Last updated on May 2nd, 2022 at 11:04 am

If your company is like most, you’re grappling with the massive, sudden change you’ve undergone this past year and a half. You likely seek a tall order: to improve security, productivity, efficiency, and your ability to deliver a superior customer experience – all while reducing operating costs. This is a noble goal and one that is achievable with the right technology. If you’ve been considering upgrading the business systems you use to make this goal a reality, it can be challenging to know where to start. 

Below, we’ll explain three major trends to consider when evaluating your business technology systems so you can make the smartest decisions for your business in 2022. 

Embrace Document Management Software

Businesses are increasingly looking to software that reduces manual processes and improves operational efficiency, either on their premises or in the cloud. Document management software fulfills both goals, and businesses recognize its effect on their bottom lines. If you’re looking to reduce operating costs, boost employee productivity, and drive better customer experiences, consider document management software for a few reasons:

• Document control automates the management of documents and their workflows, helping you to improve quality practices and streamline most business processes.
• You’ll forgo the manual work of managing paper so your team can more efficiently process documents, control revisions and versions, and more swiftly retrieve files. 
• Say goodbye to the costs of storing physical paper – not to mention the wasted time employees spend searching for it. 
• Ensure compliance as document management software helps you meet various regulatory requirements, such as FDA, ISO, OSHA, and more.

Document management software addresses a serious obstacle for many businesses – 49 percent of people surveyed said they have trouble locating documents. And the same research found that 39 percent believe their document management/sales processes are broken in their organizations. The right document management technology will help you introduce an electronic workflow that improves the operational efficiency of your organization across every department. You’ll eliminate the bottlenecks that prevent workers from completing projects, representatives from closing sales, and customers from having the best experience possible. 

Consider the Cloud

While document management software can either be in the cloud or on your business’ premise, many organizations opt for the former. Companies that had not explored cloud computing solutions before 2020 were suddenly forced to make a move during the pandemic. The benefits of using cloud-based technologies are many and varied:

• Support for remote workforces. There is no better way to keep a remote or hybrid remote workforce connected, productive, and collaborative than with the cloud. Cloud-based communications solutions can integrate with collaboration solutions like Microsoft Teams to weave together advanced voice and file-sharing technologies. The cloud gives data access to every employee regardless of location or device.
• Predictable cost structure. A huge benefit of the cloud is the subscription-based fee structure associated with many solutions. Businesses can “pay as you go” per seat instead of spending hefty amounts of cash upfront to purchase hardware. This structure also enables scalability should the company need to add or remove seats at a moment’s notice.
• Automated upgrades. In an on-premise technology setting, IT has to upgrade solutions – a process that can disrupt business and/or take months. Your provider takes care of the upgrades in the cloud, so you sit back knowing you have the most up-to-date, secure, supported version of the technology.
• Superior security. One of the greatest myths about cloud solutions is that they are not as secure as on-premise ones. The evolution of the cloud over the last decade has meant that cloud providers now offer some of the most secure technologies on the planet, and they keep security top of mind so they can evolve as the threat landscape changes.

Automate, Automate, Automate

The name of the game in 2022 will be automation, and it will touch every industry. From automating manual tasks in the accounting department to saving time in legal with contract automation and automating follow-up emails from sales reps and customer service employees, businesses will look to offload any and all manual work. 

With artificial intelligence (AI) making its way into all types of software solutions, businesses will increasingly start to enjoy the time-saving, cost-saving, bottom line-boosting benefits of automation. AIOps, for example, is a solution for improving IT operations and incident management. Enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions are also working in AI and machine learning to enable better cross-department data integration and intelligence. 

Consider solutions that have embraced AI in your decision about upgrading business systems in 2022. You won’t have to worry about how robots will replace your employees – instead, you’ll benefit from being able to leverage human-only skills to contribute to higher-value tasks while the technology handles the tedious, repetitive work.  

Author Bio

Amy Rodrigues, Chief Customer Officer at DocXellent, has over 15 years of experience working directly with system administrators and end-users on maximizing their usage and investment in enterprise software. At DocXellent, she leads the Support and Professional Services teams and focuses on understanding each customer’s business use case(s) and how to effectively utilize ENSUR, DocXellent’s Document Management, and Quality Management Solution.  During her tenure at DocXellent, she has helped various global companies in the life sciences and consumer packaging space convert from MS Office/Paper-based systems to electronic forms-based specification management.