A large part of a company’s success depends on day-to-day processes that are easy to overlook. Office automation (the digitizing of clerical functions such as printing, photocopying, and data storage) is a system that’s invisible when everything’s running smoothly. It proves its necessity, however, when something goes wrong and business is thrown to a screeching halt.
What makes automation such an integral part of doing business, that firms like JJ Bender can carve a brand out of the need for pre-owned automation equipment? Office automation provides four key advantages over manual systems: efficiency, productivity, consistency, and economy.
Efficiency
Whether a company is situated within a fast or slow-moving industry, automation allows for the quick and seamless execution of various tasks. Printing is an obvious example, with the constant demand for new or used printers, photocopy machines, and other types of office machinery.
But functions such as secretarial work can also be automated thanks to the growing popularity of freelancers, virtual assistants and shared calendars–to name just a few of the innovations coming out of the tech industry in the last decade. These products of the information age allow the modern office to ensure that routines are followed to the tee, and to speed up their workflow to make the most out of the 9-to-5.
Productivity
Quick business processes are one thing, but the high output is another gem entirely, and one the modern office owes to automation. Because machines can perform repetitive tasks at high speeds without the burden of fatigue, an office is able to produce more of the factors that go into their workday: marketing letters, memos, brochures, and the like.
Since information organization plays a large part in optimizing an office, the human end of the work process also receives a significant boost, as employees can focus on increasing their creative output and reaching more clients and consumers, no longer having to start from scratch when organizing their schedules, mail, and address books.
Consistency
While the human touch is absolutely necessary for designing marketing paraphernalia, writing documents, and building systems, human execution can yield inconsistent results and the unavoidable risk of errors.
Automation comes with the guarantee of consistency, meaning that overlooked updates and reminders are virtually a thing of the past and that an increasing number of office functions can yield an output of similar quality.
Economy
The most noteworthy benefit of office automation is also the most strongly-felt: modern offices minimize costs after streamlining their processes through automation. There are a number of reasons for this, but the most intuitive is the ability to keep corporate structure efficient by reducing the number of redundant positions. Automation allows companies to keep their staff populated by the best and brightest, trained to make the most out of the technology at hand and avoid reliance on assistants.
The cost of office automation varies, but the right setup can save you a fortune in salary and business lost to human error.
All told, office automation is responsible for huge strides in corporate success. Like any great technological revolution, companies that learn to ride the wave have received and will continue to receive, a significant edge over their competition.
