for Wired.

“Perhaps a hybrid approach, a ‘paper-light’ rather than ‘paperless’ office, where workers, and customers, are able to use paper for the tasks they know and trust, is where we should be headed, for the medium-term at least.” Jade Taylor-Salazar writing for E&T

“[T]here may be situations where it would be unfair and counterproductive to insist on change, especially if the resulting reduction in paper usage is minimal.” Paul Mah, CIO

Not to put you off your good intentions, but the fact is that the 100% paperless office universally is still out of reach for most businesses.

While you can do a lot to reduce your carbon footprint by limiting print outs and digitising payroll systems, you may always have recourse to use paper. Adopting the paper-light approach is a more feasible option that doesn’t exclude paper, but instead encourages a more deliberate attitude to printing.

How using storage can help you become more paper-light:

Keep your forever documents in storage

While you need to keep certain records on file, you may not have enough room to hold onto them. This is where we come in. At Rent A Space, you will have access to a secure, safe and dry unit to keep your documents safe.

Store only the last of your company documents

If you have committed to transitioning to a paperless approach, you will need time to establish the new systems. Since the Government requires you to locate accounting records for at least six years, you can keep these documents with us until your auditor needs to see them. That way, day to day, they are not taking up valuable office space. Meanwhile, you can use an electronic system for your current and future records.

Get rid of your printers and photocopiers

With paper systems come other heavy duty items such as printers and photocopiers. To discourage or minimise printing, reducing the items that facilitate this behaviour will lead employees to think twice before requesting a hard copy. We can store your printers, fax machines and photocopiers until you are able to dispense with them permanently.

 

If you are interested in what business storage solutions we can offer you, please get in touch today.