No modern enterprise can work without documents. Therefore, the competent organization of workflow is one of the factors affecting the overall performance of the enterprise. What does this concept include? What are the types and system of workflow? We will consider all this in the article.
Workflow and paperwork
At first glance, these are identical concepts. But if you look closely, you can see the difference. Paperwork includes three stages:
- Creation of a document upon the fact of economic activity - documentation.
- The organization of the accounting of securities and their movement throughout the organization and beyond is a document flow.
- Document storage - archiving.
Document flow is one of the stages of office work. Inside this process, stages or flows are also distinguished:
- Incoming documentation is what comes to the enterprise from outside.
- Outgoing - that the company sends to counterparties.
- Internal documentation is what is created within the organization and used for management activities.
Proper organization of the process allows you to control the movement of the document at all its stages, from the moment of creation to receipt of storage. This makes it possible at any time to know where the paper is, what kind of work is being done with it.
Document Processing Steps
Each incoming document at the enterprise goes through certain stages. The length of the path depends on the order that is fixed in the organization. All incoming correspondence can initially go to the table to the head, and only then to the performers. This is a longer way, it is not used often.
A shorter way is when the secretary deals with the distribution of departments. This option is used more often. Its advantage is obvious: documents get to the contractor faster.
Each incoming document goes through the registration procedure. This is done in a special magazine. The date of receipt is indicated, as well as the pre-assigned serial number.
Especially important documents can be monitored. The final stage of processing is sending the document to archive storage.
Workflow organization principles
Organization of workflow aims to reduce the time spent on documents. To achieve this goal, certain principles have been developed:
- Centralized reception, preprocessing and shipping. In small organizations, the secretary is engaged in this; in a large company, an entire department can carry out tasks.
- Reduction of points of passage of the document, eliminating the possibility of its return.
- Development of workflow schemes and regulations.
- Registration of papers.
- Introduction of the preliminary stage of consideration of documents.
Compliance with these rules eliminates the loss of time on duplicate actions, create a uniform load on people working with papers.
What is document flow?
So it is customary to call documents that are similar in purpose or type, which have one purpose to follow.
The flow is characterized by structure, periodicity and density. In a trade organization that ships goods to a large number of retail stores every day, the document flow will have a uniform structure, dailyness and high density. If the company is engaged in the production of expensive industrial equipment, then its flow will be with different characteristics.
Electronic document management
The fact that in the classical document circulation there is a material medium of the document creates a number of serious problems. Papers must somehow be transferred from one organization to another. For this, couriers or mail are used. This requires financial and time costs, in addition, delivery failures and errors due to human factors are possible. Document flow is a serious financial and time expense.
Papers need to be stored somewhere. If the organization is large, then large areas are required for storage. Under force majeure circumstances, death of documents is possible without the possibility of subsequent restoration. And this is far from all the problems.
Electronic document management is a system that is becoming increasingly popular, as it is devoid of the above disadvantages. Modern secure systems are used for data transfer, this ensures fast and accurate delivery, reduces document exchange time, and ensures reliable storage. 
Government organizations, such as the tax office or pension fund, quickly appreciated the benefits of sharing information electronically, so they are trying to get as many organizations to report as possible.
A clear workflow is the ability to quickly find the necessary information and send it to the address with the least amount of time.
