By Rodolfo de Juana Thursday, July16, 2009 at 9:50AM
Talking about the office of the future means talking about the paperless office and,
more specifically, how new technological improvements can help enterprises of any
size obtain cost savings and operate more efficiently using electronic documents.
Although the advantages of the paperless office seem more than clear, it is hardly
implemented by Spanish SMEs, which are generally resistant to technological innovations.
About this, and much more, we discussed with Julio Olivares, founder of
.
is a Spanish document technology software manufacturer. Founded in 1992 in Madrid,
the company now has two development centers. Its document solutions, besides from
having been implemented in many large Spanish companies, are exported to various
American, Asian and European countries.
When asking the company´s president about the reason for this "lack of interest
in document management" among Spanish SMEs, Olivares was cautious. "Large enterprises,
such as banks, understand the need to reduce their paper consumption, and many have
already implemented document management systems. However, the advantages of document
management are not as clearly appreciated by SMEs, which have a much lower volume
of printed documents," said Olivares.
Despite this, this does not mean that paper consumption of small companies in Spain
should not be a matter for consideration. "There´s an abuse of paper,"
said Olivares, who explained that employees are normally not aware that "printing
is a cost for the company. They do not realise how much printing costs the company
at the end of the year."
For this reason, he encourages businessmen to implement document management systems
with a little experiment. "It is sufficient to inform employees that a print control
system will be installed (even though one really won't be) for them to pay attention
to their printing habits and drastically reduce unnecessary printing".
Cost savings for SMEs
However, document management does not only depend on making the employees aware of
its need, since technology also plays an important role in this field. "In
fact, adequate management of print processes can produce cost savings of 30%", said
the president of
.
Cost savings are obtained with multi-functional systems "that allow office workers
to print, copy, capture as images and send and receive by email all kinds of documents"
and with adequate software to control who is printing what and why, set printing
limitations, etc. Moreover, if the whole process is outsourced (physical components,
printer supplies, etc.), SMEs can reduce costs even more.
However, why aren't these technologies more successful among small businesses despite
all their obvious advantages? According to Olivares, several factors come into play.
In the first place
"there´s a general lack of knowledge in the Spanish small business
sector,"" , which he considers to be
"excessively conservative" and not very
eager to "take risks in the management of their IT systems."
Additionally, Olivares explained that the same small business mentality makes the
small businessman "act impulsively, without defining clearly distinct roles in the
company. The small businessman wants to have absolute control over everything and
this just can not be," he said.
Another factor that the founder of
points out is that "organizations are often resistant to change because of
"obsolete processes that have been operating for ages but can not be easily replaced
because businessmen believe it is difficult to find and implement new and adequate
technologies..
"In reality," Olivares underlined, "it's a problem of a lack of knowlege, since
installing this type of system is very simple, investment costs are low and the
ROI is almost immediate."
The office of the future
However, there are reasons to believe that the paperless office will also be a reality
in the world of SMEs sooner or later. The first reason, according to Olivares,
is the existence of a "generation gap" that indicates that businessmen over 50 years
old "continue to be very attached to paper, to such an extent that they even print
all documents they receive via email." The new generation is "becoming more and
more aware of the importance of efficient management" of a scarse resource.
On the other hand, our society is becoming more and more open to ecological conscience
and considers that enterprises should play a leading role in environmental
matters. "Clearly, movements such as Green IT and ecological conscience will have
much to say in a near future," said Olivares.
An ecological conscience, however, does not only emerge from the businessmen themselves
but is also "imposed" by the Government by means of bills and taxes.
Olivares takes the (imposed) tendency into consideration, but he does not believe
it to be the ideal way to bring about change. "We cannot change things by decree,
and institutions that try to are naive,"said Olivares. "Changes must be brought
about gradually. Instead of imposed, change must be encouraged," he added.
MuyPymes.com
About 
Founded in 1992, Madrid-based
develops and sells software that covers the entire document life cycle and helps companies across the globe produce and manage their documents. Among its international clients are prestigiously recognized banks and front line corporations, for which it facilitates the difficult and complex task of designing, generating and distributing their critical business documents.
maintains a strong commitment to R&D, an area to which it allocates 50 percent of its revenue. For more information, visit:
www.docpath.com
and the
logo are DocPath Document Solutions registered trademarks. All rights reserved. Other mentioned trademarks may be property of their respective owners.
Press Contact:
Rafael Alcaraz
Intro Ibérica
email: rafael@introiberica.com
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