When done right, a paperless office can improve productivity, save time, and save costs — but if executed incorrectly, it can result in the permanent loss of important documents and lead to negative push-back from employees. Learn how to decide on the right level of paper in your office and how to prepare for a smooth transition.

If you have more questions about converting to a paperless office, or want guidance for your specific business situation, we offer a few paperless office efficiency consulting packages.

Why Go Paperless?

• Save money by buying less paper and toner;
• Extend the life of your current printer(s) and copier(s) and decrease maintenance costs;
• Eliminate the need to make copies of files that logically fit in multiple locations;
• Save money by emailing documents in lieu of faxing or mailing them;
• Never again paw through multiple file cabinets looking for the right item, or figuring out what folder someone else put it in, with full-text electronic document search;
• Protect key business records from fire, water damage, and theft;
• Improve security with granular file permissions that let you specify exactly which employees can access which documents (much better than a simple lock and key);
• Improve employee productivity by eliminating the need to get up from a desk and rummage in a file cabinet or central document room;
• Increase available office space by eliminating file cabinets;
• Access your entire record collection remotely when working from home or on a business trip;
• Avoid having to lug boxes of paper if you move offices.

Take Stock of Your Current Situation

A paperless office isn’t the best fit for every business. If you have one drawer of paper files that’s rarely opened, purchasing a scanner may not be worth it. Additionally, if your business culture is not very technology-oriented, a paperless system can quickly become a nightmare as employees struggle to locate and/or scan records on computers they are uncomfortable using.

You may decide that a partially paperless office is the best option, or decide to convert only a limited number of pieces into electronic form as a test before fully committing.

Prep the Team

Include as many employees as possible in the decision-making process. If an employee is involved in the initial process and able to contribute ideas, they are much more likely to embrace the new system instead of rejecting it. Soliciting feedback from every level of your company can also help you gauge whether a paperless office can work within your existing culture.

Often, the majority of employees will be comfortable with the idea of going paperless, but one or two will be scared and/or resistant. (They are usually the ones least comfortable with new technologies.) Be proactive about providing additional training and hands-on examples to your team without singling anyone out.

If at all possible, purchase one scanner and encourage every team member to experiment with it (even with their own personal documents). Dropping in an electric bill and being able to copy and paste the tiny fine print on the back from a PDF a minute later can genuinely be fun and exciting. (Admittedly, after scanning 100 electric bills, this excitement wanes.) Try to scan fast food receipts, newspaper articles, posters on the wall, or even (clean) candy bar wrappers; it’s amazing how energizing this exercise can be in an office. If everyone is comfortable with the scanning process ahead of time, the transition will be much smoother.

A particularly successful strategy for encouraging adoption of a paperless office is to let employees use company scanners for their own records (either during lunch or on their off-hours). If they take steps to use less paper in their personal lives, those habits will naturally influence their behavior at work, too.

Designate a Central Repository for Scanned Records

Where you store your now-electronic files depends on how often they’re accessed, and who needs to access them.

The easiest place to store documents commonly shared by a team is within an existing CRM like Salesforce. Your CRM should already provide granular permissions (so you can specify which employees have access to which files). A web-based CRM will also provide you with remote access, so traveling employees can get what they need without having to ask others to fax or email them specific pieces of paperwork. (You can also shut this option off.)

For documents that are rarely accessed, or that are accessed by just one person, a set of folders on a single computer station can work just fine.

Choose the Best Scanner(s)

The right scanner and OCR (optical character recognition, aka text-recognition) software means the difference between a pleasant and a disastrous paperless office experience.

How many documents will you scan on a daily or weekly basis? How precise does the OCR software need to be? Does it need to read handwriting or just computer type? Do you need it to scan large piles of paper by itself? (Tip: a flatbed scanner is never a good choice for a paperless office.) Do you need quality image scanning, too? A scanner that can scan images at a high enough quality to reprint them later will be more expensive.

In a high-volume office, the best choice may be a large central scanner (manned by an administrative assistant) with smaller desktop scanners on certain employees’ desks.

I love the ScanSnap S1500 (Windows) or ScanSnap S1500M (Mac) and suggest it for any office or employee that scans 25 or less documents each day. (Fujitsu often provides ScanSnap rebates, so be sure to check when ordering.)

Backup First

A document backup plan must be implemented and tested before you start scanning a single sheet.

Your backup system must have an on-site component (i.e. external hard drives) and a remote component (i.e. automatic backup via JungleDisk). Having only an on-site backup leaves you at risk for theft, fire, water damage, or simply faulty hardware; having only a remote backup can result in a restore process that takes multiple hours (if you have a lot of files that must be re-downloaded). For ultimate security, purchase multiple on-site hard drives and store the inactive one(s) in a safe deposit box.

If you are backing up sensitive information, ensure that access to the backup files is just as restricted as access to the originals. You may want (or need, depending on your industry) to have your backup plan reviewed by a computer security consultant.

I suggest JungleDisk for most backup situations. It stores files on Amazon S3 servers and offers you the option to encrypt files. JungleDisk also provides secure remote access and can double as a shared file server within the company.

Before You Scan, Eliminate

Review your current incoming documents for opportunities to eliminate paper in the first place.

Can you elect to receive certain bills electronically (and stop paper statements)? If you can, be sure it’s crystal-clear which email address the bills will go to, and who is responsible for making sure the electronic files are stored on the company system.

Are your employees printing blank forms only to fill them out by hand and file them? If so, look into creating PDF forms that your employees can fill out and save without printing, or consider a CRM solution for storing documents and customer/order details.

Decide on a File Naming and Sorting Convention

While scanning and OCRing records makes them full-text searchable, it’s surprising how often a piece of paper doesn’t explicitly say what it is. For example, a mortgage payment may not say “mortgage” anywhere. Consider documents you receive regularly (i.e. bills) and whether or not they contain their associated keywords. If not, include the keywords in the filename and/or as a note attached to the file itself.

If you stick to a regular scanning schedule in the future, documents will have an accurate “Created On” date that you can use to sort by. However, older documents will need a dating convention. I suggest:

YYYYMMDD-Keywords.extension

Why the year first? Consider what happens if you sort a computer folder by filename. If you list the month first, you’ll end up with multiple years grouped together. Putting the year first ensures accurate chronological sorting in one click.

A document filing system can mimic your existing filing cabinet methodology, with the added advantage of being able to copy a single file into multiple locations. (You can also put the file in one location and create shortcuts to that file from other locations.) Be sure to separate actively-used files (i.e. forms) from archived files. It’s also easier to define permission on a per-folder basis than a per-file basis, so aim to group confidential documents (like tax receipts or employment contracts) together.

Make a Scanning Plan for Existing Documents

Whatever you do, don’t designate a “Scanning Day” and have your employees feed file cabinet after file cabinet into the scanner. This method is guaranteed to make your entire team resent you and the entire scanning process, and resentment is the wrong way to start off a new policy.

Take stock of all the papers that need to be converted into electronic form, and how fast your scanner can scan. As long as all new documents are scanned immediately, there’s likely not a rush to get all of your old documents done as quickly. If the job seems overwhelming, aim for just one or two file folders a day, or ask each team member to be responsible for scanning one folder each day. Before you know it, your papers will be gone, and you can get rid of your now-empty filing cabinets.

For particularly high-volume scanning needs, consider hiring an outside service.

You must also plan for disposing of old documents. (Even though your backup plan should have been thoroughly tested by this point, it’s still a best practice to hold onto your paper records for at least one month before disposing of them, just in case.) Routine papers can be recycled, but confidential materials should be professionally shredded and disposed.

Paper Is Not Necessarily the Enemy

Converting a paperless office doesn’t have to literally involve eliminating every last sheet. Sometimes, a little paper can be a good thing.

Not every employee works best at a computer screen, especially when reading or copy-editing long documents. Make sure everyone understands it’s okay to occasionally print if it results in higher-quality work.

If certain documents need to be printed or copied on a regular basis (like a feedback form included with customer orders), it wastes a lot of time and energy if employees print them one at a time. If possible, run a large batch on a copy machine once and distribute a stack for each employee to keep at their desk.

(Photo by gregoryjameswalsh.)

You can port all of your existing POP/IMAP accounts into your free GMail account. You can also send from any email address, provided you have access to it in order to click the link in their confirmation notice. Great. What they don’t tell you is that every header on every outgoing message will then include this line:

From: yourusername@gmail.com On Behalf Of Your Name
(theemailyouthoughtyousentfrom@yourdomain.com)

This isn’t hiding in the extended headers somewhere… this is right there for everyone using Outlook and other mail programs to see. It’s to protect against spammers using the service, but mostly, it’s annoying. It’s also not mentioned anywhere, except in user forums where fellow GMailers explained that you can avoid this by paying $50/year to signup for Google Apps for your Domain.

I finally fork over my $50, only to discover mid-process that they limit the number of domain aliases you can use. (I have 24 separate domains + misspellings of some of those domains.) I think I got to #13 when I was greeted by a mean little red sentence informing me I surpassed this undisclosed limit. Obnoxious!

I also kept getting a mysterious “temporary 502″ error when I tried to access various pages:

Temporary Error (502)

We’re sorry, but your Gmail account is currently experiencing errors. You won’t be able to use your account while these errors last, but don’t worry, your account data and messages are safe. Our engineers are working to resolve this issue.

Please try accessing your account again in a few minutes.

Mind you this error persisted for three days, not a few minutes.

Two emails back and forth with support later, I got zero help. They kept reminding me to change my MX records. Yea, that’s what I’m going to do, send my MX records your way when you can’t explain why half my clicks result in an error message.

I’m sure I could pay $50/year/per domain to avoid this problem, and then port those 24 accounts into another GMail account, but I don’t feel like paying $1200/year for the privilege when Fusemail provides more features and seamlessly handles over 100 domains for $10/month.

In the end, I deleted my Google Apps account and ported all my domains through a single Fusemail.com account (on the suggestion of my new hero, PickledOnion). I’ve been checkiing my email for more than a year now with a real program — Mail.app — and haven’t missed Gmail for a second.

If you’re looking to hire a social media consultant, it’s probably because you are looking for someone more familiar with the social media space than you are. While a competent consultant can quickly get your business up to speed in the proper online communities–resulting in more sales and improved customer satisfaction–the wrong consultant can cost you thousands of dollars and months of lost time, and possible do irreparable harm to your brand name and reputation.

Give how low the barrier to entry is for getting involved with social media (it really only takes 5-10 minutes of filling out a few online forms), it can be harder to spot the good social media consultants amidst the bad. The more popular social media becomes, the more quacks and witch doctors are self-appointing themselves “social media experts.”

Here are seven signs you should stay away from a social media consultant:

1: They Signed Up for Twitter in 2008 or Later

A skilled social media consultant is an early adopter. Hiring a social media consultant who comes late to the game immediately sets your business up at a disadvantage for participating in new and relevant social networks early–and the earlier you have a social media presence, the more influence and visibility you’ll have.

While you may have heard about it only recently, Twitter has been around since 2006. Signing up in 2008 or after means this alleged social media consultant missed the boat by more than two years. Remember, this is allegedly their area of expertise.

You can use When Did I Start Twitter? to determine the date someone signed up for Twitter.

Just in case they try to pull a fast one on you: you can change a username from within the same Twitter account, so wanting/needing a different username from the one they first signed up with is not justification for having a newer account signup date.

2: They Don’t Have a Blog

Some people have been blogging for 10 or more years at this point. Blogs are one of the foundations of social media; any consultant worth their weight will know how to set one up, optimize it for search engines, provide relevant content, and interact with the community. If they lacked the initiative to do this for themselves, they’ll similarly lack initiative when working on your projects.

It’s true that microblogging environments like Twitter have replaced blogging for some purposes, but there are still many times when you need to share a message in more than 140 characters.

3: They Don’t Actively Use a CRM

Not using a CRM (customer relationship management tool) is basically the equivalent of saying that this consultant will cultivate relationships and connections on your behalf, but will not share those contacts with you.

A CRM logs basic details (names, company names, website URLs, Twitter handles) as well as notes and copies of emails, Twitter messages, and other social media messages exchanged. This way you have a permanent record of the various conversations and connections involving your brand.

I’ll be the first to admit that no CRM tool has full caught up with the needs of social media, and this can require a bit more copying and pasting than an efficiency consultant would like. However, just because the tools aren’t perfect doesn’t mean the job doesn’t need doing. When the social media consultant eventually leaves, it’s critical that you have a record of the body of work they accumulated that you can continue to build upon. Otherwise, all the money you spent in consulting fees goes straight down the drain.

Anecdotally, a lack of familiarity with a CRM is indicative of a lack of business and consulting experience in general. A competent consultant would use a CRM to keep track of their own clients and leads.

4: They Claim You Can’t Measure ROI for Social Media

The myth that social media efforts cannot be measured or tracked is pervasive, and also completely and utterly false. Every other marketing effort, from yellow page ads to infomercials to billboards, can be measured; on the Internet, efforts can be measured with ten times more (not less) accuracy.

Every ROI (return-on-investment) calculation for social media ultimately goes back to how the social media consultant’s efforts are driving sales for your business. Even goals like increased customer satisfaction or providing more timely customer service ultimately tie back to increased sales.

Be wary of measuring things that don’t actually impact your bottom line. For example, if your website gets 1,000 new visitors this week, but makes zero new sales, you did not get a return on your investment (unless your goal is to increase traffic numbers to charge advertisers higher rates). You want your social media efforts to bring in qualified, relevant traffic—not just clicks, but sales.

5: They Want to Do Everything Themselves Instead of Showing You How

Social media is a set of communication tools, just like email and telephones. You wouldn’t install a telephone system and have the guy from AT&T make and answer all of your phone calls for you indefinitely; you’d learn how to use the phone yourself. The same goes for social media.

That said, many business owners are very busy and naturally delegate work, including answering phones/emails and social media interactions. They key is that you should choose to continue to employ the social media consultant to work on your campaigns, and not need to continue to pay them because you don’t know how to replicate what they’re doing (or know what they’re doing at all).

6: They’re Okay with Spamming Your [Potential] Customers

Ask any potential social media consultant how they plan to increase your followers, on Twitter and elsewhere. If they mention any sort of tool or service that adds new followers automatically, run—don’t walk—away. The same goes if they suggest purchasing an email list. You don’t like receiving email spam; so why would you introduce yourself to potential new customers by spamming them?

The only correct way to build social media relationships is for a human to build those relationships. While many tools are great for identifying which social media participants compose your target market, reaching out to them with an automatic robot is anything but social.

7: They Have No Proven Experience

Before you pay anyone for social media consulting work, ask to see tangible results that they have delivered in the past. Ideally, these results will involve past business clients, but efforts to promote their own services or blog(s) within the social media space can provide equal proof of their competence.

Social media is inherently public-facing. Unless there were truly unusual circumstances, a quick Google should be able to show you how successful (or unsuccessful) their past social media efforts were. Try searching for both the name of the company/blog they were promoting, and search as though you were trying to find that service but did not know the company name. For example, if they did promotional work for XYZ Hot Dog Stand in Seattle, try searching for hot dogs in Seattle and see how often (if at all) their client shows up.

While you’re at it, make sure you Google their name. Unless they have a very common name, a strong social media presence will immediately be apparent within the first few pages of the search. (Try searching “Marina Martin” and see what comes up on the first page.)

(Photo by mugley.)

Spreadtweet is a Twitter client that makes a person’s incoming Twitter stream look like a typical Excel spreadsheet, giving the impression that an employee is working when they really are not.

You can tell the difference between Spreadtweet and a real Excel file by looking at the top of the screen. An Excel spreadsheet would not have “Home” and Replies” buttons, and it would not include a blank field with a “Send” button next to it.

If your company uses employee time tracking software (like RescueTime), look for an application called “Spreadtweet” in your logs. (The end of the name may vary slightly, depending on which version of Excel they are trying to mimic. In this case, I’m using the Mac OS X Spreadtweet.) A few minutes a day may be innocent enough, but using Spreadtweet may be indicative of other below-the-radar behaviors.

I don’t encourage micromanagement, and I strongly believe that a few minutes of downtime here and there ultimately increase attention and productivity. The real problem with Spreadtweet is deception. I would seriously question the honesty and value of an employee who had Spreadtweet up right in front of me and expected me not to know the difference.

Obviously, if Twitter is part of an employee’s job, or if your company has flexible working arrangements and/or a social media policy, using Twitter on the job may not be a concern. However, if they don’t have official permission and feel the need to hide their activities, what the employee is really doing is stealing. You are paying them for their time, and they are accepting the payment but not providing services for that paid time.

If you walk up to an employee using Spreadtweet, ask them to show you what they’re up to (in a non-accusatory tone, as though you believe they are really working on work). A more honest employee will admit their indiscretion and probably be shamed into not doing it again. If they genuinely try to convince you they’re doing work, however, I’d begin termination proceedings pretty quickly.

The following custom formula field assigns a time zone based on the state or province. For states/provinces in multiple time zones, it assigns the time zone of the majority of that region. (In other words, it may be off by an hour in some places, but it does the trick.)

(If you have trouble reading the code, here’s a plain text version.)


IF(LEN( BillingState)=0, “None”,
IF(CONTAINS(”CT:DC:DE:FL:GA:IN:ME:MD:MA:MI:NH:NJ:NY:NC:OH:PA:RI:SC:VT:VA:WV:ON:QC:NB:NS:NL:PE”, BillingState), “GMT-5 Eastern”,
IF(CONTAINS(”AL:AR:IL:IA:KS:KY:LA:MN:MS:MO:NE:ND:OK:SD:TN:TX:WI:SK:MB:NU”, BillingState), “GMT-6 Central”,
IF(CONTAINS(”AZ:CO:ID:MT:NM:UT:WY:AB:NT”, BillingState), “GMT-7 Mountain”,
IF(CONTAINS(”AK”, BillingState), “GMT-9 Alaska”,
IF(CONTAINS(”HI”, BillingState), “GMT-10 Hawaii”,
IF(CONTAINS(”CA:NV:OR:WA:BC:YT”, BillingState), “GMT-8 Pacific”, “Other”)))))))