The Document Imaging Blog--which, being administered by imaging software company eCopy, admittedly has some skin in this game--has a nice little check-list that lets you efficiently examine the way your business uses paper (which is to say, how it could use less). We definitely recommend a look.?
We still insist that paper is fast becoming the new papyrus. The fact is, and their obvious bias aside, the blog is correct to write, "Businesses only operate as efficiently as they process information and paper--a physical object--takes longer to move from department/person to another (for signatures, review, editing, etc.). Manual processes are more time consuming, error-prone, and costly than electronic processes." Now that electronic options are available, it is only a matter of time before your competitors are exploiting them, lowering their costs, improving their efficiency, and strenghtening their bottom lines. If you haven't already started thinking critically about the way your company uses paper--if you haven't ceased to accept it as a premise and started to think about changing the way your business does business--then it is well past time for you start.
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