Sep 12: Over the past decade, the world has rapidly evolved in terms of technology. Digital technology has taken over everything. Digital applications that have replaced paper-based documents and processes on a large scale are now available, making everything simpler, quicker, and hassle-free.
Everyone around the world is enjoying the benefits of digital applications and digital workflows that are more efficient than conventional workflows based on paper documents. The large-scale availability of mobile devices and cloud computing have further made it easier to work with digital documents and digital applications as they can be accessed and updated at any time, from anywhere on the internet.
Governments around the world can benefit by going paperless and using digital workflows, as are companies and organizations worldwide. Almost every person that owns a smartphone is accustomed to using the internet and can manage to work with digital documents. We will be discussing a few reasons why governments should consider going paperless:
Saves Employees' Time
By going paperless, governments can save a lot of time for their employees. When documents are stored in digital form on the cloud instead of physical form in the store room, employees can access the documents on the go instead of requesting documents from colleagues or co-workers.
Searching for a specific part or a specific line in a paper document can be a long and tedious job, especially if the document consists of multiple pages. With digital documents, employees can search for a specific part of the document or a specific paragraph using keywords in just a few seconds. Working with digital documents is way quicker than physical documents.
Various Tasks Can Be Automated
Another significant reason for governments to consider going paperless is that various tasks related to digital documents can be automated. There are now document automation systems available using which you can automate multiple tasks.
You can track the status of different documents, automatically notify the responsible people regarding different documents, create reminders so that tasks can be completed on time, and automatically populate databases with digital forms instead of manually entering data, etc. This automation allows various tasks to be carried out promptly without any bottlenecks.
Easy Accessibility Of Data
When a government institution goes paperless and stores all the data in a central storage space in the cloud, it becomes easily accessible for all employees. All employees can access different documents from the storage depending on their access permissions. In addition, any changes made to documents will take place in real-time, ensuring that every employee and every department has access to the latest data & information, which is something that is not achievable with paper documents.
Digital Documents Are Easier To Manage & Organize
Digital documents are much easier to organize and manage. Digital documents don’t require you to print and mail documents to citizens by postal service as it can be done through the internet via email. Along with this, there are various free programs available on the internet such as the PDF to Word converter that makes it easier for employees to work with PDF and Word documents by allowing them to convert PDFs into Word documents.
Similarly, there are various other free tools available such as Excel to PDF, JPG to PDF, Word to PDF, PDF Compressor, etc that make it so much more convenient to work with digital documents. And the best thing about these tools is that they are all available for free, which helps to cut down costs.
Brings Various Departments Closer
When data and documents from multiple departments are stored on a centralized storage system on the cloud, it will bring all departments close and allow them to collaborate. It will become easier for employees across various departments to access and manage documents from other departments on the go. This allows for better communication, brings different departments together, and eliminates communication bottlenecks that are usually seen with paper documents.
Require No Physical Storage Space
Digital documents require way less space than physical documents. Physical documents can pile up year after year and take up multiple rooms just in storage space. Not only are you paying for the storage space but searching through those documents can be a huge hurdle. With digital documents, you need minimal physical space to store the documents on the cloud, and searching through digital documents is always quicker and more convenient than searching through physical documents.
Easier For Citizens To Access
When documents are stored in digital form and there is a proper portal system built, it becomes easier for citizens to access the documents. To access physical documents, citizens have to take a trip to the city hall or various government offices but with a proper portal system built for digital documents, citizens can access information 24/7 without having to go anywhere, making it convenient for citizens too.
It might be clearer now why governments need to digitize various processes and go paperless. In the upcoming year, it will soon become a necessity due to technological advancements. So better make this transition sooner than later.