By Mark Brousseau
Despite the lousy economy, document imaging solutions continue to enjoy strong adoption among organizations of all sizes. No wonder: the technology is proven to deliver tremendous operations and business benefits, including lower processing costs, streamlined storage and retrieval, and better information tracking and reporting.
But even the strongest business case for document imaging can be undermined by crucial errors during system deployment, says Brett Rodgers (brodgers@ibml.com), manager, Solution Consulting, Americas, at ibml (www.ibml.com), a Birmingham, AL-based document imaging solutions provider.
If you want to keep your document imaging business case on track (and who doesn't?), Rodgers suggests avoiding the following 10 all-too-common foul-ups during system deployment:
1. Incorrect sizing of the necessary number of document scanners.
2. Not including all stakeholders (business and IT) in the requirements definition.
3. Buying technology without first conducting a proof of concept.
4. Making decisions on front-end and back-end software separately.
5. Not coordinating software and hardware vendors during system deployment.
6. Not using a phased implementation approach (biting off too much at once).
7. Letting "fear of change" take over.
8. Not thinking LEAN.
9. Not cutting the paper cord.
10. Not "sharing" -- as in utilizing shared services.
What was your biggest mistake when deploying document imaging?
Showing posts with label content management. Show all posts
Showing posts with label content management. Show all posts
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Monday, May 23, 2011
Where’s the automation?
By Mark Brousseau
Despite revenues in the billions of dollars and the document volumes inherent to that scale of operation, many—possibly even most—companies have not made the leap to automated data capture technology for invoice processing, a proven driver of efficiency and value in accounts payable (AP).
That’s the key takeaway of a survey of attendees of Fusion 2011, held May 8-12 at the Gaylord Palms Resort and Convention Center near Orlando, Florida. The survey polled AP professionals around the globe, working in numerous industries and for organizations ranging from less than $500 million in annual revenues to well in excess of $10 billion in revenues. It was conducted by The Institute of Financial Operations and sponsored by Brainware. Fusion 2011 brought together more than 1,800 financial operations professionals and 170 exhibiting companies.
With an increased focus on working capital management, many AP professionals are emphasizing a need for greater visibility into and reporting of invoice processing—a demonstrated strength of available data capture and extraction technologies such as optical character recognition (OCR) and intelligent document recognition (IDR). That’s what makes these survey findings so surprising.
More than half of the survey respondents (56.3 percent) indicated that their AP organization doesn’t use automated data capture technology. And, only 3.1 percent of respondents stated that their AP organization plans to implement automated data capture within the next six months, while 6.3 percent stated their AP organization plans to implement the technology within the next 12 months.
Why aren’t AP departments making greater use of automated data capture and extraction?
Tight capital budgets are undoubtedly a factor. But AP departments also may not see the need.
Despite their lack of data capture technologies, most of the respondents to the survey are doing a pretty good job of holding the line on invoice processing costs. A plurality of respondents (41.9 percent) indicated that their average invoice processing costs have not changed over the past 12 months, while 38.7 percent of respondents stated their invoice processing costs have dropped slightly. Only 12.9 percent of respondents indicated that their average invoice processing costs have increased either slightly (9.7 percent) or significantly (3.2 percent) over the past 12 months.
Similarly, a plurality of respondents (40 percent) indicated that their average cost to process an invoice is between $2 and $5 – in line with the costs published in surveys by industry research firms. Some 16.7 percent of respondents said their average invoice processing costs are less than $2.
But the survey results show that many AP departments could benefit from labor-saving technologies such as automated data capture. More than a quarter of respondents (26.7 percent) pegged their average invoice processing costs between $5 and $10. Worse, 13.4 percent of respondents stated their average invoice processing costs are between $10 and $20, while 3.3 percent of respondents indicated that their average invoice processing costs were between an eye-popping $20 and $25.
“Among other findings, more than a third of respondents claim it still takes them more than twelve days to process an invoice, inhibiting their ability to take early payment discounts, creating backlogs, and often necessitating increased headcount,” notes Charles Kaplan, vice president of sales and marketing at Brainware. Twenty-five percent of respondents stated it takes their organization more than 15 days to pay invoices. “Automated data capture solves those problems and many others.”
To this point, a plurality of respondents (32.3 percent) believe that “better visibility and reporting” is the biggest benefit of the technology, followed by “faster turnaround” (29 percent), “lower costs” (12.9 percent), “better working capital management” (12.9 percent), and “fewer errors” (9.7 percent). Only 3.2 percent of survey respondents stated that they see “no benefit” to automated data capture.
The bottom line is that despite all the hype about automating invoice processing with data capture technology, vendors have a long way to go in convincing AP departments to deploy them.
What do you think?
Despite revenues in the billions of dollars and the document volumes inherent to that scale of operation, many—possibly even most—companies have not made the leap to automated data capture technology for invoice processing, a proven driver of efficiency and value in accounts payable (AP).
That’s the key takeaway of a survey of attendees of Fusion 2011, held May 8-12 at the Gaylord Palms Resort and Convention Center near Orlando, Florida. The survey polled AP professionals around the globe, working in numerous industries and for organizations ranging from less than $500 million in annual revenues to well in excess of $10 billion in revenues. It was conducted by The Institute of Financial Operations and sponsored by Brainware. Fusion 2011 brought together more than 1,800 financial operations professionals and 170 exhibiting companies.
With an increased focus on working capital management, many AP professionals are emphasizing a need for greater visibility into and reporting of invoice processing—a demonstrated strength of available data capture and extraction technologies such as optical character recognition (OCR) and intelligent document recognition (IDR). That’s what makes these survey findings so surprising.
More than half of the survey respondents (56.3 percent) indicated that their AP organization doesn’t use automated data capture technology. And, only 3.1 percent of respondents stated that their AP organization plans to implement automated data capture within the next six months, while 6.3 percent stated their AP organization plans to implement the technology within the next 12 months.
Why aren’t AP departments making greater use of automated data capture and extraction?
Tight capital budgets are undoubtedly a factor. But AP departments also may not see the need.
Despite their lack of data capture technologies, most of the respondents to the survey are doing a pretty good job of holding the line on invoice processing costs. A plurality of respondents (41.9 percent) indicated that their average invoice processing costs have not changed over the past 12 months, while 38.7 percent of respondents stated their invoice processing costs have dropped slightly. Only 12.9 percent of respondents indicated that their average invoice processing costs have increased either slightly (9.7 percent) or significantly (3.2 percent) over the past 12 months.
Similarly, a plurality of respondents (40 percent) indicated that their average cost to process an invoice is between $2 and $5 – in line with the costs published in surveys by industry research firms. Some 16.7 percent of respondents said their average invoice processing costs are less than $2.
But the survey results show that many AP departments could benefit from labor-saving technologies such as automated data capture. More than a quarter of respondents (26.7 percent) pegged their average invoice processing costs between $5 and $10. Worse, 13.4 percent of respondents stated their average invoice processing costs are between $10 and $20, while 3.3 percent of respondents indicated that their average invoice processing costs were between an eye-popping $20 and $25.
“Among other findings, more than a third of respondents claim it still takes them more than twelve days to process an invoice, inhibiting their ability to take early payment discounts, creating backlogs, and often necessitating increased headcount,” notes Charles Kaplan, vice president of sales and marketing at Brainware. Twenty-five percent of respondents stated it takes their organization more than 15 days to pay invoices. “Automated data capture solves those problems and many others.”
To this point, a plurality of respondents (32.3 percent) believe that “better visibility and reporting” is the biggest benefit of the technology, followed by “faster turnaround” (29 percent), “lower costs” (12.9 percent), “better working capital management” (12.9 percent), and “fewer errors” (9.7 percent). Only 3.2 percent of survey respondents stated that they see “no benefit” to automated data capture.
The bottom line is that despite all the hype about automating invoice processing with data capture technology, vendors have a long way to go in convincing AP departments to deploy them.
What do you think?
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Unlocking the value of enterprise content management
By Mark Brousseau
It’s one thing to have enterprise content management (ECM) technology, it’s another thing altogether to get value out of it, Gartner Analyst Mark Gilbert told attendees at Systemware’s user conference, SWUC 11, last week at the Westin Galleria in Dallas.
Companies seem to be getting Gilbert’s message. Many are focusing like never before on ECM applications that provide more value, he told attendees. This trend is being driven by increased expectations from ECM buyers and users, new demands for faster and richer process management and information delivery, increased archiving, compliance and information governance requirements, and the evolution of social media into a tool targeting supply and value chain management.
“The ECM market is strong, and it is reshaping itself as the technology becomes more adaptive and customers make more demands on it,” Gilbert explained, noting that the ECM market now tops $4 billion a year in sales. He added that, “Companies are now relying on ECM to drive business efficiency and achieve better results.“
When it comes to ECM, “ROI matters,” Gilbert said flatly.
Some key elements of the ECM business case that Gilbert identified include:
… Faster, better, processes.
… Better customer service
… Better, less costly regulatory compliance
… Better management decisions
… Better front-line decisions
… Better teamwork
“When we talk to customers, these things come up time and time again,” he said.
Gilbert offered several tips for ensuring your company meets its business case:
… Build a vision for how ECM can transform and drive your business.
… Survey ECM use-cases in your industry.
… Establish roles and an organizational structure to support your ECM vision.
… Set scope for your ECM initiatives by assessing risk and the value of information assets – across the breadth of the content continuum.
… Leverage existing technology and vendors and determine what you have and how it supports the ideals of information infrastructure.
… Accept the fact that technology alone will not succeed; policies and governance models are critical for long-term value.
What do you think?
It’s one thing to have enterprise content management (ECM) technology, it’s another thing altogether to get value out of it, Gartner Analyst Mark Gilbert told attendees at Systemware’s user conference, SWUC 11, last week at the Westin Galleria in Dallas.
Companies seem to be getting Gilbert’s message. Many are focusing like never before on ECM applications that provide more value, he told attendees. This trend is being driven by increased expectations from ECM buyers and users, new demands for faster and richer process management and information delivery, increased archiving, compliance and information governance requirements, and the evolution of social media into a tool targeting supply and value chain management.
“The ECM market is strong, and it is reshaping itself as the technology becomes more adaptive and customers make more demands on it,” Gilbert explained, noting that the ECM market now tops $4 billion a year in sales. He added that, “Companies are now relying on ECM to drive business efficiency and achieve better results.“
When it comes to ECM, “ROI matters,” Gilbert said flatly.
Some key elements of the ECM business case that Gilbert identified include:
… Faster, better, processes.
… Better customer service
… Better, less costly regulatory compliance
… Better management decisions
… Better front-line decisions
… Better teamwork
“When we talk to customers, these things come up time and time again,” he said.
Gilbert offered several tips for ensuring your company meets its business case:
… Build a vision for how ECM can transform and drive your business.
… Survey ECM use-cases in your industry.
… Establish roles and an organizational structure to support your ECM vision.
… Set scope for your ECM initiatives by assessing risk and the value of information assets – across the breadth of the content continuum.
… Leverage existing technology and vendors and determine what you have and how it supports the ideals of information infrastructure.
… Accept the fact that technology alone will not succeed; policies and governance models are critical for long-term value.
What do you think?
Friday, April 29, 2011
Document management best practices
Posted by Mark Brousseau
According to the International Association of Administrative Professionals (IAAP), there are more than 4.3 million secretaries and administrative assistants working in the United States. In honor of Administrative Professionals Day, celebrated on April 27, Cintas Corporation offered best practices to help administrative professionals implement a successful office-wide program to manage, maintain and protect confidential business documents.
"During the recession, downsizing has forced all office professionals to come together and work harder in the workplace,” said Marcia Peller, corporate office services manager, Cintas. “Ensuring business information remains secure, yet easily accessible is essential to the success of any business. This is best accomplished through an integrated program that involves all relevant stakeholders.”
Cintas’ best practices include:
1. Create a document retention schedule. All businesses have an abundance of documents and records to maintain, which can often be a daunting task. To maximize space efficiently and increase productivity, work with management and a legal consultant to identify a retention schedule based on legal requirements and internal company policies. Depending on the type of business, proactively learn and implement these retention guidelines to maintain an organized, uncluttered office.
2. Educate and engage employees. Once a retention schedule has been established, educate and train all employees to take a proactive role and follow protocol. Each year, update employees regarding any new legal requirements and encourage them to securely shred any documents that are no longer needed. This will save space to ensure current documents are easily accessible.
3. Store records offsite. If your company has a large volume of records with long retention periods but limited space, consider an offsite storage provider. This will free up space and keep confidential information out of the wrong hands. The ideal provider will offer a secure storage facility equipped with 24-hour security cameras, alarm systems and complete fire protection systems to protect records from catastrophes such as floods and fires.
4. Limit accessibility to records. Only personnel who require job-related access should be authorized to view records. Limiting accessibility is critical as every business retains some degree of confidential information regarding their employees and customers. Such information includes names, addresses, credit card numbers, Social Security numbers and other account information. By enforcing these rules, administrative professionals can greatly reduce the threat of data breaches from employees and other unauthorized sources.
5. Digitally image critical files. Converting paper files and records to electronic documents can help businesses increase productivity, improve processes and ensure compliance with regulatory requirements. From disaster recovery planning, to having immediate access to files, a digital imaging solution helps employees find what they need, when they need it. Consider working with a professional provider that provides secure document imaging and scanning services to gain immediate, real-time access to all critical files.
6. Implement a “shred-all” program. It is important to securely shred all unneeded documents. With identity theft and data breaches on the rise, doing so will protect confidential business data and customers’ sensitive information from falling into the wrong hands. In addition, encourage employees to shred their personal information at work to protect their identity as well. Recommend a shredding service that destroys documents on a scheduled basis. These companies place secure shredding containers in accessible and identifiable locations to make it safe and convenient for all employees to properly shred documents that have reached the end of their useful life. In addition, they will provide a certificate of destruction for a legal audit trail.
7. Create an office recycling program. Ensure that your office or department is doing its part to protect the earth by encouraging and promoting a paper recycling program. Many companies that offer shredding services recycle the paper into secondary paper products, such as paper towels, to reduce the impact on the environment. Recycling paper saves water, reduces green house gas emissions and uses 25 percent less energy than manufacturing paper from trees.
“Administrative professionals work hard throughout the year to ensure their offices operate as efficiently as possible,” said Brittney Kirk, marketing associate, Cintas Document Management. “This Administrative Professionals Day, we want to recognize their efforts and provide them with best practices to help them securely protect and store confidential information to ensure business success.”
What do you think?
According to the International Association of Administrative Professionals (IAAP), there are more than 4.3 million secretaries and administrative assistants working in the United States. In honor of Administrative Professionals Day, celebrated on April 27, Cintas Corporation offered best practices to help administrative professionals implement a successful office-wide program to manage, maintain and protect confidential business documents.
"During the recession, downsizing has forced all office professionals to come together and work harder in the workplace,” said Marcia Peller, corporate office services manager, Cintas. “Ensuring business information remains secure, yet easily accessible is essential to the success of any business. This is best accomplished through an integrated program that involves all relevant stakeholders.”
Cintas’ best practices include:
1. Create a document retention schedule. All businesses have an abundance of documents and records to maintain, which can often be a daunting task. To maximize space efficiently and increase productivity, work with management and a legal consultant to identify a retention schedule based on legal requirements and internal company policies. Depending on the type of business, proactively learn and implement these retention guidelines to maintain an organized, uncluttered office.
2. Educate and engage employees. Once a retention schedule has been established, educate and train all employees to take a proactive role and follow protocol. Each year, update employees regarding any new legal requirements and encourage them to securely shred any documents that are no longer needed. This will save space to ensure current documents are easily accessible.
3. Store records offsite. If your company has a large volume of records with long retention periods but limited space, consider an offsite storage provider. This will free up space and keep confidential information out of the wrong hands. The ideal provider will offer a secure storage facility equipped with 24-hour security cameras, alarm systems and complete fire protection systems to protect records from catastrophes such as floods and fires.
4. Limit accessibility to records. Only personnel who require job-related access should be authorized to view records. Limiting accessibility is critical as every business retains some degree of confidential information regarding their employees and customers. Such information includes names, addresses, credit card numbers, Social Security numbers and other account information. By enforcing these rules, administrative professionals can greatly reduce the threat of data breaches from employees and other unauthorized sources.
5. Digitally image critical files. Converting paper files and records to electronic documents can help businesses increase productivity, improve processes and ensure compliance with regulatory requirements. From disaster recovery planning, to having immediate access to files, a digital imaging solution helps employees find what they need, when they need it. Consider working with a professional provider that provides secure document imaging and scanning services to gain immediate, real-time access to all critical files.
6. Implement a “shred-all” program. It is important to securely shred all unneeded documents. With identity theft and data breaches on the rise, doing so will protect confidential business data and customers’ sensitive information from falling into the wrong hands. In addition, encourage employees to shred their personal information at work to protect their identity as well. Recommend a shredding service that destroys documents on a scheduled basis. These companies place secure shredding containers in accessible and identifiable locations to make it safe and convenient for all employees to properly shred documents that have reached the end of their useful life. In addition, they will provide a certificate of destruction for a legal audit trail.
7. Create an office recycling program. Ensure that your office or department is doing its part to protect the earth by encouraging and promoting a paper recycling program. Many companies that offer shredding services recycle the paper into secondary paper products, such as paper towels, to reduce the impact on the environment. Recycling paper saves water, reduces green house gas emissions and uses 25 percent less energy than manufacturing paper from trees.
“Administrative professionals work hard throughout the year to ensure their offices operate as efficiently as possible,” said Brittney Kirk, marketing associate, Cintas Document Management. “This Administrative Professionals Day, we want to recognize their efforts and provide them with best practices to help them securely protect and store confidential information to ensure business success.”
What do you think?
Monday, March 21, 2011
The business value of managed content
Posted by Mark Brousseau
Managed content can deliver 30 percent productivity gains and a 25 percent in efficiency improvements, according to new research co-sponsored by OpenText and AIIM.
One of the more notable findings from the survey of more than 450 information technology professionals and business managers is that the productivity of professional staff would be improved by 30 percent if they could only find internal information and documents as quickly and as easily as they find information on the Web. Along the same lines, respondents said customer service levels and response times could be improved by 33 percent if all customer-facing staff could immediately access and share all of the customer-related and case-related information.
Additional opportunities for improvement included:
• The productivity of administrative staff could be increased on average by 33 percent through use of workflow, scanned forms and automated data capture.
• Changing to a culture of electronic-only filing would reduce the office space allocated to filing storage from 14.5 percent to 5.9 percent – a 60-percent reduction.
• The size of server farms dedicated to unstructured content and emails could be reduced by between a third and a half if each document or email attachment was stored only once.
• A collaborative, widely accessible team-site environment could improve project delivery by 23 percent on average in terms of time and project costs.
• Respondents indicated they believe that Enterprise 2.0 applications could improve staff productivity and engagement by about 18 percent.
• The improved efficiency from providing office staff with comprehensive mobile access to company information would likely be between 20 and 25 percent.
While the survey indicates a compelling case for adopting enterprise content management (ECM) technologies, it also exposes the significant challenges for companies that get overwhelmed by the sheer volume of documents and content accumulating on shared drives, email, laptops and mobile device and paper files.
According to 61 percent of the survey respondents, organizational knowledge is the first thing to suffer in a badly managed environment, causing the organization to lose its competitive position due to poor decisions and a lack of accumulated corporate expertise. Innovation is considered to be another significant victim of poor collaboration and restricted knowledge-sharing, followed by the productivity impact of information search fatigue.
Compliance breaches and information and data leaks also weighed heavily on the minds of the survey respondents. For instance, 40 percent of organizations would take a financial hit from a compliance breach while fully 66 percent would suffer bad – and costly – publicity. Over a third of organizations reported they would have no way of finding out who was responsible if sensitive data was “leaked” to a competitor or to the press by a trusted employee. Only a quarter could readily point to a specific employee based on activity logs. For 60 percent of the largest organizations, the potential impact of such a leak would be high, and for 13 percent it would be “disastrous.”
“As the research confirms, companies that claim, control and capitalize on content increase their people’s contribution, deliver better customer service, and save money – all of which leads to better business,” said James Latham, chief marketing officer, OpenText. “At the same time, succumbing to fast-growing unstructured content inside the enterprise will increase risk, stifle innovation, or worse yet, leak sensitive documents. The case for ECM has never been stronger.”
What do you think?
Managed content can deliver 30 percent productivity gains and a 25 percent in efficiency improvements, according to new research co-sponsored by OpenText and AIIM.
One of the more notable findings from the survey of more than 450 information technology professionals and business managers is that the productivity of professional staff would be improved by 30 percent if they could only find internal information and documents as quickly and as easily as they find information on the Web. Along the same lines, respondents said customer service levels and response times could be improved by 33 percent if all customer-facing staff could immediately access and share all of the customer-related and case-related information.
Additional opportunities for improvement included:
• The productivity of administrative staff could be increased on average by 33 percent through use of workflow, scanned forms and automated data capture.
• Changing to a culture of electronic-only filing would reduce the office space allocated to filing storage from 14.5 percent to 5.9 percent – a 60-percent reduction.
• The size of server farms dedicated to unstructured content and emails could be reduced by between a third and a half if each document or email attachment was stored only once.
• A collaborative, widely accessible team-site environment could improve project delivery by 23 percent on average in terms of time and project costs.
• Respondents indicated they believe that Enterprise 2.0 applications could improve staff productivity and engagement by about 18 percent.
• The improved efficiency from providing office staff with comprehensive mobile access to company information would likely be between 20 and 25 percent.
While the survey indicates a compelling case for adopting enterprise content management (ECM) technologies, it also exposes the significant challenges for companies that get overwhelmed by the sheer volume of documents and content accumulating on shared drives, email, laptops and mobile device and paper files.
According to 61 percent of the survey respondents, organizational knowledge is the first thing to suffer in a badly managed environment, causing the organization to lose its competitive position due to poor decisions and a lack of accumulated corporate expertise. Innovation is considered to be another significant victim of poor collaboration and restricted knowledge-sharing, followed by the productivity impact of information search fatigue.
Compliance breaches and information and data leaks also weighed heavily on the minds of the survey respondents. For instance, 40 percent of organizations would take a financial hit from a compliance breach while fully 66 percent would suffer bad – and costly – publicity. Over a third of organizations reported they would have no way of finding out who was responsible if sensitive data was “leaked” to a competitor or to the press by a trusted employee. Only a quarter could readily point to a specific employee based on activity logs. For 60 percent of the largest organizations, the potential impact of such a leak would be high, and for 13 percent it would be “disastrous.”
“As the research confirms, companies that claim, control and capitalize on content increase their people’s contribution, deliver better customer service, and save money – all of which leads to better business,” said James Latham, chief marketing officer, OpenText. “At the same time, succumbing to fast-growing unstructured content inside the enterprise will increase risk, stifle innovation, or worse yet, leak sensitive documents. The case for ECM has never been stronger.”
What do you think?
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Greening Your Mail Can Keep You in the Black
By Greg Brown, Marketing Director, Melissa Data
A recent Aperture Research Institute study reported upwards of 70 percent of organizations have adopted a green initiative of some kind. While those companies should be lauded for their efforts at environmental stewardship, bad days on Wall Street and for the economy have seen some companies abandon or scale back their green initiatives as they tighten their belts.
Now is the time to take a realistic look at your company’s green initiatives and ask whether or not the practices undertaken are “evergreen” – promoting not only environmental sustainability, but also sound business practices and solid return on investment so as to be sustainable in good economic conditions as well as bad.
For instance, over six million trees and more than 300 million pounds of paper are wasted each year on undeliverable-as-addressed Standard class mail, as reported by UAA Clearinghouse. It costs the Post Office over 2 billion dollars annually to process this true “junk mail”. And the cost to mailers is even more dramatic – undeliverable mail costs direct mailers over $6 billion dollars a year.
So, is Postmaster General Jack Potter’s call to reduce UAA mail by 50 percent by 2010 a green initiative designed to decrease global warming and unnecessary environmental waste? Absolutely. But it’s also a common sense business initiative that will save both the USPS and mailers a tremendous amount of money – money better spent on job creation, product development, and effective marketing.
Here are 10 steps you can easily implement to save money as you green your mailings – reducing waste, while improving deliverability, effectiveness and response to ensure you stay in the black, even as the economy sees red:
1. Correct your mailing
2. Update your mailing
3. Dedupe your mailing
4. Suppress your mailing
5. Target your mailing
6. TransPromo your mailing
7. Connect your mailing
8. Downsize your mailing
9. Sustain your mailing
10. Recycle your mailing
Has your organization had success with any of these strategies?
A recent Aperture Research Institute study reported upwards of 70 percent of organizations have adopted a green initiative of some kind. While those companies should be lauded for their efforts at environmental stewardship, bad days on Wall Street and for the economy have seen some companies abandon or scale back their green initiatives as they tighten their belts.
Now is the time to take a realistic look at your company’s green initiatives and ask whether or not the practices undertaken are “evergreen” – promoting not only environmental sustainability, but also sound business practices and solid return on investment so as to be sustainable in good economic conditions as well as bad.
For instance, over six million trees and more than 300 million pounds of paper are wasted each year on undeliverable-as-addressed Standard class mail, as reported by UAA Clearinghouse. It costs the Post Office over 2 billion dollars annually to process this true “junk mail”. And the cost to mailers is even more dramatic – undeliverable mail costs direct mailers over $6 billion dollars a year.
So, is Postmaster General Jack Potter’s call to reduce UAA mail by 50 percent by 2010 a green initiative designed to decrease global warming and unnecessary environmental waste? Absolutely. But it’s also a common sense business initiative that will save both the USPS and mailers a tremendous amount of money – money better spent on job creation, product development, and effective marketing.
Here are 10 steps you can easily implement to save money as you green your mailings – reducing waste, while improving deliverability, effectiveness and response to ensure you stay in the black, even as the economy sees red:
1. Correct your mailing
2. Update your mailing
3. Dedupe your mailing
4. Suppress your mailing
5. Target your mailing
6. TransPromo your mailing
7. Connect your mailing
8. Downsize your mailing
9. Sustain your mailing
10. Recycle your mailing
Has your organization had success with any of these strategies?
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Enterprises will place emphasis on vendor integration in 2011
Posted by Mark Brousseau
As organizations become increasingly decentralized, 2011 will see enterprises identifying technology suppliers that can integrate effectively with other — often competing — solutions, according to new research released by analyst firm Real Story Group (formerly CMS Watch).
"Going into 2011, our research customers are indicating an unprecedented aversion to vendor lock-in," said Real Story Group President and Principal Analyst, Tony Byrne. "In the real world, enterprises have to support multiple devices, multiple internal portals, multiple web delivery channels, underutilized SharePoint deployments, and the lingering primacy of e-mail as a corporate information management platform — so vendors will have to adapt."
Real Story Group provided 12 other technology predictions for 2011:
1. "Bring Your Own Device" policies will push HTML5 adoption for mobile access to enterprise applications
2. Content-rich customers will rebel against Web CMS marketing spins
3. Microsoft will turn to partners to fix SharePoint shortcomings
4. The top end of the Web CMS market will be redefined
5. Intranet community managers will adopt public social functionality
6. SaaS vendors will try to separate from "The Cloud"
7. Buyers will have a greater acceptance of newer standards
8. Case Management will become the leading application from high-end ECM vendors
9. Digital Asset Management vendors will greatly expand video management capabilities
10. E-mail will remain the world's de-facto enterprise document repository and workflow system
11. Portal software will increasingly produce services for other portals
12. Specialized talent around managing content will begin to migrate out of large corporations
What do you think?
As organizations become increasingly decentralized, 2011 will see enterprises identifying technology suppliers that can integrate effectively with other — often competing — solutions, according to new research released by analyst firm Real Story Group (formerly CMS Watch).
"Going into 2011, our research customers are indicating an unprecedented aversion to vendor lock-in," said Real Story Group President and Principal Analyst, Tony Byrne. "In the real world, enterprises have to support multiple devices, multiple internal portals, multiple web delivery channels, underutilized SharePoint deployments, and the lingering primacy of e-mail as a corporate information management platform — so vendors will have to adapt."
Real Story Group provided 12 other technology predictions for 2011:
1. "Bring Your Own Device" policies will push HTML5 adoption for mobile access to enterprise applications
2. Content-rich customers will rebel against Web CMS marketing spins
3. Microsoft will turn to partners to fix SharePoint shortcomings
4. The top end of the Web CMS market will be redefined
5. Intranet community managers will adopt public social functionality
6. SaaS vendors will try to separate from "The Cloud"
7. Buyers will have a greater acceptance of newer standards
8. Case Management will become the leading application from high-end ECM vendors
9. Digital Asset Management vendors will greatly expand video management capabilities
10. E-mail will remain the world's de-facto enterprise document repository and workflow system
11. Portal software will increasingly produce services for other portals
12. Specialized talent around managing content will begin to migrate out of large corporations
What do you think?
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Companies Unprepared to Address Risks Created by New Technology
Posted by Mark Brousseau
Less than a third of global businesses have an IT risk management program capable of addressing the risks related to the use of new technologies, according to Ernst & Young’s 13th annual Global Information Security Survey. In spite of the rapid emergence of new technology, just one in ten companies consider examining new and emerging IT trends a very important activity for the information security function to perform.
A significant increase in use of external service providers and business adoption of new technologies, such as cloud computing, social networking and Web 2.0, is recognized to increase risk for 60% of respondents. Yet, in spite of this, less than half intend to increase annual investment in information security.
Paul van Kessel, Ernst & Young Global IT Risk and Assurance Leader,comments: “Technology advances provide an increasingly mobile workforce with seemingly endless ways to connect and interact with colleagues, customers and clients. These advances represent a massive opportunity for IT to deliver significant benefits to the organization but new technology also means new risk. It is vital that companies not only recognize this risk, but take action to avoid it.”
Over half of respondents state that increased workforce mobility poses a considerable challenge to the effective delivery of information security initiatives, due to widespread use of mobile computing devices. For almost two-thirds employees’ level of security awareness is recognized as a considerable challenge.
"As the mobile workforce continues to grow, so does the level of risk. In addition to implementing new technology solutions and re-engineering information flows, companies must focus on informing the workforce about risks. The delivery of effective, and regular, security awareness training is a critical success factor as companies attempt to keep pace with the changing environment,” van Kessel adds.
Among the other findings in the report:
•Half of respondents plan to spend more over the next year on data leakage and data loss prevention – up 7% from last year. To address potential new risks, 39% are making policy adjustments, 29% are implementing encryption techniques and 28% are implementing stronger identity and access management controls.
•For the first time, continuous availability of critical IT resources was identified as one of the top five risks.
•23% of respondents are using cloud computing services, a further 15% plan to use within the next 12 months. For 85% of respondents, external certification of cloud service providers would increase trust; 43% state that certification should be based upon an agreed standard and 22% require accreditation for the certifying body.
What do you think?
Less than a third of global businesses have an IT risk management program capable of addressing the risks related to the use of new technologies, according to Ernst & Young’s 13th annual Global Information Security Survey. In spite of the rapid emergence of new technology, just one in ten companies consider examining new and emerging IT trends a very important activity for the information security function to perform.
A significant increase in use of external service providers and business adoption of new technologies, such as cloud computing, social networking and Web 2.0, is recognized to increase risk for 60% of respondents. Yet, in spite of this, less than half intend to increase annual investment in information security.
Paul van Kessel, Ernst & Young Global IT Risk and Assurance Leader,comments: “Technology advances provide an increasingly mobile workforce with seemingly endless ways to connect and interact with colleagues, customers and clients. These advances represent a massive opportunity for IT to deliver significant benefits to the organization but new technology also means new risk. It is vital that companies not only recognize this risk, but take action to avoid it.”
Over half of respondents state that increased workforce mobility poses a considerable challenge to the effective delivery of information security initiatives, due to widespread use of mobile computing devices. For almost two-thirds employees’ level of security awareness is recognized as a considerable challenge.
"As the mobile workforce continues to grow, so does the level of risk. In addition to implementing new technology solutions and re-engineering information flows, companies must focus on informing the workforce about risks. The delivery of effective, and regular, security awareness training is a critical success factor as companies attempt to keep pace with the changing environment,” van Kessel adds.
Among the other findings in the report:
•Half of respondents plan to spend more over the next year on data leakage and data loss prevention – up 7% from last year. To address potential new risks, 39% are making policy adjustments, 29% are implementing encryption techniques and 28% are implementing stronger identity and access management controls.
•For the first time, continuous availability of critical IT resources was identified as one of the top five risks.
•23% of respondents are using cloud computing services, a further 15% plan to use within the next 12 months. For 85% of respondents, external certification of cloud service providers would increase trust; 43% state that certification should be based upon an agreed standard and 22% require accreditation for the certifying body.
What do you think?
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Waiting for the LightSwitch to Go On
By Roy Chomko, President, Adage Technologies
Microsoft’s VSLive2010 event was recently held in Orlando, FL. This yearly developer’s event is all about development in the Visual Studio environment, and one of the big announcements this year was the launch date for Visual Studio LightSwitch. LightSwitch is a Rapid Development environment that will allow technical and somewhat-technical people the ability to create light weight Line of Business applications. While many developers don’t think LightSwitch will be useful for creating apps, we think it can be very beneficial to use in the right circumstances. Here are some reasons why.
Right-Sized vs Enterprise Ready
In recent years there has been a growing philosophy that everything needs to be enterprise ready. The prevailing thought is all solutions need to be scalable, flexible, anything-able. While that is true for anything that really does need to be enterprise ready, there are situations where enterprise ready is TOO much. Imagine you are a small start up. You are not focused on enterprise ready. You are focused on getting through your first year. Alternately, you might be an established organization that is considering getting into a new line of business.
Focusing on getting something up and running to let your employees share information in a cost effective way would ensure you are not risking valuable resources (i.e., capital). In today’s economy capital budgets are limited, and in some companies non-existent.
Best of Both Worlds
Traditionally, we have seen tools such as Access, Excel, and more recently SharePoint act as a useful starting point for a low cost prototype. The best thing that can be said of those initial forays in developing Line of Business applications is that usually all of the necessary data points have been identified and that there is a working prototype. We find that having a working prototype when starting an enterprise application development effort is immeasurably helpful.
While Access and Excel solutions do provide value when moving to the next level of maturation, LightSwitch can provide even more. Since LightSwitch can connect to Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle databases, the application can utilize either of those databases during the initial development. LightSwitch also generates an ADO.Net EntityFramework class structure that can be used in the next iteration of development. Finally, the interface is rendered to a Silverlight application.
Recently, we had a customer request a simple application for generating quotes for customers and tracking them in a web format. Taking this use case, we decided to give LightSwitch a go. We were able to build a working prototype for the need within 4 hours, complete with the database tables, class structure, and Silverlight interface. Normally this would have taken close to 40 hours to get to the same point in a traditional web development environment.
Efficiency vs. Maturation
Some people point out that if this right-Sized application is successful that it will need to be rebuilt, usually from the ground up. While this is mostly true, it’s relevant to restate that having a working prototype does reduce the risk (risk = time + money) in starting a new application.
So would it be more efficient to build the enterprise ready version of the application first? The assumption there is that you are going to get the application right the first time. Or that the application will be used for a period of time to recover its ROI. But aren’t those two very big assumptions?
Furthermore, aren’t those two very expensive assumptions?
Also, it’s relevant to say that enterprise software endeavors are never guaranteed successes. We all know the high rate of failure for traditional development, whether it is done using an agile or waterfall approach. As noted in a recent Gartner report, approximately 50% of all features are either never used or rarely used. Why not develop those features inexpensively first and then decide what needs to be in your final application? These are the types of benefits Microsoft’s LightSwitch can provide, making it something to consider moving forward.
Adage Technologies is a Chicago-based web and software development company. In 2001, Roy co-founded Adage Technologies combining a passion for technology and the desire to build a company focused on driving business value through web technology. As President, Roy's energy and customer centric approach have helped to grow Adage to a well respected web and software development firm.
Roy has over 20 years of experience in technology sales, consulting, and development. Prior to founding Adage, Roy was a principle of a Cisco VAR and a web development firm in the late 1990s. Roy has also held business development positions with Wolfram Research and GE Capital.
Microsoft’s VSLive2010 event was recently held in Orlando, FL. This yearly developer’s event is all about development in the Visual Studio environment, and one of the big announcements this year was the launch date for Visual Studio LightSwitch. LightSwitch is a Rapid Development environment that will allow technical and somewhat-technical people the ability to create light weight Line of Business applications. While many developers don’t think LightSwitch will be useful for creating apps, we think it can be very beneficial to use in the right circumstances. Here are some reasons why.
Right-Sized vs Enterprise Ready
In recent years there has been a growing philosophy that everything needs to be enterprise ready. The prevailing thought is all solutions need to be scalable, flexible, anything-able. While that is true for anything that really does need to be enterprise ready, there are situations where enterprise ready is TOO much. Imagine you are a small start up. You are not focused on enterprise ready. You are focused on getting through your first year. Alternately, you might be an established organization that is considering getting into a new line of business.
Focusing on getting something up and running to let your employees share information in a cost effective way would ensure you are not risking valuable resources (i.e., capital). In today’s economy capital budgets are limited, and in some companies non-existent.
Best of Both Worlds
Traditionally, we have seen tools such as Access, Excel, and more recently SharePoint act as a useful starting point for a low cost prototype. The best thing that can be said of those initial forays in developing Line of Business applications is that usually all of the necessary data points have been identified and that there is a working prototype. We find that having a working prototype when starting an enterprise application development effort is immeasurably helpful.
While Access and Excel solutions do provide value when moving to the next level of maturation, LightSwitch can provide even more. Since LightSwitch can connect to Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle databases, the application can utilize either of those databases during the initial development. LightSwitch also generates an ADO.Net EntityFramework class structure that can be used in the next iteration of development. Finally, the interface is rendered to a Silverlight application.
Recently, we had a customer request a simple application for generating quotes for customers and tracking them in a web format. Taking this use case, we decided to give LightSwitch a go. We were able to build a working prototype for the need within 4 hours, complete with the database tables, class structure, and Silverlight interface. Normally this would have taken close to 40 hours to get to the same point in a traditional web development environment.
Efficiency vs. Maturation
Some people point out that if this right-Sized application is successful that it will need to be rebuilt, usually from the ground up. While this is mostly true, it’s relevant to restate that having a working prototype does reduce the risk (risk = time + money) in starting a new application.
So would it be more efficient to build the enterprise ready version of the application first? The assumption there is that you are going to get the application right the first time. Or that the application will be used for a period of time to recover its ROI. But aren’t those two very big assumptions?
Furthermore, aren’t those two very expensive assumptions?
Also, it’s relevant to say that enterprise software endeavors are never guaranteed successes. We all know the high rate of failure for traditional development, whether it is done using an agile or waterfall approach. As noted in a recent Gartner report, approximately 50% of all features are either never used or rarely used. Why not develop those features inexpensively first and then decide what needs to be in your final application? These are the types of benefits Microsoft’s LightSwitch can provide, making it something to consider moving forward.
Adage Technologies is a Chicago-based web and software development company. In 2001, Roy co-founded Adage Technologies combining a passion for technology and the desire to build a company focused on driving business value through web technology. As President, Roy's energy and customer centric approach have helped to grow Adage to a well respected web and software development firm.
Roy has over 20 years of experience in technology sales, consulting, and development. Prior to founding Adage, Roy was a principle of a Cisco VAR and a web development firm in the late 1990s. Roy has also held business development positions with Wolfram Research and GE Capital.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Improving content management
Posted by Mark Brousseau
Thinking outside the box can help organizations improve payback on their enterprise content management (ECM) solutions. Jim Bunn of ibml (jbunn@ibml.com) explains:
Great minds think alike. But, when it comes to enterprise content management (ECM) solutions, like minds can be a problem. If every organization approaches its ECM deployment the same way, using the same out-of-the-box technologies and the same old workflows, then creating exceptional results is going to be extremely difficult. The problem is compounded by the fact that many organizations don't have a thorough, in-depth understanding of their own business processes. The more a company thinks that its operations are just like any other, the more difficult it becomes to achieve new efficiencies.
To maximize payback on their ECM investments, organizations need to think outside the box by ignoring the industry groupthink and focusing on their own needs and objectives.
Starting with a clean slate
Long before they agree to their first meeting with an ECM vendor, organizations should get a handle on their operations requirements and business objectives. Additionally, they should understand all of the document types that pass through their operations and their data capture needs. Be warned: this process can be time-consuming. It will also be eye-opening. Upon closer inspection, some of your legacy processes are sure to elicit groans. But, there's nothing worse for an ECM business case than forcing inefficient manual processes into an automated workflow.
Deploying an ECM solution provides an opportunity to re-engineer business processes and eliminate some altogether. For example, take a hard look at every manual step in document preparation or image capture; start by measuring how long it takes for documents to be scanned after they have entered your company. This step will have the added benefit of allowing you to look for ROI/cost savings in your end-to-end document flow. Also, consider soliciting input from the different departments that are associated with a specific process to learn their information needs and any downstream exceptions they are seeing.
When you are researching your ECM needs, resist the temptation to cede control to your company's IT department. No one knows your business requirements better than you. Work collaboratively with IT to define system workflows to ensure that the deployed solution will meet your needs. For instance, an IT programmer is unlikely to know whether a specific work type should be routed to an individual's work queue (possibly for security/privacy reasons) or to a common operator queue. Some business users accompany their IT staff for technical training classes provided by vendors just so they know what the software is capable of. Then, they can better communicate their needs.
Think big. By definition, ECM solutions help bring down data silos and bridge information gaps. So, when you are developing your ECM initiatives, think beyond one department's needs. The combination of new integration tools and emerging technologies allows organizations to make information available to whoever needs it, quickly and securely, regardless of their location. To this end, it may make sense to leverage imaging, data capture and workflow investments to develop a shared services infrastructure where one department manages document processing for others.
Similarly, map out how documents currently enter your organization -- and who is touching them -- to determine if the information flow can be streamlined. Don't assume that distributed capture is the most efficient means of scanning documents. Many organizations are surprised by the "hidden costs" of distributed capture. Likewise, a completely centralized scanning operation may miss opportunities to expedite information capture and handling. What's important is that organizations look for a flexible scanning infrastructure with centrally managed control and reporting capabilities. In some cases, you may be able to integrate electronic forms into your automated workflow. These solutions can significantly reduce manual processing, forwarding only exceptions to operators for review.
Evaluate, evaluate, evaluate
Once you have automated your document processes, evaluate how you are doing. And then evaluate the process again. And again. It's not uncommon for business requirements (volumes, document design, etc.) to change soon after a new system is implemented. You want to be sure your ECM solution adapts as well. Consider using centralized reporting or analytics tools, real-time operations dashboards or periodic operations audits to ensure your ECM solution is still meeting your needs.
You may also want to adapt your compensation plan to reward employees for productivity and quality in the new automated document environment. Similarly, consider embracing flexible work hours -- to save labor costs and attract Blue Chip talent -- based on the needs of your operations.
With budget-strapped organizations fearful of making a misstep in new system implementations, it's easy to see how they become locked into a myopic way of seeing ECM deployments. But, that makes it hard to spot new efficiencies and pounce on opportunities for business process improvements.
The key to maximizing ECM payback is to think outside the box.
What do you think?
Thinking outside the box can help organizations improve payback on their enterprise content management (ECM) solutions. Jim Bunn of ibml (jbunn@ibml.com) explains:
Great minds think alike. But, when it comes to enterprise content management (ECM) solutions, like minds can be a problem. If every organization approaches its ECM deployment the same way, using the same out-of-the-box technologies and the same old workflows, then creating exceptional results is going to be extremely difficult. The problem is compounded by the fact that many organizations don't have a thorough, in-depth understanding of their own business processes. The more a company thinks that its operations are just like any other, the more difficult it becomes to achieve new efficiencies.
To maximize payback on their ECM investments, organizations need to think outside the box by ignoring the industry groupthink and focusing on their own needs and objectives.
Starting with a clean slate
Long before they agree to their first meeting with an ECM vendor, organizations should get a handle on their operations requirements and business objectives. Additionally, they should understand all of the document types that pass through their operations and their data capture needs. Be warned: this process can be time-consuming. It will also be eye-opening. Upon closer inspection, some of your legacy processes are sure to elicit groans. But, there's nothing worse for an ECM business case than forcing inefficient manual processes into an automated workflow.
Deploying an ECM solution provides an opportunity to re-engineer business processes and eliminate some altogether. For example, take a hard look at every manual step in document preparation or image capture; start by measuring how long it takes for documents to be scanned after they have entered your company. This step will have the added benefit of allowing you to look for ROI/cost savings in your end-to-end document flow. Also, consider soliciting input from the different departments that are associated with a specific process to learn their information needs and any downstream exceptions they are seeing.
When you are researching your ECM needs, resist the temptation to cede control to your company's IT department. No one knows your business requirements better than you. Work collaboratively with IT to define system workflows to ensure that the deployed solution will meet your needs. For instance, an IT programmer is unlikely to know whether a specific work type should be routed to an individual's work queue (possibly for security/privacy reasons) or to a common operator queue. Some business users accompany their IT staff for technical training classes provided by vendors just so they know what the software is capable of. Then, they can better communicate their needs.
Think big. By definition, ECM solutions help bring down data silos and bridge information gaps. So, when you are developing your ECM initiatives, think beyond one department's needs. The combination of new integration tools and emerging technologies allows organizations to make information available to whoever needs it, quickly and securely, regardless of their location. To this end, it may make sense to leverage imaging, data capture and workflow investments to develop a shared services infrastructure where one department manages document processing for others.
Similarly, map out how documents currently enter your organization -- and who is touching them -- to determine if the information flow can be streamlined. Don't assume that distributed capture is the most efficient means of scanning documents. Many organizations are surprised by the "hidden costs" of distributed capture. Likewise, a completely centralized scanning operation may miss opportunities to expedite information capture and handling. What's important is that organizations look for a flexible scanning infrastructure with centrally managed control and reporting capabilities. In some cases, you may be able to integrate electronic forms into your automated workflow. These solutions can significantly reduce manual processing, forwarding only exceptions to operators for review.
Evaluate, evaluate, evaluate
Once you have automated your document processes, evaluate how you are doing. And then evaluate the process again. And again. It's not uncommon for business requirements (volumes, document design, etc.) to change soon after a new system is implemented. You want to be sure your ECM solution adapts as well. Consider using centralized reporting or analytics tools, real-time operations dashboards or periodic operations audits to ensure your ECM solution is still meeting your needs.
You may also want to adapt your compensation plan to reward employees for productivity and quality in the new automated document environment. Similarly, consider embracing flexible work hours -- to save labor costs and attract Blue Chip talent -- based on the needs of your operations.
With budget-strapped organizations fearful of making a misstep in new system implementations, it's easy to see how they become locked into a myopic way of seeing ECM deployments. But, that makes it hard to spot new efficiencies and pounce on opportunities for business process improvements.
The key to maximizing ECM payback is to think outside the box.
What do you think?
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Creating the Efficient Paperless Office
By Mark Brousseau
There’s a school of thought that the data capture and document imaging industry should have made more progress by now. “We’re talking about the same issues today that we were years ago,” Chris Preston of EMC Corporation said during a keynote presentation this morning at TAWPI’s Capture Conference in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. But the economic downturn may accelerate the pace of change.
“The technology has substantially improved, and we’re moving to the right direction, but we’re not getting the paper out of the organization entirely,” Preston told conference attendees. “The challenge is to more efficiently handle the paper once it’s in an organization.”
Preston noted that the economic downturn is driving the push to more efficiently handle paper. “What’s driving organizations are three basic things, and they will continue to drive organizations even in the recovery: reduce operating costs, better serve customers, and reduce risk,” Preston said.
“Organizations want to know how to deliver value faster, better, cheaper than before,” Preston said.
Preston pointed to a study conducted by EMC and The Economist that cited agility as the top priority for 88 percent of executives worldwide. “Agility is not just about speed, it’s about adaptability and the ability to adapt quickly,” Preston said, noting that agile companies grow revenues 30 percent faster according to the study. To improve agility, Preston said organizations must:
… Improve process efficiency (change management, outsourcing, automation and satisfaction)
… Improve knowledge management and information sharing processes
… Encourage and extend collaboration across the business and beyond
“Doing all of these things will provide a foundation for becoming a more agile company,” he said.
To this end, organizations are moving from an application approach to information-centric infrastructure, with a common, virtual pool of information that applications have access to, or contribute to. “This is what organizations are trying to aspire to,” Preston explained.
Standing in the way of this migration is information. “If you look at information, there is lots of it (1.8 zetabytes), it is mostly unstructured (95 percent), mostly unmanaged (85 percent), managed by organizations (85 percent), and becoming more regulated,” Preston said. “The consequences of not managing information are severe – everything from regulatory fines, impact on customer service.”
And the paper challenges facing organizations aren’t likely to change anytime soon. Preston noted that more than 20 millions of office paper is produced and consumed each year in the United States and Europe. “Paper is, and will continue to be, a critical component of business transactions. In order to drive efficiency you’ll have to find better ways to manage paper,” Preston told attendees.
“The opportunity is to look at document imaging and data capture to transform paper into business-ready information so the organization can do something with it,” Preston stated, adding that the greatest opportunity to reduce costs and enhance services lies in transactional content management.
What do you think? Post your comments below.
There’s a school of thought that the data capture and document imaging industry should have made more progress by now. “We’re talking about the same issues today that we were years ago,” Chris Preston of EMC Corporation said during a keynote presentation this morning at TAWPI’s Capture Conference in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. But the economic downturn may accelerate the pace of change.
“The technology has substantially improved, and we’re moving to the right direction, but we’re not getting the paper out of the organization entirely,” Preston told conference attendees. “The challenge is to more efficiently handle the paper once it’s in an organization.”
Preston noted that the economic downturn is driving the push to more efficiently handle paper. “What’s driving organizations are three basic things, and they will continue to drive organizations even in the recovery: reduce operating costs, better serve customers, and reduce risk,” Preston said.
“Organizations want to know how to deliver value faster, better, cheaper than before,” Preston said.
Preston pointed to a study conducted by EMC and The Economist that cited agility as the top priority for 88 percent of executives worldwide. “Agility is not just about speed, it’s about adaptability and the ability to adapt quickly,” Preston said, noting that agile companies grow revenues 30 percent faster according to the study. To improve agility, Preston said organizations must:
… Improve process efficiency (change management, outsourcing, automation and satisfaction)
… Improve knowledge management and information sharing processes
… Encourage and extend collaboration across the business and beyond
“Doing all of these things will provide a foundation for becoming a more agile company,” he said.
To this end, organizations are moving from an application approach to information-centric infrastructure, with a common, virtual pool of information that applications have access to, or contribute to. “This is what organizations are trying to aspire to,” Preston explained.
Standing in the way of this migration is information. “If you look at information, there is lots of it (1.8 zetabytes), it is mostly unstructured (95 percent), mostly unmanaged (85 percent), managed by organizations (85 percent), and becoming more regulated,” Preston said. “The consequences of not managing information are severe – everything from regulatory fines, impact on customer service.”
And the paper challenges facing organizations aren’t likely to change anytime soon. Preston noted that more than 20 millions of office paper is produced and consumed each year in the United States and Europe. “Paper is, and will continue to be, a critical component of business transactions. In order to drive efficiency you’ll have to find better ways to manage paper,” Preston told attendees.
“The opportunity is to look at document imaging and data capture to transform paper into business-ready information so the organization can do something with it,” Preston stated, adding that the greatest opportunity to reduce costs and enhance services lies in transactional content management.
What do you think? Post your comments below.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Countering the Content Conundrum
Posted by Mark Brousseau
In the article below, Bruce Sharpe of JustSystems takes structured content to the enterprise, showing how it can solve problems most people didn’t know could be fixed, problems that we all have if we work with content.
Have you ever spent hours poring over a document to ensure accuracy and inclusion of all edits made to earlier versions? Have you — or has your company — ever suffered consequences from taking content written for an internal audience and using it for sales or marketing — without thoroughly vetting it for external use?
No matter the department — HR, sales, marketing, legal, administration, etc. — many of you find that kind of content pain to be an unavoidable fact of work life, standard operating procedure. Unaware of a better way to create and manage content, you suck it up. Well, you can stop sucking because there is a better way, and that way is structured content — documents that have been chunked into meaningful component parts and tagged in a systematic fashion.
While it remains one of the best-kept enterprise secrets, structured content has long proven its value in technical communications where it mitigates risks, reduces costs, and increases revenues. Better still, the road to mature, standards-based structured content has been paved by organizations such as IBM and OASIS and standards such as DITA. Now, it’s time for other enterprise functions to realize the same benefits associated with structured content.
In brief, structured content brings organization and automation to content. Structured content lets content creators efficiently create, collaborate, manage and reuse high volumes of information, which can be repurposed into the languages and formats your customers demand.
The result? Organizations accelerate the cost-effective delivery of accurate information products — whether those products are for internal or external consumption, e.g., sales RFPs, marketing brochures, HR forms, legal contracts or any other department’s content.
So, what does structured content look like in the enterprise? It depends where you look.
In research & development, you can use structured content to create and manage engineering documents, technical publications, and strategy and planning documents. Here, structured content can help increase revenues by improving the ability of key employees, partners and vendors to share and discover documents, resulting in faster time to market for new products.
Meanwhile, costs can be reduced through content repurposing and reuse, which eliminates the duplication and re-creation of existing content. And structured content can mitigate R&D risk, for instance, helping companies avoid noncompliance, and improve customer satisfaction by ensuring the consistent use of authoritative content in product documentation.
In manufacturing, contracts, manufacturing operations, standard operating procedures and regulated documents all benefit from structured content. Revenue growth can come from streamlined creation of contracts and agreements, ultimately accelerating time to revenue. Cost reductions may be seen in reduced rework, recall and aftermarket service costs otherwise caused by inaccurate information in manufacturing documents. Risk can be mitigated by reducing the risk of inaccurate or inconsistent contracts, and by reducing the risk of human error associated with reviewing one-of-a-kind, complex legal documents.
In sales and marketing, structured content can be applied to sales and marketing collateral as well as contact center documents. The revenue opportunities in the sales and marketing department include developing a reusable library of proven RFPs and content to improve win rates. That reusable library also helps to reduce the costs of goods sold by reducing the time and costs associated with developing proposals and business correspondence. Predefined, reusable content components with approved language and standard terms and conditions mitigate risks by ensuring the accuracy of contracts and legally binding agreements.
In service and support, you can use structured content for maintenance and repair, technical support and training documents. To increase revenues, you could increase aftermarket sales through maintenance and repair operations supported with structured content. Cost reductions may be realized through content reuse, which reduces editorial and publishing costs. Structured content helps mitigate the risk of noncompliance and potentially catastrophic equipment failure by ensuring personnel have consistent, up-to-date maintenance and repair information.
In corporate administration, structured content can benefit legal and regulatory, human resources, and finance and operations documents. Revenue growth can come from improving the ability to discover patents and IP documentation for ongoing growth and protection of revenue streams. Cost savings may be realized by reducing redundant editorial and publishing costs, which lowers the cost of publishing and maintaining standard documents. Finally, structured content can help reduce the risks of errors during the review process and through regulatory filings, demonstrating that you have compliance policies in place.
Clearly, these are just a few of many examples in which structured content can benefit the organization. The important takeaway is that you don’t have to live with your current content conundrums. You can relieve the pain and realize significant advantages by embracing structured content, in whatever department you happen to work.
Dr. Bruce Sharpe brings over 25 years of technology leadership experience to JustSystems, including founding XMetaL and HoTMetaL content creation solutions. He held senior technical management positions at MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates, Advanced Gravis, SoftQuad Software, Corel, and Blast Radius before successfully bringing XMetaL to JustSystems. Learn more about JustSystems at http://www.justsystems.com and contact Bruce at bruce.sharpe@justsystems.com.
In the article below, Bruce Sharpe of JustSystems takes structured content to the enterprise, showing how it can solve problems most people didn’t know could be fixed, problems that we all have if we work with content.
Have you ever spent hours poring over a document to ensure accuracy and inclusion of all edits made to earlier versions? Have you — or has your company — ever suffered consequences from taking content written for an internal audience and using it for sales or marketing — without thoroughly vetting it for external use?
No matter the department — HR, sales, marketing, legal, administration, etc. — many of you find that kind of content pain to be an unavoidable fact of work life, standard operating procedure. Unaware of a better way to create and manage content, you suck it up. Well, you can stop sucking because there is a better way, and that way is structured content — documents that have been chunked into meaningful component parts and tagged in a systematic fashion.
While it remains one of the best-kept enterprise secrets, structured content has long proven its value in technical communications where it mitigates risks, reduces costs, and increases revenues. Better still, the road to mature, standards-based structured content has been paved by organizations such as IBM and OASIS and standards such as DITA. Now, it’s time for other enterprise functions to realize the same benefits associated with structured content.
In brief, structured content brings organization and automation to content. Structured content lets content creators efficiently create, collaborate, manage and reuse high volumes of information, which can be repurposed into the languages and formats your customers demand.
The result? Organizations accelerate the cost-effective delivery of accurate information products — whether those products are for internal or external consumption, e.g., sales RFPs, marketing brochures, HR forms, legal contracts or any other department’s content.
So, what does structured content look like in the enterprise? It depends where you look.
In research & development, you can use structured content to create and manage engineering documents, technical publications, and strategy and planning documents. Here, structured content can help increase revenues by improving the ability of key employees, partners and vendors to share and discover documents, resulting in faster time to market for new products.
Meanwhile, costs can be reduced through content repurposing and reuse, which eliminates the duplication and re-creation of existing content. And structured content can mitigate R&D risk, for instance, helping companies avoid noncompliance, and improve customer satisfaction by ensuring the consistent use of authoritative content in product documentation.
In manufacturing, contracts, manufacturing operations, standard operating procedures and regulated documents all benefit from structured content. Revenue growth can come from streamlined creation of contracts and agreements, ultimately accelerating time to revenue. Cost reductions may be seen in reduced rework, recall and aftermarket service costs otherwise caused by inaccurate information in manufacturing documents. Risk can be mitigated by reducing the risk of inaccurate or inconsistent contracts, and by reducing the risk of human error associated with reviewing one-of-a-kind, complex legal documents.
In sales and marketing, structured content can be applied to sales and marketing collateral as well as contact center documents. The revenue opportunities in the sales and marketing department include developing a reusable library of proven RFPs and content to improve win rates. That reusable library also helps to reduce the costs of goods sold by reducing the time and costs associated with developing proposals and business correspondence. Predefined, reusable content components with approved language and standard terms and conditions mitigate risks by ensuring the accuracy of contracts and legally binding agreements.
In service and support, you can use structured content for maintenance and repair, technical support and training documents. To increase revenues, you could increase aftermarket sales through maintenance and repair operations supported with structured content. Cost reductions may be realized through content reuse, which reduces editorial and publishing costs. Structured content helps mitigate the risk of noncompliance and potentially catastrophic equipment failure by ensuring personnel have consistent, up-to-date maintenance and repair information.
In corporate administration, structured content can benefit legal and regulatory, human resources, and finance and operations documents. Revenue growth can come from improving the ability to discover patents and IP documentation for ongoing growth and protection of revenue streams. Cost savings may be realized by reducing redundant editorial and publishing costs, which lowers the cost of publishing and maintaining standard documents. Finally, structured content can help reduce the risks of errors during the review process and through regulatory filings, demonstrating that you have compliance policies in place.
Clearly, these are just a few of many examples in which structured content can benefit the organization. The important takeaway is that you don’t have to live with your current content conundrums. You can relieve the pain and realize significant advantages by embracing structured content, in whatever department you happen to work.
Dr. Bruce Sharpe brings over 25 years of technology leadership experience to JustSystems, including founding XMetaL and HoTMetaL content creation solutions. He held senior technical management positions at MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates, Advanced Gravis, SoftQuad Software, Corel, and Blast Radius before successfully bringing XMetaL to JustSystems. Learn more about JustSystems at http://www.justsystems.com and contact Bruce at bruce.sharpe@justsystems.com.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Getting the Point!
By Mark Brousseau
More organizations are leveraging Microsoft SharePoint as a common presentation layer for delivering information from disparate enterprise content systems in a highly contextual way.
“Your content and collaboration strategy needs to take into consideration the role of multiple systems serving different needs, but with a strategic vision,” Rob Koplowitz, principal analyst, Forrester Research, Inc. (rkoplowitz@forrester.com), said today during an Information Week WebCast sponsored by ASG Software Solutions.
“Companies see SharePoint as a layer for shared access across systems,” Koplowitz said. “Not only for pulling information from systems, but for presenting the information in a common way. Lots of people are doing lots of interesting things with SharePoint.”
That’s for sure. SharePoint has now surpassed 100 million licenses worldwide, representing more than 17,000 customers with over $1 billion in revenues. What’s more, Microsoft now counts over 3,300 companies as SharePoint partners. “SharePoint is a game-changing platform for Microsoft,” said Adam Morgan, portal, collaboration and search specialist with Microsoft (adam.morgan@microsoft.com).
And SharePoint should continue to move very fast. According to the results of a Forrester survey presented by Koplowitz, 24 percent of organizations said they are ‘immediately’ implementing or upgrading to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server. An additional 41 percent of respondents said they will be implementing or upgrading to the platform within six months, and 22 percent said they would be doing so within the next 12 months. Only 7 percent of organizations responding said they have no plans to use the SharePoint platform.
Underlying this demand for Microsoft SharePoint is a renewed interest in enterprise collaboration and document management, Koplowitz said. “Collaboration and content management are becoming increasingly intertwined,” Koplowitz explained. “A new layer of infrastructure is being developed to access and manage content across multiple systems and processes. Users want simplified access or they won’t participate.”
This is the role Microsoft SharePoint is filling, Koplowitz said.
As evidence of the move toward collaboration and content management, Koplowitz shared the results of a Forrester survey showing that 50 percent of organizations said that implementing enterprise collaboration strategies would be among their major technology initiatives for the next 12 months. Thirty-four percent of respondents said it was a priority and 15 percent of respondents said it was a ‘critical priority.’
What’s more, Koplowitz provided the results of another survey revealing that nearly 75 percent organizations will invest in document management solutions in 2008 – topping content and e-mail archiving (66 percent), document imaging (64 percent), Web content management (62 percent), and enterprise content management (60 percent).
What is your organization’s view of Microsoft SharePoint? Post your comment below.
More organizations are leveraging Microsoft SharePoint as a common presentation layer for delivering information from disparate enterprise content systems in a highly contextual way.
“Your content and collaboration strategy needs to take into consideration the role of multiple systems serving different needs, but with a strategic vision,” Rob Koplowitz, principal analyst, Forrester Research, Inc. (rkoplowitz@forrester.com), said today during an Information Week WebCast sponsored by ASG Software Solutions.
“Companies see SharePoint as a layer for shared access across systems,” Koplowitz said. “Not only for pulling information from systems, but for presenting the information in a common way. Lots of people are doing lots of interesting things with SharePoint.”
That’s for sure. SharePoint has now surpassed 100 million licenses worldwide, representing more than 17,000 customers with over $1 billion in revenues. What’s more, Microsoft now counts over 3,300 companies as SharePoint partners. “SharePoint is a game-changing platform for Microsoft,” said Adam Morgan, portal, collaboration and search specialist with Microsoft (adam.morgan@microsoft.com).
And SharePoint should continue to move very fast. According to the results of a Forrester survey presented by Koplowitz, 24 percent of organizations said they are ‘immediately’ implementing or upgrading to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server. An additional 41 percent of respondents said they will be implementing or upgrading to the platform within six months, and 22 percent said they would be doing so within the next 12 months. Only 7 percent of organizations responding said they have no plans to use the SharePoint platform.
Underlying this demand for Microsoft SharePoint is a renewed interest in enterprise collaboration and document management, Koplowitz said. “Collaboration and content management are becoming increasingly intertwined,” Koplowitz explained. “A new layer of infrastructure is being developed to access and manage content across multiple systems and processes. Users want simplified access or they won’t participate.”
This is the role Microsoft SharePoint is filling, Koplowitz said.
As evidence of the move toward collaboration and content management, Koplowitz shared the results of a Forrester survey showing that 50 percent of organizations said that implementing enterprise collaboration strategies would be among their major technology initiatives for the next 12 months. Thirty-four percent of respondents said it was a priority and 15 percent of respondents said it was a ‘critical priority.’
What’s more, Koplowitz provided the results of another survey revealing that nearly 75 percent organizations will invest in document management solutions in 2008 – topping content and e-mail archiving (66 percent), document imaging (64 percent), Web content management (62 percent), and enterprise content management (60 percent).
What is your organization’s view of Microsoft SharePoint? Post your comment below.
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