We live in a digital world where people rely on being able to instantly get information at the touch of a computer, tablet, or smartphone screen. Ironically, at work, people tend to get into the habit of printing paper or sending a paper document. Those documents end up being stored in a metal filing cabinet or boxes consuming valuable workspace, and the information becomes frozen on the paper. Money is wasted printing documents; time is spent looking for files, and office space isn’t utilized well.

What if you could type bits of information such as a name, student ID, or loan number and have a file or document appear within seconds? Then, what if you had the ability to collaborate and distribute information to the necessary people within a matter of moments? What if you could digitally and securely sign a document without the need to print it?

You can!

There is a solution for digitizing and organizing essential documents as well as getting rid of unwanted paper in a secure and eco-friendly way.

Here are five easy and practical steps to begin the process of digitizing your business:

1. Assess your company’s paper situation.

Take an inventory of the paper in your office. Think paper in file cabinets, desk drawers, or on top of desks. Maybe you have a room or basement area dedicated to storing boxes of files, receipts, or invoices. Now imagine all that paperwork digitized and conveniently stored in a secure cloud solution where documents can be indexed and cross-referenced for ease of searchability.

2. Securely destroy the paper that is no longer needed.

Partnering with a professional document shredding service to keep your sensitive business information confidential is an essential step in your company’s digital transformation. A professional shred service should be certified by the National Association for Information Destruction (NAID), which ensures compliance with data protection laws such as HIPAA, FERPA, and PCI. Depending on how much paper is passed retention date you may want to schedule a large volume purge or set up a routine monthly shred service.

3. Convert paper documents into a digital format

Decide if you want to scan your documents in-house or utilize a professional document scanning service that will prepare, scan, and index for you. Intelligent document scanning software can pull information directly from the page for indexing, thus saving time and reducing human error.

4. Implement a digital filing cabinet

Once your documents are in digital format, you’ll need to choose a document management software. This may feel like the most daunting part of your journey to eliminating paper, but with the right software solution, you will instantly see the benefits of being able to quickly retrieve your well-organized documents, creating workflows to automate processing, and safely back up your documents.

5. Train Employees on the utilization of the virtual filing cabinet

Your next step is to train your employees on your new document management system. Again, you have options. You may opt for in-person training, online training courses, or webinars.

IMS is here to assist you!

IMS Technology Group, in conjunction with Paper Free Office Solutions, makes it easy to evolve from a paper-heavy office environment to an organized and efficient digital workplace. Contact IMS for a complimentary digital transformation assessment. We will help you organize, store, protect, and simplify your document and information management. Our team of professionals simplifies each step of your digital transformation journey! We work hand-in-hand with you to select the right shredding, scanning and software options scaled to fit your business no matter how big or small.