Importance of Documentation in Quality Management

Are you among those businesses that maintain documentation just for the sake of compliance regulations? Then, you are doing it all wrong.

You must understand that Documentation is not a formality. It’s rather a critical process that businesses should streamline to ensure proper, authenticated, and accurate information for their teams. Your well-maintained documents can become a treasure of valuable information and insights for the people who are going to join in future.

When you are equipped with good information to start your project, you are more likely to get success. Good information doesn’t necessarily means capturing the positive outcomes; it means capturing every step or action plan with their results even if things went wrong. It will allow you to put your point more clearly why certain things will not be a success with their objective evidence. Also, all the information gathered in the last few years significantly improve decision-making capability of your quality teams.  

The key reason why businesses don’t pay attention to the documentation is the added administrative work that comes along. Managing files, sharing them, and keeping them secure is another reason. You would be surprised to know that only 4% of companies are there that document their processes. 

It implies that rest of the businesses are undervaluing the potential of documentation to keep their information resources intact. In this blog, we will look at seven amazing benefits of documentation. These benefits will demonstrate the true worth of document management for the quality management businesses.  

Related Articles: Top 7 Challenges Document Management Software Help Overcome

Seven Amazing Benefits of Documentation 

1. You can save time and energy. 

According to estimates, knowledge workers typically spend over two hours a day looking for information. Therefore, documentation for tasks, projects, or teams (from account logins to detailed instructions) should be organized and centrally located. Dig through emails or download files shouldn’t be necessary to find the latest information. 

Documentation lets you keep things moving without wasting hours searching for details, credentials, directions, and more when you’re handing off tasks, planning a new project, or asking another team member to step in. 

It will be easier to identify bottlenecks and bloated workflows when you write down your procedures, so you can further streamline how your team works. 

2. You can have better control of quality and processes. 

You want your team to approach their tasks however they see fit, and you want to give them the flexibility to do so. 

Nevertheless, when you produce things regularly, you will want consistent results. It’s essential to maintain some level of cohesion so as not to appear uninformed. Your team gains an understanding of how processes function and what finished projects typically look like when you document them.  

Maintaining consistent, repetitive tasks such as quarterly reports or monthly reports is easy whenever your team members access those tools.  

3. You can eliminate duplicative work. 

Have you ever begun a new project only to discover that it has already been completed by someone else? Companies that document past projects, gather research, and share decisions can save precious time by reducing re-work. 

Rather than reinventing the wheel, why not leverage the work already done? It is easier to learn from past work with documentation in place instead of repeating the same mistakes. 

4. You can have a streamlined hiring and onboarding process. 

In business, your team will not stay the same forever, and that is a fact you must face. There will be new members brought in and people who will hit the road.  

It can be intimidating for both the existing team and the new employee to onboard new team members when they are new. You want team members to feel empowered, not thrown to the wolves. This means educating and empowering them.  

Documentation will provide your new hires with insights that will help them get up to speed in their new roles. Using these resources, they can start to solve their problems independently, rather than relying on you to answer every question or solve every issue. 

5. It will keep your teams on the same page. 

In the workplace, knowledge is king. It gives us a feeling of security as if we cannot be replaced. Many employees assume that they lose their value if they share their expertise. Thus, it’s not surprising that 60% of employees find it challenging to get their colleagues to share vital information.  

Together with documentation, everyone who works with you gains more knowledge. It will be easier for you to develop a collaborative and strategic culture when sharing information becomes the norm on your team. In addition, making decisions will be easier when the data you need is easily accessible. 

6. You can have better training resources 

When you keep all the processes documented, you can use it as good training resources for all your new employees especially freshers. It will help develop a culture of quality throughout the organization.  

You can integrate the documented resources with a training management software to make information available to your teams globally.  

7. You can meet compliance regulations 

As we have discussed this earlier that organizations maintain documentation for compliance. But it should not be the only consideration when documentation comes to mind. It is very important to note that documenting processes, designs, and instructions will only make our work easier and efficient.  

Once you will start following best practices for documentation, you won’t need to make any extra efforts to meet compliance requirements.  

What if we tell you that we have made documentation even easier, accessible, and manageable for you? 

Yes, you heard it right! 

We, at Qualityze, offer a suite of smarter quality solutions. One of our exemplary products is Qualityze Document Management.

As an industry-leading technology platform, Qualityze Document Management’s capabilities enable organizations to create, collaborate, revise, approve documents, and train employees, allowing them to conform to regulatory requirements. It helps you maintain and share control documents and best practices throughout your organization in a cost-effective manner. 

Our solution integrates seamlessly with Change Management and Training Management to simplify managing document processes, change control, and training management processes. It also supports digital signature to meet compliance with applicable regulatory standards. It comes with amazing in-built capabilities including task scheduler, email approvals, alerts, notifications, and much more. 

For more details on Qualityze Document Management, please get in touch with our customer success team at +1-877-207-8616 or email us at info@qualityze.com, and we will be there for you.

Alternatively, you can request for a free demo to get practical insights about our products. You can also experience the difference that cloud platform offers to make document management simpler, faster, and better.