More government offices pledge paperless conversion

While many businesses and organizations have made the effort to go green, many state and local government offices have been leading that charge. Efforts, such as moving into Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certified offices and conservation campaigns, have provided important steps on this path and helped government entities reduce waste and go green.

According to Government Technology, many more government bodies are adopting paperless office initiatives as part of this process. Adopting the cloud, tablets and other new technology can help a business reduce power consumption, but the amount of paper generated in most offices is a major resource that can be reduced to help save the environment.

"It’s just amazing how much paper government agencies use," said Tom Spengler, CEO of Granicus, a cloud company that recently saw 70 various government entities pledge to be part of its Go Green Project and go paperless.

One step in the process of going paperless is providing access to older paperwork as well. By adopting non-paper resources but not investing in document conversion service for older records, an organization is only going halfway. Converting all office paperwork to the same system improves overall information management, as well as access to the information for employees.

According to the news source, many offices are uploading meeting notes and packets to iPads, instead of printing them, as well as adopting web and other resources to disseminate information. Multnomah County, Oregon, recently saw savings up to $40,000 a year after switching to a paperless system.

In addition to saving an organization money, and helping with energy and environmental efforts, going paperless can help improve business processes, making workflow more efficient and ultimately increasing overall productivity in the office.