A Paperless Culture Is for Everyone

by | Aug 17, 2015

According to a Pew Research study done in 2015, more than one-third of workers in America are millennials (those born between 1981 and 1997), and this generation has surpassed Generation X to take over as the dominant demographic in today’s American workforce.

Millennials—also known as Trophy Kids—are a unique group with their own special characteristics. According to a quiz published by BuzzFeed, millennials binge watch on Netflix, have a favorite EDM (electronic dance music) DJ, utilize social media often, take more selfies than one human being should, wear jeggings and boat shoes, and shop at stores like American Apparel, Urban Outfitters, and IKEA.

The stereotypical millennial is also tech-savvy (hence utilizing social media often)—with the millennial constantly typing, texting, and posting on social media networks and apps like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat; networking on LinkedIn; and multi-tasking like crazy. Every gadget in our current existence—from tablets to smartphones—allows millennials to do multiple things at once. Everything is easily accessible, right at our fingertips.

Knowing how tech-savvy millennials are, a paperless culture is right up their alley. Modern amenities like online banking and Apple Pay are now important fixtures in our everyday lives, and millennials gravitate towards the latest and greatest technological trends and fads. According to an iAnnotate, you can highlight and mark up PDF notes just like you would with paper notes.

Learning and Studying

With Socrative, you can create games, quizzes, and other learning materials that will help you ace your next test or quiz with flying colors.

Sharing and Collaborating

With ScreenChomp, you can record your screen and touchscreen actions from a classroom whiteboard and share it with your classmates to create projects and videos.

 

The Baby Boomers and More

Many millennials work at an office, but there are still a lot of office workers who aren’t members of the selfie-taking, multitasking Generation Y.

The paperless office is the future, and many offices around the world are already implementing alternatives to using paper in the workplace.

 

There’s a plethora of things that the non-millennial and millennial alike can do to implement a paperless office:

  • Transfer your files and documents electronically instead of printing
  • Use an eSignature for all of your signature needs
  • Receive and send bills, payments, and invoices online or via email
  • Use a scanner with OCR to scan and save all of your files and documents
  • Discard or recycle all unnecessary papers (empty those file cabinets!)
  • Back up and manage your files digitally through eFileCabinet
  • Make digital agendas and notes for meetings
  • Create itineraries for business trips online and through travel apps
  • Use an iPad or tablet for visitor sign-ins at the front desk instead of a paper sign-in sheet
  • Use tablets and smartphones for everything, including accessing files and documents

 

The Experienced Business Owner

The experienced business owner might have a hard time straying away from their tried-and-true ways of running their business, but a paperless business is a better business in the long run.

According to an article from Entrepreneur.com, the United States spends $460 billion in salaries to manage paper-driven information overload, and the only solution to that problem is a business based on paperless technology and features.

 

Here’s how the experienced business owner can be paperless:

  • Put all of your files into a secure and paperless document management system. These systems will safely back up your files, will make them easy to search, will follow compliance regulations, and are more environmentally friendly, among other benefits.
  • Adopt electronic invoicing (e-Invoicing) and issue invoices directly to customers via email to reduce the amount you spend on printing and postage.
  • Scan and securely email important files and documents instead of printing them.
  • When customers are making payments, use cool gadgets like Square, which accepts credit cards, sends invoices from your smartphone or iPad, sets appointments, simplifies your books, helps you get paid quickly, and takes payments with the Square reader (a card-scanning instrument that easily attaches to your iPad).
  • Ditch those flyers and brochures and use apps like Buffer for Business, which make social media marketing for your business both easy and efficient.

The experienced business owner or the baby boomer or the high school student may not be a tech-savvy and multi-tasking millennial, but that doesn’t mean going paperless isn’t for them. A paperless office or classroom or business—a paperless culture—is for all ages, for all levels of experience, and for all levels of social media users, even for those who’ve never taken a selfie in their lives.

Photo Source: Vladimir Melnikov/Shutterstock