There has been an entire industry in the finance world built upon the idea of going paperless.

It’s a simple concept and one that scales well.

If you are a small company, perhaps it is not ideal to spend thousands on a system to make everything paperless (green credentials aside). When you are a large and growing company though, the fine margins really do matter. Economies of scale start to be very important.

The savings accelerate at speed, be it in time or physical items.

Many offices and departments will be storing their records in ageing file cabinets, folders, ring binders and often inadvertently behind desks, under sofa cushions and well, who knows where else.

It’s not unsurprising, nor is it anyone’s fault, it’s simply what happens over the years as people come and go, as filing systems change and processes are adapted.

Yet in this new world we live in, there is no real excuse for this.

The technology is out there to ensure that you have customer and supplier history, so why not use it?

By consolidating all information, regardless of which department we are talking about, you are adding value to the organisation you work for.

There are a many reasons as to why this is common sense. The most important could be proposed as allowing analysis. Analysis that can make a huge difference going forward. Transparency is another big plus, especially if your work affects others, being able to give access to data at the touch of a button will save a huge amount of time.

You can also manipulate a system to suit your processes, adapt access and change with the times.

That being said, I’m probably rehashing the arguments of numerous people.

Ultimately, I’d keep it simple. The world around us is changing. As is your workforce.

If you fail to keep up with, even get ahead of the game when it comes to digitising your processes you are falling behind.