Documents are an essential part of every business operation, from contracts to employee onboarding paperwork to invoices and beyond. Since the 1990s, PDF has become the leading force in the digital transformation of the workplace, but IDC estimates that most organizations suffer a 21.3 percent loss of productivity over document challenges.
The Costs of the Paper-Based Workplace
Enterprise organizations have a significant opportunity to improve how their employees work, and your PDF productivity solution is the best place to start. But don’t take our word for it, the numbers speak for themselves:
- Copying and printing: Yes, printers are expensive to run—just think of the paper, ink, toner, and machine maintenance costs—but let’s get real: People hate printers. There’s a reason that 23 percent of all IT help desk calls are printer related. Printers old and new are glitchy, impossible to troubleshoot on your own, and when you need something printed on deadline there always seems to be an error.
- Employee productivity: The average employee wastes countless hours every single week going back and forth to the printer, scanner, or fax machine, not to mention the time spent looking for, filing, and re-filing documents. In one study, 81 percent of employees said they found themselves working on the wrong version of a file, which not only kills productivity, but it stresses your employees out, too. In today’s world, being paper-based just doesn’t work.
- Business process: Managing all that paper usually requires hiring someone to do it, which means additional salaries. On top of that, the average company wastes $2.5 million to $3.5 million per year searching for and recreating lost documents.
- Security and disaster recovery: Lost or misplaced documents, not to mention documents that aren’t properly disposed of, can pose a huge threat to your company’s data. And we’ve all seen something on the printer that we shouldn’t have—tax returns, bonus statements, flight details. Paper records breaches are more common than you think, and they don’t just happen in the health sector, either. If it’s private, it should be kept digital.
- Environmental impact: The paper and pulp industry is the third largest contributor to water, air, and soil pollution, and paper makes up 26 percent of solid waste that ends up in landfills.
Give Remote Workforces What They Need
In the modern workplace, all workers need to be able to complete tasks quickly, collaboratively, securely, and remotely as needed. A robust tool to boost PDF productivity empowers your staff to create, edit, and convert documents—as well as get signatures or eSign a document themselves—whenever and wherever they need them.
With an integrated PDF productivity and eSigning solution, you no longer have to print files and worry about the ever-changing, remote workforce, or that a sensitive file wasn’t properly disposed of, putting your company’s data at risk. Ensuring that you choose a secure tool that stores your PDF files in the cloud and has certifications, such as SOC 2 Type 2 and HIPAA, will put your mind to rest. You won’t need to worry about the massive security and recovery costs associated with cybercriminals infecting your files with malware or other potentially crippling viruses when you have a secure and compliant PDF productivity tool that has top-notch support just a call or click away.
Use and Collaborate on PDF Documents Easily: With a low learning curve, a PDF productivity solution can help your employees spend minutes, not hours, on PDF files—whether that means creating, editing, eSigning, converting, combining, or sending documents. PDF productivity tools allow the modern workplace to thrive with lower operations costs, less physical storage, reduced risk, fewer errors, and an attention to environmental impact. All of these benefits are a boon to efficiency and better relationships—with customers, clients, vendors, and even your very own employees.
Get Stress-Free eSignatures: More than 51 percent of all printing is done just to get a signature from someone else. Imagine eliminating all of that paper waste by using an eSigning solution. People are busy, more workers are remote, the C-suite is constantly on video conferences. With a fully integrated tool that combines PDF editing with eSigning, you no longer need to print files for signatures, wait for them to be signed, or scan them back in again. Whether you need a signature on a PO, contract, expense report, or NDA, at the click of a button, you can sign a file or request a signature from another party.
Arm Yourself to Start Working Better with Documents
Equipped with Nitro, no one should ever again need to deal with a printer, paper, or even a pen.
As the eSigning solution of the Nitro Productivity Platform, Nitro Sign enables anyone to make an unlimited number of eSignature requests that can be completed from any device with a mobile browser. Anyone can use Nitro Sign Essentials. Start your free trial here.
For larger teams and businesses, contact us today about a free managed trial for your team.
