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Going Green With Paperless Procurement
As society pushes the modern business world toward sustainable practices, the bottom line becomes about more than just finances. The green movement encourages companies to consider social and environmental factors in addition to economic concerns. Governments and regulatory bodies are implementing increasing numbers of environmental regulations for companies. In addition, customers are also more and more likely to expect your company to “go green.”
In the long term, this focus on sustainability through green procurement and other business practices often has significant financial benefits. Environmental sustainability can go hand-in-hand with economic sustainability. In addition, “going green” can give others a more positive impression of your company and keep your business one step ahead of regulatory compliance.
Why Go Green?
Sustainable business practices might have a higher up-front cost, but companies are increasingly seeing return on investment in terms of procuring longer-lasting, safer, and more reliable products. Socially responsible products are often manufactured to a higher quality standard and use fewer hazardous materials. Safer products lessen the risk of lawsuits, and the higher safety standards typically result in a quality product that lasts longer before needing to be replaced.
Going green also has a positive impact on the company’s reputation, which can lead to increased business. More and more frequently, business partners and consumers are seeking to work with companies that are environmentally friendly and demonstrate a commitment to conducting business in a responsible, sustainable manner. Taking your company green may even lead to increased opportunities to work with government organizations and other businesses that prefer contracting with green companies.
The Paper Problem
Going green in the procurement department isn’t limited to going paperless, but that’s a big step. Paper is an environmentally costly thing to produce, so there’s no sense in using it to print documents that are often thrown away or that could be much more easily stored in digital format. Paper is also less secure since documents with sensitive information are often left on printers for anyone to see and paper is easier to destroy than digital documents (which can be password-protected and backed up in multiple locations).
Paper also has a monetary cost, and not just the cost of the paper. Paper costs are compounded by the price of printing, copying, storage, and postage. Shockingly, maintaining a standard filing cabinet can cost companies $1,500 to $2,100 a year! Plus, you’ll have to pay to trash or recycle the paper that you don’t store. Altogether, some estimate that the final cost of using paper is 30 times the amount spent to purchase paper.
There’s also a higher processing cost: paper processing takes longer than digital processing, which means paying employees more per transaction. One of the big benefits of going digital—especially with business process automation software—is that employees don’t have to waste time on repetitive, time-consuming manual tasks. In a Zapier survey of people working at small to medium-sized businesses, “76 percent of respondents said they spend 1-3 hours a day” on data entry, and “73 percent of workers spend 1-3 hours just trying to find information or a particular document.” Paper isn’t the only reason for this inefficiency, but it does contribute to the problem.
Making The First Move
Given today’s business climate, you probably won’t meet with much opposition to bringing a focus on sustainability into your company’s procurement process. Once your company commits to going green, you can immediately start taking steps toward the goal of entirely green procurement.
Start by researching green suppliers and asking your current suppliers if you can have a copy of their green policies and standards. If they have one, then you may not have to look for a new supplier. If they don’t, the request will let them know that you’re interested in procuring green products and why you could be switching suppliers in the near future.
Next, work on developing green policies and procedures for your company. You might consider taking a look at the green policies of other corporations for ideas, as well as getting your PR and Marketing departments involved, along with the Corporate Social Responsibility department if your company has one.
Sustaining Green Procurement
Green procurement must look at the bottom line in a sense that includes social, environmental, and economic concerns. Taking all these factors into consideration isn’t nearly as challenging when you have reliable software helping with the procurement process. NextProcess’ Purchase Order Module gives you increased control and insight into your company’s purchasing practices and lets you automatically enforce key purchasing policies.
With business process automation software, going paperless is a goal that’s within your company’s reach. Making the switch to digital, automated procurement is an essential step in creating a sustainable purchasing solution. These systems reduce paper use, speed up processing, and streamline the whole procurement process to provide long-term procurement solutions that are good for the environment and your company.
As your company moves closer and closer to the goal of green procurement, continue to set goals, refine your strategy, and conduct evaluations. If all goes well, you’ll soon start seeing rewards like lower long-term costs and better public perception. Making the move to green, sustainable procurement won’t happen overnight, but it’s a goal worth pursuing. Contact us today to learn more about how NextProcess can support your company’s green initiatives. We’ll be happy to answer your questions and schedule a free demo so you can see our software in action.
