How to Achieve the Paperless Office
12/2/2010 at 4:33 pm by
The paperless world is here – really?
If there’s one thing that’s exaggerated it’s how quickly the business world is going paperless. Everyone likes to joke about it, and there are a lot of things that we all do online now – renew our licenses, paying bills, and ordering all sorts of things. And then . . . we go to the office.
We’re addicted to our paper forms, our paper printouts, our control reports. The beat goes on. Paper and old processes go hand in hand. The paper IS the process. The process is embedded in the people doing the job, and in most cases doing it really well. When a change is suggested, the standard reply follows almost immediately is “Let’s get used to that new system, and then in a few months, we’ll revisit the situation and see if we can eliminate that report.” Sound familiar?
For those of you trying to drive change, here are few tips that have worked for me:
- Nail it down. Don’t let users off the hook without committing to a date to phase out paper.
- Turn the tables. Eliminate the paper for a month, with a commitment to revisit the situation if problems arise. Note the concerns and take the heat. If you can survive the first 2 weeks, you’re home free. Once users get used to the new process, they may have issues, but most likely they’ll be coming up with solutions that don’t involve going back to the old way.
- Put fun in the game. Get a management commitment to take the paper savings and put it into a party fund, an outing or an event. That helps everyone focus on the fun of change, as opposed to the pain.
- Make it cool. Use cool technologies such as the Ipad to show users how readily accessible information can be without having hard copy right in front of you. Sometimes the wow factor is enough to change the status quo.
- And lastly, don’t give in. Keep pushing. Eliminating paper means changing processes and changing behavior. It takes time. Happy Holidays. Please don’t gift wrap these tips. I’m eliminating paper!
photo credit: allerleirau






