Introduction to Enterprise Content Management (ECM)

Priscilla Emery - Principal, Information Management

IQ Business Group

October 29, 2014

Introduction to Enterprise Content

Management (ECM)

Agenda

• What is ECM?

• Component technologies

• Component practices

• Why consider implementing ECM?

• Examples: Good and Bad

• Implications for Court Clerks and Comptrollers

The Big Picture

What is ECM?

• The technologies, tools, and methods used to capture,

manage, store, preserve, and deliver “content” or

“information” across an enterprise or organization

• At the most basic level, ECM tools and strategies allow the

management of an organization’s unstructured

information, wherever that information exists.

• Unstructured information means letters, e-mails, reports,

etc., as opposed to databases or accounting systems,

which contain “structured” information.

Source: AIIM

COMPONENT

TECHNOLOGIES

Typical ECM Toolbox

Web Content Management

Document Management

Imaging

Capture Technologies

Scanning

Forms Processing & Recognition

Business Process Management / Workflow

Business Intelligence and Analytics

Storage Management

Records Management

The Garage Metaphor

Car Tools

Garden Tools

Power and

Hand Tools Paint Supplies

It’s In There

The Challenge is to

Pick the Right Set of

Tools or Tool For the

Right Job

Capture

• It's not just about scanning and imaging

• It is all about input

• It's how you capture all kinds of content

• Scanners

• Web content, Sites, Wikis, Blogs

• Electronic Docs - Microsoft Word, Excel, et.al., PDF/A

• Barcodes, QR codes - scanners, readers, mobile devices

• Photos- scanners, cameras/SD cards, mobile

• Geographic Information - Maps

• Paper / Microfilm / Microfiche

Making / Keeping Documents Searchable

• Sometimes an Image is Not Enough

• Recognition Technologies

• Optical Character Recognition (OCR)

• Intelligent Character Recognition (ICR)

• Optical Mark Recognition (OMR)

• Magnetic Ink Character Recognition (MICR)

• Sometimes An Image Is All You Get

• Photos

Electronic Forms

• Structured approach to capturing data

• Should be device independent

Source: Avoka

Metadata Capture

• Quality metadata capture is extremely important further

down the line

• Data about the data

• Who, what, when, where, and how of an electronic

document

• Author, date created, last accessed, alteration dates,

etc.

• Availability of metadata depends on the properties of the

file type (i.e. MS Office, E-mail, WordPerfect, graphic files,

Web addresses, etc.)

Classification

• Random placement is NOT a good idea

• Taxonomy is the science of classification according to a

pre-determined system, with the resulting catalog used to

provide a conceptual framework for discussion, analysis,

or information retrieval.

• In the vernacular, organizing documents, web pages, and

other content into logical groupings based on their

contents.

• This leads to indexing

Store

• All this information has to go somewhere

• Combination of software and hardware

Lots of Storage HW Options Available

• Storage Area Network (SAN): High speed network, connecting

computer systems and storage resources

• Network Attached Storage (NAS): Hard disk storage directly attached

to a network rather than through a computer

• Magneto-Optical (MO):Recording data using a combo of magnetic and

optical techniques to change the polarity of a magnetic field in the

recording medium. Data is erasable

• DVD / CD-ROM / Optical Disc

• Tape

• Magnetic Storage

• Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID): Storing the same data

on multiple hard disks for improved performance and fault tolerance

Document Repositories

• Library Services

• Version Control: Means of tracking document author(s)

and tracking multiple versions of a single document

• Check in / Check out: Ensures that only one person can

work on a document at any time

• Search / Retrieval

• Audit Trail: a log of who changed what and when –

supports accountability

Manage

• Document Management System is a software platform that

controls and organizes documents throughout an

enterprise.

• It incorporates document and content capture, workflow,

document repositories, output systems, and information

retrieval systems.

• Mostly all electronic records management systems require

a document management platform but not all document

management systems support the management of

records.

RM is Inextricably Linked with DM

Retention & Disposition

Physical and Electronic

Classification

Hold Management

Circulation

Workflow

Project /Team Collaboration

Notifications

Discussions

Event Auditing

Version Control

Storage/Repository

Access Control

Search & Retrieval

Security

Records Management Document Management

Classification and Organization

An Important First Step

• Essential component for Document Management

• Classification according to a pre-determined system

• Resulting catalog used to provide a conceptual

framework for analysis and information retrieval

• May need to rationalize different internal classification

schemes

Encouraging Collaboration While

Avoiding Chaos • Classification plays a key role in making DM

implementation successful.

• Still want to encourage users to work on the same content

within the same environment.

• Prevents document loss during the production of

information

Web Content Management

• Technology that supports the content creation, review,

approval, and publishing of web-based content combining

it with styles and templates.

• Supports the publishing workflow model using standard

document management techniques and web-based

architectures.

Workflow

• Should not be confused with Business Process

Management, which is a business practice.

• Automation of business processes, in whole or in part,

where documents (usually electronic), information, or

tasks are passed from one participant to another for

action, according to a set of rules.

Digital Asset Management (DAM)

• Allows an enterprise to digitize, log, store, manage, track

and distribute high volumes of rich media through multiple

channels, such as video, audio and images.

• Principally used by media outlets, e.g. TV networks,

publishing houses, magazines, etc.

• Can be used by other industries but typically gets

confused with document management systems.

Preserve • Long-term, error-free storage of digital information, with means for

retrieval and interpretation, for the entire time span the information is

required for.

• Long-term is defined as "long enough to be concerned with the

impacts of changing technologies, including support for new media

and data formats, or with a changing user community.

• Digital preservation is seen as the set of processes and activities that

ensure continued access to information and all kinds of records,

scientific and cultural heritage existing in digital formats.

• This includes the preservation of materials resulting from digital

reformatting, but particularly information that is born-digital and has no

analog counterpart.

Speed of Digital Obsolescence is

Increasing

• When a software or decoding technology is abandoned,

or a hardware device is no longer in production, records

created with such technologies are at great risk of loss,

simply because they are no longer accessible

• Are you Still Using Word 3.0?

• Do you have Digital Records that were created with

Word 3.0?

Tools Are Limited • Microfilm.

• PDF/A

• WORM

• Paper???

• Need to have a strategy for migrating electronic assets to newer digital

storage as it ages

Deliver

• Presentation format and delivery mechanisms can vary

greatly by application and audience

• COLD/ERM.

• Enterprise Search

• Compression Technologies

COMPONENT PRACTICES

Outsourcing

• Can be done for all or for certain parts of the ECM

application

• Using the cloud is becoming more practical than before

but still need to consider issues of data sovereignty and

security.

Business Process Management

(BPM) • A systematic approach to improving an organization’s

business processes.

• BPM activities seek to make business processes more

effective, more efficient, and more capable of adapting to

an ever-changing environment

• A business process is a set of coordinated tasks and

activities, conducted by both people and equipment that

will lead to accomplishing a specific organizational goal.

BPM is not…

• The automation of manual tasks

• Re-engineering the Enterprise

• Change Management

• Six Sigma

• A management methodology

• Workflow or BPM technology

But the techniques and tools can be used to

support any of these …. if you want them to.

Principles of BPM

• Organize around outcomes not tasks

• Correct and improve processes before (potentially)

automating them.

• Establish processes and assign ownership

• Standardize processes across the enterprise

• Enable continuous change

• Improve existing processes, rather than build radically

new or “perfect” processes.

What is a Business Process?

• A business process is a set of coordinated tasks

and activities, conducted by both people and

equipment that will lead to accomplishing a

specific organizational goal.

• Documents and records exist to support business

processes – not the other way around.

Business Process Lifecycle

Continuous Improvement

Model

Automate

Change

Manage

Optimize

Source: Rashid M. Khan

Start

ECM - What Is It Good For? • Improved efficiency

• Reduced cost

• Satisfy statutory and regulatory compliance requirements

• Tracking work activities associated with accessing info

• Improved financial performance

• Competitive differentiation – enhanced revenue

• Typical Business Applications

• Accounting

• Customer Service

• Insurance Adjudication

• Pharmaceutical Research Regulatory Compliance

• Land Records Archives

• Court Records Archives???

Benefits of Using ECM to Manage

Electronic Records • Improved Business Processing

• Can drive down cost

• Can drive up revenue

• Can reduce time to market or respond to customer

• Reduced cost to maintain a physical archive

• Staff costs: Filing Room, Mailing Room, others

• Floor Space

• Reduce Call-backs – reduced telephone costs

• Disposal or recycling of furniture and/or storage boxes.

• Consumables

• Situation: The County saw its population increase nearly 50%—from nearly 500,000 in 2000 to 725,000 by 2007—straining the county’s infrastructure. Needed to improve efficiency and customer service. Needed to reduce paper and microfilm records volume.

• Solution: Installed Laserfiche for three reasons:

Scalability and extensibility Laserfiche Toolkit, for integrating Laserfiche with existing and planned software applications Records Management Edition (RME), in order to manage retention for electronic documents.

• Benefits: 300 hours of staff time saved annually in the Auditor’s accounts payable office. Reduction in volume of file folders and labels formerly used to place each paper copy of a check and the backup into a separate folder on Auditor departmental shelving. 10 days (per payment) saved by eliminating paper payment processing in the Tax Assessor/ Collector’s Office 400 records storage boxes eliminated in the Tax Assessor’s Office.

Collin County, Texas, Dallas-Fort Worth

Court-related Installations

• Kern County Superior Court – California – Laserfiche

• Convert Microfiche to Imaging

• Over 300 users County wide

• Eliminated 40,000 records from records room

• Better information sharing county-wide. Scan once – share among

many

• Florida 13th Judicial District – Florida – Xerox Docushare

• Integration with SharePoint as Portal

• 3,000 hours of filing time saved and 48,000 copies reduced in about a

year

• Scan to e-mail, scan to FAX, etc.

• Saves time processing court orders

• Better security and disaster recovery features to preserve record

What Can Derail a Project?

• Underestimating process and organizational

issues

• Project derailed by internal politics

• Lack of knowledge or training among internal

staff

• Uneven usage due to poor procedures and lack

of enforcement

Underestimating Process and

Organizational Issues • Change is Inevitable – But Not

Without a Fight

• What’s In it For the Employee or

Department

• The KISS principle still applies

• Get perspective not just from

supervisors but with the troops in

the trenches

Project Derailed by Internal Politics

• Controlling information is power to some people

• Recognize that political issues within

organizations do exist

• Don’t try to be “above all that” and ignore them.

Lack of Knowledge or Training

• Everyone Says They Want It But:

• No one wants to pay for it

• No one wants to take time from their busy day

to do it

• Create processes that demand minimal change

to current business routine

• Create Employee accountability – link training to

objectives.

Smart Employees Hate Stupid

Procedures

• Don’t create arcane and impossibly

complicated procedures

• Enforcement should be consistently applied

when needed

• Make systems non-invasive

Change Management & Training

• Very few people enjoy change.

• Ease of use makes compliance more likely.

• Employee training is critical – Routinely – Not

just once.

• Employee accountability – link to objectives.

Also incorporate internal checks and balances

for oversight.

• Continually market program

Implications For Court Clerks and

Controllers

• Are your paper-based processes suited to migration to

ECM?

• Will BPM practices need to be applied to utilize ECM

effectively?

• Will implementation outcomes be measurable?

• Are you doing work now that can isn’t measured but could

be reduced (or eliminated) through the use of ECM

technologies?

• ECM is not a fad - it is a fact and can provide increased

productivity and cost savings for the right applications.

Any Questions?

Priscilla Emery

E-Mail: [email protected]

[email protected]

www.iqbginc.com