How Managing Clutter Can Benefit Your Mental Health
All commercial businesses should be aware of the risks of not shredding your documents once their retention schedule indicates it’s time to do so. As long as you follow these established business practices, you can avoid running into these problems.
It Can Lead To Legal Troubles
The biggest issues are related to the risks of not shredding your documents. There are numerous privacy laws and standards in place to hold businesses accountable for not securely disposing of sensitive information (digital and physical) when necessary, such as the Data Protection Act. If you’re simply tossing these documents in the trash or not disposing of them at all, you can find yourself paying some significant fines in the future.
It Can Cause Unnecessary Clutter
Even with more than adequate room to store your documents, boxes of paperwork shouldn’t be kept just because you have the available space and are too lazy to securely dispose of them. First off, the longer that clutter remains, the more likely it is to fall into the wrong hands. Plus, if you and other employees have to go through these files to complete daily tasks, piles of documents that shouldn’t have been kept are going to hinder that workflow immensely.
The more files there are to go through, the longer it can take to find what you’re looking for, which slowly chips away at the time you could be spending on other work. In a well-organized file cabinet (or any other secure form of storage) containing only the essential documents, you should be able to find what you need quickly and efficiently.
It Can Hurt Productivity
As mentioned above, the creation of unnecessary clutter can lead to several issues, including hindered productivity. In house shredding can also be a drain on productivity if there’s a constant volume to shred, unless you have an employee whose sole job is to shred documents.
Shredding in-house requires an employee to step away from their daily tasks to destroy the documents. The longer the employee is away from their usual duties, the longer that workload sits and the pile grows. Although professional shredders can chomp through paper clips and staples with ease, normal in-house shredders cannot. This means that the employee will also have to remove staples, paper clips, folders, binders, etc.
As you can see, not shredding your sensitive documents when it’s time to do so can cause a flurry of issues. Luckily, seeking out a professional shredding company to dispose of these documents and other forms of information is incredibly convenient. Most shredding companies offer onsite and offsite shredding services, both of which don’t require you to leave the office at all. Even preparing the documents for shredding is so convenient as you don’t have to worry about removing paper clips or staples—that’s how powerful their shredders are.