Switching from paper to digital processes in your pest control business
Six compelling reasons for you to stop using paper and start becoming digital
Paper memories from my history: Two decades ago, I used to handle the quality system and food safety audits for my company at Kerala. For each audit, we had to prove compliance with records, and that in the late ’90s meant paper records. So, we would prepare for audits by having marked box files and ring binders containing records. We would dedicate the conference room of our factory for the audit, and it was common those days to have the large table in that room full of files to which we showed to the auditor! That seems a very distant memory now, as, in 2020, we can prove compliance to auditors just by opening our computers, either laptops or desktop. Even when the original records are on paper, they can be scanned and retrieved from any part of the world using servers or email. In just twenty years, the world of business has changed so much concerning records that one can’t believe that we did business with so much paper at work. Sadly, days of paper at work & even at home seem numbered. Here are six reasons why I think each Indian PCO should go digital and forget paperwork in their business.
Manpower unavailability and costs: It is increasingly becoming difficult to find people at any level of the organization right from someone to head a company to the operator who does the actual work in customer premises. PCO’s have to learn to run their businesses with fewer people than hitherto as having fewer people than required is a reality of the twenty-first century. There is an additional reason too to go digital, and that is to save on workforce costs. Every Indian industry had the luxury of over-staffing and using more people for a process than required, but those days are now history. With profit margins shrinking in every segment, including pest control, PCO’s have to cut costs to remain viable if not survive.
Customers now prefer doing business digitally: Whether retail customers or B2B customers, each segment today deals with vendors either on the Smartphone or on the web. Customers want the ease of doing business with businesses from whom they buy products or services. The present-day environment is called an attention economy as people’s attention spans are very low & they can spare seconds if not minutes in dealing with any matter, including ordering pest control services. Customers today also want ‘On-Demand’ services and prefer to place their orders or access their information at any time of day or night and using the means they are comfortable with – either an app, a web browser, or as we see Voice Assistants increasingly! If any PCO can’t be digital, customers will go to the next one who can be contacted digitally and deals with a customer over that medium.
Paper-work is more expensive than digital records: My generation grew up using paper, but in 2020, paperwork is costlier than going digital. Company stationery costs money to print & store at offices; when used for printouts, stationery costs even more, not to forget the cost of sending invoices by paper. In big cities, office space is expensive, and every office soon runs out of space for flat files & box files. If you are still not convinced, remember, locating paper records however well they are filed is a big task. Try it. Lastly, the paper is prone to destruction – as it is affected by fire, water, and our friends – termites! Digital records, on the other hand, don’t need any space other than on a server, and that too can be on the cloud. Theoretically, a PCO can store all records on a Cloud Server and not have any computer server or other storage devices. Of course, they won’t need an office either if it is mainly to store records.
Millennials are digital natives comfortable in a digital environment: Whether your employees or your customers, you will deal with a lot of Millennials (also called Generation Y). These are people born after 1985 and considered digital natives – those who are comfortable in a digital environment. Going forward, the next generation of employees (called Generation Z) will be totally digital. Many are unused to taking notes on paper or are uncomfortable doing so. To attract and retain millennial and post-millennial generation as your team members and those buying your services, you have to be digital. There is no other option.
Customers find you digitally: Some time ago, we were discussing with an agency a company brochure we wanted to make. That agency was also to prepare an audiovisual clip, a presentation, and a video. After a few months into the process, we decided to scrap the paper brochure! Unlikely that customers actually like receiving collaterals in paper any more. More likely, they will ask you to send them an email or share your website with them or even ask for details by messaging apps like WhatsApp. If a PCO does not have a good website, then, for practical purposes, the PCO is thought not to exist! As the first thing any prospective customer searches for when wanting pest control services is “PCO Near Me.” If one is not online, then that PCO is not in line to do business in the present day.
To make business process dependent: Our industry with so many small PCO’s all run by a few people in the team is very people-oriented and less process-oriented. Sadly, however good one or more employees may be in your team; they turn out to be its limitation as the business remains dependent on them! Scaling up or growing a business requires standardizing processes, which is very easy with digitization. Once the business processes are online, either by software or through the use of an App, then any employee, including a new one, can easily adapt to it. Even if a good employee leaves (this is sadly typical of our industry with that person going on to become our competitor), the business does not suffer. As the records remain with us and the replacement has just to get familiar with the online process and start using it. And the digitized process ensures that requirements are met even if not fully understood or known to the employee involved in the process. Yes, this also means we can get rid of Standard Operating Procedures or SOPs. Why have SOP’s on paper when nobody reads them & when you can ensure that your digitized process is as per the SOP?
Going digital does not mean having a fancy Smartphone with the latest generation processor! Every PCO has to switch to the digital platform to conduct all aspects of its business right from managing its employees, dealing with the government, customers and vendors, and everything else that happens in the company. The tools to do so are now available at a very reasonable cost that makes it viable for any PCO, big or small, to afford.
In future issues of PCO Mentor, we shall go over the ways to become digital in Pest Control Services.
Till then, I Wish You A Great Weekend Ahead.
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