By now, you likely understand how important it is to shred all confidential and sensitive documents that your business accumulates. Keeping this information secure is vital to the success of your company. If you are the cause of a leak of confidential information, you are opening yourself up to lawsuits, fines, and the loss of important customers. But how do you make sure the correct documents are being shredded? How do you prevent employees, or even yourself, from shredding information that you actually need to keep? Shredding documents is important, but it is just as important to make sure you don’t shred documents that you will need in the future.
Create a Company Policy for Shredding
Ways to easily distribute information are everywhere: email, smartphones, copiers, printers, fax machines, etc. Because it is so easy for information to leave the office, sometimes without the knowledge of those in charge, it is essential to adopt company policies regarding the dissemination of company information, including confidential documents. Make sure your policies are clear and enforceable.
To avoid shredding needed documents, train the employees who will be in charge of deciding what should and should not be shredded. Limit access to those documents, and keep the number of people who shred things small. Consider storing files that need to be saved in a different location from those that can be shredded after a certain time. Clearly label all documents, so no one is in doubt about whether or not they should be saved.
Having a clear list of documents that need to be shredded or saved that employees can consult could significantly reduce mistakes. Clearly state the consequences of violating the policies. This will motivate employees to double check before throwing something into the bin to be shredded.
A Clean Office Leads to Fewer Accidents
When you are surrounded by mountains of paper, it is easy to start randomly throwing things in the bin just to be rid of them. Managing your archives is essential to document security, and Shred On Site can help you with your office clean out. A good, thorough archive box clean out will reduce errors in document shredding, because the task of sorting through documents will be much smaller. And, if you are shredding on site, we can help you decide what to shred. Then, once your policy is in place and your office is organised, you should have no trouble keeping track of what to shred and what not shred.
Don’t forget: this is not a policy that you will put into place and forget about. Because technology and threats to technology are constantly changing, you must keep revisiting your policy to make sure it is still effective. Shred On Site stays up to date on all the latest news when it comes to technology, government regulations and identity theft, and we are ready to assist you with all of your company policy and shredding needs.
