Document Management isn't just for documents

Forward movement

Strategic planning can benefit from having correct documents all in one place. It’s amazing how an effective document management system can free up your time to focus on other lifeblood targets for your business. Without effective control of critical documents, your objectives can move, be pushed back, and in worst-case scenarios, be jettisoned into the never-never.

Efficiency and productivity

Even when the best intentions are visible, the propensity for staff trying to fit a square peg into a round hole can be alive and well.

This can be the fault of the tools, especially when they are inadequate for the task at hand. Practically, an organization’s need to manage documents, and all that involves, comes from a direct need for either efficiency or compliance requirements. Sometimes both. As an example, printing might just be your main area of inefficiency, not to mention risk. Confidential documents are left on the printer for hours, sometimes days, for non-classified eyes to see. That’s risky.

Incorporation of the right technology to prevent misinformation and privacy issues from becoming a problem is the best form of mandatory conformity that can work in harmony, not only with your business’s mission statement but your regulatory obligations.

In addition, take e-signatures as another example. The time-wasting that occurs with people printing, faxing, and obtaining signatures the old-fashioned way is quite astounding. Organizations are now joining the 21st century and abolishing this antiquated method of sharing.

Paperless workplace

Yes, people still talk about this, albeit with a whimsical scoff and an occasional non-believing eyebrow raise.

In reality, office space requirements can be a genuine issue, especially for SMEs with square footage prices influencing cost justification and even a business’s future viability. Technology is readily available to help with uncluttering, and reduction of paper waste in the form of great document management. You never know, you might be more eco-friendly than you thought, raising all sorts of kudos in today’s enviro-conscious world.

What a good corporate citizen, you would be.

Future growth and expansion

Having the correct software that will grow with your document management needs should be a given, but unfortunately is sometimes overlooked.

Especially for organizations that have experienced fast growth, document management can be a blessing, alleviating the need to continuously worry about reinventing the wheel, and whether they will fall off under too much pressure.

Convenience and collaboration

The shortest distance between two points is a straight line. Sounds good doesn’t it?

Although it doesn’t always work out that way, it certainly should be a goal for document management. Not only does it save your people time, but it’s also far more convenient than jumping between multiple platforms.

If your organization system can offer accessibility through fewer paths to the prize, then you’re a winner. Your salespeople and consultants are out there in the world. Motion creates its own set of challenges, but accessing essential documents shouldn’t be one of them. Happy salespeople are successful salespeople. Hand in hand with convenience is the need for the unified collaboration between staff and management, and their shared documents. Although many employees may feel they work best alone, with a little effort, the interaction between staff can be seamless and beneficial if so desired, my collaborative-minded friends.

Support service

It’s not surprising that document management and its symmetry have become a focus. But it’s not all about having quick access to compliance, training, and personnel information within seconds. If we chose to, we will learn that document management can be the tip of the iceberg for the future plans of any organization’s support structure, for now, and a strong foundation for the ways we wish to move in the future.

So we can now be confident knowing document management is not only about the document themselves. The above points are certainly not the be-all-and-end-all, and may not be a revelation to some, but are simply a few of the doors that correct document management can open.

We all have a human trait of seeing things how we want to, but if we step outside the box for a moment, and take a different angle, we might be surprised at the opportunities that can arise.