Paper Process Automation

At its essence, scanning/conversion/document digitization, whatever you want to call it, are all terms for the beginnings of the digital transformation of a process, in this case, a paper process.

At its core, you have to ask yourself, what does digital transformation mean to you and your business? For example, are you:

·       Trying to reduce costs associated with paper, like toner, ink, paper itself? Maybe wanting to go green for environmental purposes?

·       Are you trying to reduce error rates?

·       Are you trying to speed up the time a form arrives at its destination?

·       Are you trying to accommodate a work from home employee/staff or even someone who is out sick or on leave?

There are numerous reasons to use a more digital workflow.

To start this process, examine the motivation that drives the workflow. Then, believe it or not, START SMALL!

Don’t be intimidated! You don’t have to change all your processes on Day One. My LinkedIn profile says Crawl, Walk OR Run, not AND Run for a reason.

Businesses are always trying to differentiate themselves from their competitors and offer the best customer and employee experience. As traditional businesses acclimate to the digital age, many don’t want paper anymore, or at least not as much of it. It’s not to say paper is bad – again, you can be in the crawl phase and still accommodate those who will continue use paper. We just want to start to look at and test more efficient and economical processes.

Automation of certain processes not only frees up staff from monotonous tasks, but also helps workers do their jobs more efficiently, responding to external and internal customers faster. With automated workflows, you can get information in real time or near real time. That allows you to make better, more informed decisions.

A quick example of process automation from the not so distant past, before RPA, ML and AI: Hiring someone to answer the phone to give a caller store hours or directions to your business. We all know there are phone systems and search engines to do that now. But not too long ago, businesses hired someone to answer those calls – day in, day out – a mind numbingly boring task for that employee. Automating that process freed them up to do what humans do best – think. And, make them a more valuable employee to the business!