This document discusses how to go paperless in a law office. It outlines the benefits of going paperless such as reduced costs, greater productivity, better access and control of documents, and improved security. It then discusses common paper-related problems like spending too much time searching for documents and money on off-site storage. The document provides tips for creating a plan to go paperless, including prioritizing goals and analyzing motivations. It also discusses how to map out the typical path documents take within an office. Finally, it recommends hardware, software, document management systems, and protocols to establish a paperless workflow.

1. NCBA Center for Practice Management
Going Paperless in Your Law Office
Joyce Brafford

2. Why go
Paperless?
Reduced Costs
Greater Productivity
Better Access
Better Control
Improved Security
Environmental Impact

3. Too Much Paper
✤ $50/day searching for
documents.
✤ $200/month in off-site, humidity
controlled Storage.
✤ Loss of Control.
✤ Overwhelming.

4. Make a Plan
✤ Prioritize what you need to achieve.
✤ Less Paper or No Paper?
✤ Less Storage or No Storage?
✤ Remote Access for Staff?
✤ Analyze your motivating factors
✤ What’s the driving force?
✤ What problem are you solving?

5. Document Travel within Your Office
✤ How do documents arrive to your office?
✤ Who is the first to touch it?
✤ What happens next?
✤ How is it saved?
✤ Where is it saved?
✤ Is it saved in more than one place?
✤ How is it retrieved later?

6. Selecting
Hardware
What hard technology will be
essential to meet the goals you
already identified?

7. Hardware
✤ Scanners?
✤ Fujitsu Scansnap
✤ HP
✤ Servers
✤ Personal Clouds
✤ SaaS Could Storage
✤ Backup Systems
✤ Multiple Monitors

8. ScanSnap
Takes up very little space Easy to set up: works with
Macs or PCs
Scans at a rate of up to 25 pages per minute
Scans both sides of a page in one pass (duplex) and
ignores blank pages.
Automatically rotates upside down pages
Handles letter and legal sized pages, even if inter-mixed
Comes with software that automatically makes PDFs
text-searchable
Can scan wirelessly to a computer, or to iPads, iPhones
or Android devices
Comes with Adobe Acrobat Standard, a $300 value
(Windows software only however; sorry Mac folks!).

9. Servers
✤ In house or Cloud Based
✤ Storage Space
✤ Expandability
✤ Back Ups
✤ Speed
✤ Redundancy
✤ Operating System Compatibility

10. Backup Systems
✤ Hardrive Backup
✤ Cloud Backup
✤ Full System Backup

11. Necessary Software
✤ PDF Creation Software
✤ Word Perfect
✤ MS Word
✤ Apple Pages
✤ Adobe Acrobat
✤ Nitro Pro
✤ PDF Converter Pro
✤ Document Management Software
✤ NetDocuments
✤ Worldox
✤ DropBox
✤ Clio

12. Paperless
Protocols
How will you manage the process, and
how will you ensure your protocols are
followed?

13. Basic Steps in Your Protocols
✤ Convert documents to PDF
✤ Quality Control Spot-check Scanned and Converted Docs
✤ Store before Shredding
✤ Create a File-Naming System
✤ Standardized Process for Saving Documents
✤ Folder Templates to Ensure Consistency

14. File Retention Basics
✤ Standard File Retention Policy
✤ Manage the size of documents stored (with Scanner or
Adobe)
✤ File Closing Procedures
✤ Destroy Electronic Records
✤ Regular Training for New Employees

15. Questions?
JBrafford@ncbar.org
919-657-1566
CPM@ncbar.org