Are You Drowning in Paper? Reach for the Cloud!

Paper documents, manila folders, and file cabinets have long been symbols of office work. Today, these once-proud symbols are looked down upon, due in part to the public being more environmentally conscious, as well as advancements made in cloud computing that make a paper-centric workflow an inefficient option.

To find an example of this, look no further than your HR department. Did you know that the average HR record takes up a whopping 29 pages of paper? Now multiply that by the number of employees you have and you’re looking at a hefty stack of documents. For SMBs, these records alone could take up as much as an entire four-drawer file cabinet. Also, let’s not forget that it’s normal to keep HR records of previous employees on file for the past year or so. For companies with a high turnover rate, these files alone could take up an additional drawer or cabinet.

While it’s certainly annoying to have a row of bulky file cabinets take up precious office space, the annoyance level multiplies when it’s time to actually dig through all of these files and retrieve an obscure piece of information. When considering how much time it takes to pay a worker to manage and maintain the contents of a file cabinet, it makes sense how file cabinets wind up costing companies upwards of $20,000... each!

Alternatively, if all of these pages and pages of HR records (as well as all of your company's other documents) were to be digitized, then finding needed information would be as easy as entering what you’re looking for in a search form. Plus, if these documents were to be stored in the cloud, then those needing access to digital records wouldn’t be limited to viewing the documents only from their work PC. Instead, every employee needing access would be able to access these files from anywhere with an Internet connection, and on most Internet-connected devices.

Additionally, storing your documents in the cloud vastly improves security compared to keeping paper documents lying around the office, or even having them hidden away in a file cabinet that’s only protected by a low-grade lock. To give you an idea of how the cloud can improve document security, consider a recent study by IDG Cloud Computing that found that 94 percent of SMB cloud adopters claimed to have experienced security benefits from moving to the cloud.

Increased efficiency, money-saving workflows, and improved security, these are just three ways that cloud computing can improve how your company does business. Oh, and we forgot to go into the most important benefit: going paperless is good for the environment!

The benefits of cloud computing are clear and getting started with the cloud is easy. Just call Network Solutions Unlimited today at (217) 428-6449!