Do you need to know the 3 ways better information processing will help?
If you run a small to medium-sized business or organization and find that you’re ready for an information system to keep up with your growing pains, I hope this post will help convince you of the need for a modern and fast database solution that’s reliable and inexpensive.
Introduction
There are certainly more than 3 ways a better information processing system will help you achieve what you’re looking for.
The main areas, I’m focusing on this instance, are the impacts on administration, financial management, and on stakeholder and funder relationships for your business or organization.
Not every organization will face an administrative burden, or the mismanagement of financial resources, of course. Some organizations may have great working relationships with stakeholders and funders, but an information system can improve every organization whether the need can be ranked as severe or just moderately annoying.
Like everything else in life, there is a spectrum.
3 Ways Better Information Processing will Impact Administration
Reducing or removing manual functions seems an obvious one. Document storage, time and billing, and case management were and are routine tasks that are now better suited to being handled by an information processing system.
Document storage in filing systems have been catalogued for years. Often, we didn’t need to see the actual paper copy but the microfiche version.
Now, we can view an electronic version. Much quicker but often not always as handy as it could be. Think separate employee folders.
Only recently have cloud versions of document storage made it easier for everyone, everywhere.
Having one system, that the whole team can access is performance-wise, one of the most effective ways to retrieve and store documents.
Time and billing systems have been manually tracked for years. Successfully, too. But the need for quicker response times and payment times have changed all that.
Not everyone works by the hour either, there are time-and-effort reports made where you certify you worked 100% of the time on a certain case or project.
Great systems exist today that make this manual process easier. Again, having it part of the case or project management system, as whole is what would make it most effective. One system, one place.
Case management has been carried out manually for years. You still see legal offices, for example, with volumes of files surrounding desks in their workspaces. You can barely move a file or a stack of files without throwing off their entire flow. How better information processing will impact administration in a profound way in spaces like these is a whole conversation in itself.
I love the tactile feel of paper as much as the next person. Putting pen to paper is faster for me than typing something up. Using an electronic note system has never been my favourite way of remembering or recording anything. Only lately, have I started writing things and then storing, or rewriting, it into my personal information system at the end of the workday. What I’m trying to say here is: do what works for you! If it’s not working, read on.
Creating legal documents – you know those forms where the spaces are left blank, and the admin staff fills in the template manually or electronically? If you’re doing this, you should know that a system with better information processing can make this manual system easier for everyone.
You can install a database system that records these fields in a table and fills the form in for you. Everything except the signature line, of course.
Find a mistake? Fix the database record and submit it again.
No need to double record everything either. Your information processing system with the case management file will know a form has been sent and you can store the final signed document when you receive it.
No blank areas in the form either unless you need them to appear. It will save paper if the intention is to print it out and mail. Everything is just neater, if clean and professional is what you’re aiming for.
Stay tuned for more.