6 Things You Need to Update in Your Office Now

Everyone wants to be a part of the modern business world, yet some of us are still living in the Stone Age. Not an actual age of stone, mind you, but an age in which bulky fax machines and filing cabinets are still the engines of an office.

While you might be at least one step ahead of the electric telegraph, others are having much more fun with their modern toys and, consequently, are moving at a much faster pace. Here are six things you might still have lingering around your office that have got to go:

“Fax? Why don’t you just send it over on a dinosaur?”

First on the list is the dreaded fax machine. I do remember a time when these contraptions were incredibly useful, but now it’s all just a strange blur. Today, most businesses capitalize on services like eFax which allow you to send and receive fax documents in digital format. Instead of using paper, you’ll just be using your email. This preserves the undeniable importance of fax communication without forcing you to surrender your email address to everyone you make contact with.

Postage Meter

This was also once a very helpful device when it came to communication. In fact, the concept alone is timeless—the convenience of paying postage and tracking postage costs from the comfort of your office is a luxury that just might never die. However, there are new ways to go about doing it, specifically via Stamps.com.  The site allows you to calculate and print official, USPS postage for almost everything. Whether you need to send postcards, packages or business mail, you can do it all without ever visiting the post office and can usually save around 75% of the money spent on postage meters.

PBX Phone System

Public Branch Exchange phone systems are networks set within a company that cut costs by distinguishing inside calls from outside calls. Nowadays, the ultimate cost-cutting award goes to VoIP (Voice over IP) systems, which allow telecommunication companies to use the Internet for voice calls. Fitting multiple conversations into the same amount of bandwidth makes the phone bill plummet more than you would initially imagine.

Even better, VoIP technology can be implemented into PBX systems (often referred to as IP PBX systems) so that any device can be used for outside numbers and long-distance calls. If the usefulness of such technology isn’t appealing enough for you, then the substantial amount of money you can save by upgrading should do the trick.

Filing Cabinets

Oh yes, there’s no getting around this one. Good reasons for keeping filing cabinets around the office are sparse—they take up too much space and there’s no real guarantee that essential files will always be protected. Right now, it’s important that you capitalize on document imaging. Instead of storing mountains of paperwork inside a cabinet, you can just keep digital copies of everything on a file server (or better yet, the Cloud). This makes files easier to locate because all you have to do is type in a search for what you’re looking for, and it also makes creating copies less time-consuming

Moreover, having digital files adds protection to your assets. If a fire or a natural disaster were to damage all of your essential documents, the price to pay would be crippling. This usually isn’t something to worry about when it comes to document imaging if you’re operating on the Cloud.

File Servers

Speaking of the Cloud, file servers have lost their touch over the years as well. The problem with them is that they are also anchored to the physical location of your business. Digital imaging eliminates the file cabinets, but it doesn’t protect you from losing your files in a disaster.

The Cloud, however, lets you host everything on a network separate from your business—files, software, essential data and the like. If tomorrow your office was burned down in flames, your files would still be secure up in the digital sky!

The Single-Monitor Experience

It’s a lousy one. At least for some business it is. Depending on how complicated your day-to-day operations are and how busy you keep your employees, the convenience of having dual monitors is undeniable. You might be drafting a priority document while at the same time having a brief chat with an important client via IM. Maybe you need to keep a close eye on your inbox or perhaps do research on a separate web page while completing essential tasks. No matter what you’re doing, it can always be done more efficiently with two monitors. Give it a shot, but beware—once you try out dual monitors, you won’t be able to go back!
References:

[1] http://www.differencebetween.net/technology/difference-between-pbx-and-voip/ (Retrieved 6-12-2012)
[2] http://stamps.com/postage-online/how-it-works/ (Retrieved 6-12-2012)