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Wouldn't it be nice to go completely paperless in your office? You would not require as much space for storing files. That corner where the file cabinet once sat could now hold a table with a combination of a printer/scanner/fax and possibly a plant. The closet that held boxes of pictures from when you were a child could now hold a nice shoe rack. Those tiny receipts that you need for tax time and held onto in that old beaten up shoebox, could now be scanned and put on your computer.

The printer/scanner/fax/copier is a very versatile machine. The printer would naturally be to print anything that you may need as a hard copy. The scanner would be to scan documents. The documents could consist of pictures, signed contracts, or hand written letters. Scanning a document is like making a copy of it and saving it to a CD or your hard drive on your computer. The copier would be for doing exactly what it says, copying.

In time you will probably notice that you do not require as much paper or as many ink cartridges to be purchased because you are not printing as many documents. Your ability to find documents has become much easier and you have a more secure form of storage.

Many companies have taken steps to go paperless. They may still need hard copies of presentations for a board meeting or copies of a contract, but taking the steps have not been as hard as once thought.

A human resources department may have decided to put all of their policies and procedures on the intranet for employees to retrieve at their convenience. Management of the documents becomes much easier. They no longer have to keep books on shelves that take up space and they can notify employees of changes through the company e-mail.

Doctor's offices can have a clinical software program installed. This allows them to update patient records while they are with the patient. Prescription's can be entered and forwarded to the pharmacies for fulfillment. With this paperless system, another physician in the same office can see a patient and they will have up to date information at their fingertips. The use of large, bulky folders is no longer needed.

I do not believe we will every go totally paperless. Statistics have shown that paper usage has actually increased by 40% since the introduction of the Internet. This increase is due to people printing e-mails and documents from the Internet.

Learn more about this author, Susan Harter.
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