Increased PDF use due to pandemic
Digital work processes have been more in demand than ever due to the COVID-19 pandemic and have significantly boosted the use of PDF formats and PDF software.
Due to the challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic, most companies sought digital solutions to switch to paperless business processes, as they needed to quickly move to digital workflows and home office or adapt existing analogue processes. As a result, the need for digital solutions increased significantly and demand remains high.
Surveys showed that work performance was less affected than expected, even though many employees had to switch to home office. This was mainly because companies could rely on digital processes. Since COVID-19, most companies have expanded paperless business processes and increased the use of file formats such as PDF.
Today, fewer and fewer companies work with paper. Online documents, PDF processing, and e-signature solutions were already on the rise before the pandemic and are now, together with cloud solutions, key requirements for companies that want to work efficiently and remain competitive.
The paperless office accelerated by COVID-19
Many authorities and administrations, as well as companies, are gradually shifting fully to digital work processes. At the same time, digital services gained momentum during the pandemic, allowing many processes to take place contact-free and location-independently. Online commerce, online meetings, online shopping, telephone consulting, video consultations, online training, and online appointments all increased. In short: the pandemic made work more difficult, but productivity remained surprisingly stable where digital structures and home office models were already in place.
Advantages of using PDF
The PDF format is always popular when documents need to be transferred easily. In addition to transferability, PDF documents also offer security, a great deal of flexibility and the possibility of affixing electronic signatures. PDF documents are also compact, can be saved optimally and the file size can be adjusted according to the purpose of use. This means that PDF documents can be sent worldwide via the Internet without any problems, loss-free and true to the original.
With the move to a home office and more flexible working, the demand for PDF processing and e-signature solutions has naturally increased. Especially when communicating with customers, it is important to be able to work efficiently with PDF documents. This is because in most cases it is possible to completely eliminate the analogue process, up to and including signing by hand, which can be done digitally instead. With PDF documents, it is possible to share data and information securely within a company but also with customers.
There is also another factor: since the beginning of the pandemic, documents are also frequently read and edited on mobile devices. Whenever shared access to data and information is necessary and paperless working is a priority, the use of the PDF format also makes sense. PDF files also come with security features that make it possible to protect documents and confidential data, exchange them securely and prevent unwanted changes.
What does modern work look like after the pandemic?
With home office, working via video conferencing also came into focus. Most companies want to continue to develop and expand these working techniques in the future. "Mobile", flexible working is a development that is becoming more and more prevalent even without the pandemic. Meanwhile, hybrid events, training sessions, conferences or meetings have also become quite commonplace, whether they are meetings or city council meetings or the like. Hybrid means that a combination of online/video meetings and face-to-face events is implemented. The classic business trip has been replaced by convenient video conferences and video meetings.
In general, the trend is to use techniques and solutions that make work more flexible. These include cloud solutions as well as PDF or e-signature solutions.
Digitization boost due to the COVID-19 crisis: Bitkom study
According to the results of a representative survey by bitkom, most companies want to convert their letter post completely to digital communication. Here it became increasingly clear that the digital office plays a role for the majority of all companies and that with the onset of the pandemic, i.e. from 2020 onwards, it was even one of the most important factors in how companies could remain able to work, productive and communicative. Digitalisation is seen as the basic prerequisite for a secure start into the future and also serves to enable employees to take advantage of flexible forms of work. All office and administrative processes that have been converted to digital served the company well in surviving the challenges of the pandemic.
One can say that all important "business processes of the future run exclusively digitally" - and since the pandemic at the latest, this has really become very clear to every company. It has become clear that modern and competitive companies are above all those that question the previous culture of presence and, as employers, make flexible working models possible on a permanent basis.
The Bitkom position paper on the topic of the working world after Corona shows that it is precisely those companies that were able to quickly offer their employees work in a home office and which were able to quickly adapt to new operating procedures that were best able to maintain business operations. For this, in turn, digital tools are needed as a basis to make this possible in the first place. Thus, the importance of digital solutions and formats such as PDF should not be underestimated. The tools that enable digital collaboration and secure digital infrastructures are particularly important here.