Latest data, trends, and statistics on content management and social business, scanning, BPM, SharePoint and ECM from AIIM President John Mancini -- home of "8 things"
Two main concerns for any document imaging exercise are the image quality and the file size. The objective: get the best possible image quality while keeping the file size to a minimum. Thus image enhancement has become an essential step in a well defined capture workflow.
The purpose of image enhancement (image cleanup/image processing) is to make the images more readable, and also to remove unwanted noise reducing the storage requirements. This is especially important for forms processing/OCR applications in order to improve character recognition.
Whitney Tidmarsh is the chief marketing officer for the Content Management and Archiving Division of EMC Corporation. Whitney is active in AIIM and currently serves on the AIIM Board of Directors. She can be followed on Twitter at @whitneytidmarsh. For more information about EMC, visit: www.emc.com.
These 8 ways to control your SharePoint infrastructure loosely fall into three buckets -- 1) Improve infrastructure performance, 2) Assert governance and control over your SharePoint infrastructure, and 3) Get more out of your SharePoint investments. EMC and Microsoft share a longstanding partnership aimed at providing customers with solutions and tools to benefit business workers around the world.
There’s no doubt that Microsoft SharePoint is big and here to stay as a platform for customized information sharing. A recent IDC study showed enterprise adoption or planned adoption of SharePoint at 70% -- and that figure seems conservative. Users are widely embracing SharePoint for tying together disconnected islands of data, integrating technology with business processes, and targeting and personalizing information for groups and individual users.
The explosion of these active and inactive teamsites poses information management challenges for IT and the business.
At the highest level, we believe an effective information management strategy enables enterprises to manage information growth (not be overwhelmed by it), secure information to protect intellectual property and meet regulatory mandates, employ information to drive innovation around customer needs, and extend access to information to streamline the collaborative process.
Today, every information management strategy must include SharePoint, and we see 8 ways to control your SharePoint infrastructure.
8 Ways to Control Your SharePoint Infrastructure
1 -- Manage Information Growth.
Manage information growth by consolidating repositories and de-duplicating the information, especially in “orphaned” sites. Moving the information from these inactive sites out of SharePoint to an appropriate lower storage tier will also save you money. The key is to ensure end-users maintain access to the information.
2 -- Reduce Server Sprawl and Associated Costs, and Eliminate Performance Bottlenecks.
This is not an aspiration! Organizations that take an active role in limiting SharePoint farms and controlling the information silos stand to benefit. IT will immediately recognize the performance, scalability and availability enhancements of SharePoint applications by moving data from production environments, and can reduce backup windows and costs by archiving information before conducting backups.
3 -- Enforce Consistent Policies across the Infrastructure.
This is to ensure you are meeting regulatory and corporate governance requirements. Create strong retention and disposition policies to protect against the risk of data loss or unintentional deletion. At EMC, we know something about policy-based information management, and the value organizations can derive from putting the right policies in place -- namely, choice and flexibility in how you manage and place information; control to properly ensure compliance, and efficiency and leverage to extract more value from your information for competitive advantage.
4 -- Maintain a Steady State of Litigation Readiness.
This will reduce the costs and time of eDiscovery against SharePoint and other information sources. You’ll also mitigate risk and reduce corporate exposure associated with unmanaged content.
5 -- Deliver Automated Compliance with No Impact on Users.
Your objective is to ensure a transparent user experience by enabling self-service access to all the information that users need through the familiar SharePoint interface. Doing so will also reduce administrative costs.
6 -- Provide Centralized Information Management.
This includes policies for long-term retention and archiving for SharePoint site content, by allowing SharePoint and non-SharePoint users to access and share physical and electronic content.
7 -- Increase Efficiency of Managing and Accessing Paper-based Information.
Scanning documents into electronic images drastically reduces paper management costs, eliminates shipping costs, and facilitates electronic storage within SharePoint. Organization can also shorten processing times by automating document and data capture and facilitating integration with SharePoint applications. Global customers have found massive value in solutions like EMC Captiva for intelligent enterprise capture. These solutions reduce storing and shipping paper costs, improved productivity by reducing manual process handling and increasing processing speed, and deliver stronger compliance through greater controls around paper.
8 -- Extend and Enhance SharePoint via Additional Capabilities and Services.
We have seen numerous organizations extend the content management capabilities of SharePoint by enabling both SharePoint and non-SharePoint users to access and share physical and electronic content.
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And just FYI, if you weren't able to be at AIIM On Demand this year, here's my keynote presentation.
You will find all sorts of information, organized into 4 parts -- news from experts in the field, a collection of best practices information under the label "Everything You Need to Know Wiki," a Buyers Guide (with user ratings), and a discussion area. Bear with us while we grow critical mass from our other social sites, but visit the community and I think you'll get a clear idea of where we are headed.
To give you an idea of the richness of resource that has started to build, here is the latest from our network of Expert Bloggers...
During a recent project we did a spider web chart with a mixed group of it and non-it people. We did the exercise to try and find out what were the most important inhibitors to...
I recently heard someone saying that businesses must unify their social networks. They meant that a business should use one, and only one, social network for every business...
Napoleon Hill in his classic work, Think and Grow Rich, tells us we should burn all our ships. “Every person who wins in any undertaking must be willing to burn his...
Product and Marketing Manager - Google Enterprise (UK & Benelux)for Google
This week I was reminded of the value of the collaborative web, when we had hundreds of employees stranded across the globe, due to the volcanic ash flight problems.
Associate (Social Media Lead)for Booz Allen Hamilton
How did you first learn how to join a team and start contributing? Where did you first learn leadership skills? When was the first time you learned conflict...
During the last couple of years I have carried out ECM and Collaboration assessments for companies where I have observed a resistance towards social software - which to a large...
What they are; what’s next; and how to profit It's been almost seven years since the term “Web 2.0” began its ascent into mainstream. Over this time it...
Today marks the beginning of my new blog for AIIM's Enterprise 2.0 expert group. This is exciting stuff for me because I have seen dramatic changes in AIIM's industry...
Last week my wife and I spent a few days in Charleston, SC. (A side note to readers -- beautiful city and great food -- go there.) When it came to the most important part of...
At the same time, I am also struck at how difficult it is to get organizations to actually MOVE on these technologies -- especially when the overall economic climate is still a bit tenuous.
As an old econ major, I think the tension comes often from a confusion of motives and roles. As we think about moving toward greener solutions, we need to be conscious of both what drives individuals AND what drives organizations. And the two are not the same.
At the individual level, the response to environmental concerns is emotional rather than economic. As we seek to motivate employees, a great place to start is paper. It's there. It's visible. And its connection to the environment (i.e., trees and waste) is obvious.
Paper is the number one material that is thrown away.
For every 100 pounds of trash we throw away, 35 pounds is paper.
Paper fills up 30-40% of American landfill space.
As paper decomposes in landfills or is burned in incinerators, chemicals from its inks are released into the environment.
Deforestation is occurring at an alarming rate worldwide, particularly in tropical regions. The World Resources Institute estimated in 1997 that only a fifth of the world's old-growth forests were undamaged, and almost half of these faced immediate threats from logging and development.
Americans use more than 50 million tons of paper each year, consuming more than 850 million trees.
At the organizational level, doing good is all well and good, of course, but frankly "green" needs to make sense at the bottom line or all the good intentions in the world won't amount to anything. And again just thinking about paper, the economic arguments for "going green" are clear:
On average, more than 15% of floor space in offices is taken up by filing cabinets: the research shows that the introduction of a document management system is likely to reduce this by 35%.
The average time per day spent looking for paper documents, document files, emails, intranet, and web pages is 51 minutes. It may only take 15 seconds to search and retrieve an electronic document.
A document management system can reduce routine copying and filing activities in an HR department by 25%
Invoice Automation can halve the time taken to approve and process payments and reduce the number of lost invoices by 66%
Introducing a formal workflow system in accounts receivable can cut late payments by 50%
Electronic processing of delivery documentation can reduce the time taken chasing and sorting documents by 46%, and halve the number of lost documents.
So what's everyone waiting for? What are your suggestions for how we can create a groundswell in organizations for getting rid of paper? Sure it will be good for document management companies. But it will be good at the bottom line for organizations of all types. And it will satisfy the need of individuals to feel they work for an organization that shares their concerns about the environment.
Why not post a comment? Give us your ideas on how to goose this thing and get it going!
RIM Program Managerfor Chevron Phillips Chemical Company LP
Reading the words of my fellow bloggers last week, it seems that the topic of Information Governance (IG) is on most people’s minds. It is definitely on my mind, but I...
For anyone who attended the 2010 AIIM expo + conference last week you had to wonder if this were really the “SharePoint Conference”. As I walked around the expo...
When we first started a records management initiative 15 years ago, it was all about scanning account agreements and storing statements & green bar reports from our core...
I’ve matured professionally in an era of progressive electronic records and information management. My education in grad school 10 years ago consisted of hard copy,...
How come the companies that keep everything forever always get in trouble, while the folks that retain very little get off easy? If this continues to hold true, why not...
Senior Vice President, Bank of America, Enterprise Digital Records Program (EDRP)for Bank of America
In my first blog post last week, I talked about foundational requirements that, in my opinion, support maintaining trustworthy electronic records in lieu of paper - unless there...
A file plan or classification scheme is a basic building block for successful ERM. The file plan is a category hierarchy, usually presented conceptually as nested folders.
CMIS made a big splash at AIIM On Demand. My personal opinion is that CMIS (or the SQL-ization of content repositiories) will have an enormous impact on the consumerization of ECM, one of the points I focused on in my keynote. The CMIS demo at AIIM is located HERE.
I asked Laurence Hart, one of the real smart guys in the ECM space and CMIS-guru, to put together an 8 things post on CMIS. Laurence is Director of Technology Solutions for Washington Consulting, Inc. and the author of the blog "Word of Pie". Over his 13 years in the ECM industry, he has led a wide-range of efforts including content digitization, Records Management, BPM, and Collaboration for both the commercial and public sectors. Laurence has worked with a wide variety of vendors over the years and is sure that the list will continue to change. He is a member of the AIIM iECM committee and an outspoken advocate for the CMIS standard.
8 Things You Need to Know About the CMIS Standard
1 -- CMIS is A Content Management Domain Model with Protocol Bindings.
CMIS is not a new interface into your content repository. At its core, it is a Content Domain Model. It defines a way to abstract the structure of any content repository into a common framework. On top of that, two different protocol binding have been defined to allow applications to interact with the underlying domain model. The two initial binding are the Web Services and Restful AtomPub bindings. As new technologies are developed, new binding can be developed, extending the power of CMIS in the years to come.
2 -- CMIS Simplifies Repository to Repository Communication.
This is one of the first ways to use CMIS that people think of when they hear "Interoperability". In this scenario, two or more repositories talk directly to each other. This is an extremely powerful use case as it permit the easy publication of content from one repository to another or the move from an active repository to an archived or records repository.
3 -- CMIS Enables Application to Repository Communication.
The second fundamental user case is Application to Repository. This scenario is a boon to application developers. Content Applications can now be written in a content repository independent manner, allowing developers to focus on the user experience and business problems and not with learning the API for every vendor. Imagine being able to use your favorite collaboration or web management tool and having your content managed in your content repository, without having to write an integration. We are already seeing some traction out there as multiple vendors have developed CMIS-based user interfaces for the browser and the iPhone/iPad.
4 -- CMIS Enables Federation.
The third use case is Federation. This is a powerful capability that will allow users to work with multiple repositories from a single interface. This can provide an inexpensive way to implement a federated search solution, or to deploy an interface allowing users to interact with content from both a live repository and a legacy repository.
5 -- CMIS is Technology Neutral.
There are no restrictions on the technology platform. The bindings can be accessed from .Net, Java, PHP, Flex, or any other number of technology platforms. Application developers no longer have to base architectural decisions on the APIs of their given content management platform.
6 -- CMIS is Vendor Supported.
This had been the most important aspect in the development of the CMIS standard. The vendors are behind it, and they are showing their support through actions. Microsoft has announced support for CMIS for SharePoint 2010 in June, one month after the release of both the standard and SharePoint 2010. Alfresco, EMC, eXo, IBM, and Nuxeo have all made repositories available to the AIIM iECM Committee to build a reference application for CMIS that is open to the public. To top it off, there are many more vendors that have already made early implementations of their CMIS interfaces available for people to test and try out.
7 -- CMIS is Supported by the Open Source Community.
The open source vendors have been working together on an implementation, Apache Chemistry, which will enable all JCR-compliant vendors to support CMIS. This will allow users of the repositories to leverage CMIS without the need to develop the interfaces directly.
8 -- CMIS is Just Getting Started.
The final release of CMIS 1.0 is imminent. For CMIS to succeed from here, it is important to not rest on our laurels. While CMIS provides core functionality, there is more needed. Records Management, improved custom metadata model support, semantic capabilities, and new bindings (WebDAV and/or JSON?) are among the capabilities that need to be added to strengthen the CMIS standard. Our ability as a community to work together and evolve CMIS to keep up with the ever-changing environment is what will make the difference between CMIS being an universally useful standard and just another footnote in the ECM world.
The Thomas C. Bagg Standards Award is given in memory of Thomas C. Bagg, Jr., who was an internationally recognized leader in the standards community.
This year's recipient is John Breeden, VDOT Records Manager, Commonwealth of Virginia, Virginia Department of Transportation.
Distinguished Service Award
This award recognizes individuals whose outstanding service over the last 12 months benefited the advancement of Enterprise Content Management technology through AIIM chapters, national or international standards development, or other committee activity.
The 2010 award recipients are:
Stacey Cripps, Catalyst Search Group
Brian Dirking, Oracle Corporation
Pamela Doyle, Fujitsu Computer Products of America
Steven J. Fiers, Imaging USA
Duff Johnson, Appligent Document Solutions
Todd LeVeque, Eastman Kodak Company
David M. Partsch, Geisinger Health System
Russell E. Stalters, BP America, Inc.
Susan J. Sullivan, National Archives and Records Administration
Alan Turner, Autonomy Cardiff
Company of Fellows
The Company of Fellows honors those individuals in the association who merit recognition and distinction for their outstanding contributions to the Enterprise Content Management Industry.
The 2010 award recipients are:
Jan Andersson, ReadSoft
Charles Dollar, Cohasset Associates
Mark Mandel, Office of the Secretary, Executive Office of the Mayor, District of Columbia
Award of Merit
The Award of Merit is the highest award the association can bestow to its members. This award recognizes lifetime achievement to the association and to the industry.
This year's recipient is Edward W. Mackin, Sr., MetaSource.
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The National Capitol Chapter swept all of the awards categories for chapters and was recognized as Chapter of the Year.
In addition, the Association presented its Best Practices Awards. AIIM's Carl E. Nelson Best Practice Award is presented on an annual basis. The 2011 Carl E. Nelson Best Practice Award submission will be announced in December 2010. This year's Carl E. Nelson Best Practice Award winners by category were:
Small Company Category (1 – 100 employees)
End User: Charles Town Police Department
Vendor: Oracle Corporation and EDAC Systems, Inc.
Charles Town Police Department decided to modernize its Investigative Case Management and Automated Evidence Tracking and Inventory System using Business Process Management (BPM), Content Management, Bar codes and other technologies. Officers were manually entering information numerous times on forms. With the implementation of CaseFLOW all case information, leads, and approvals are entered into the system which dynamically tracked the activities. Charles Town Police Department was able to increase efficiency and effectiveness in collecting and storing evidence and was better able to track where the evidence was at any given time providing an auditable chain of custody for the evidence.
Medium Company Category (101 – 1000 employees)
End User: American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA)
Vendor: Diversified Information Technologies (DIT)
The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) is the national professional association of CPAs, with more than 360,000 CPA members. AICPA manually processed a growing volume of incoming mail from its members, partners and vendors. Through the use of Diversified Information Technologies’ Digital Mailroom, AICPA employees now access their work through a secure web-based application. AICPA realized benefits immediately since this was a SaaS implementation with no upfront investment needed.
Large Company Category (1001 + employees)
End User: Bureau of Indian Affairs
Vendor: Oracle Corporation and Mythics, Inc.
The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) supported all the government functions of a small country without being connected to the Internet. BIA wanted to modernize and meet the OCIO’s core mission to deliver the right information to the right users through the use of distributed management tools. Through the use of distributed content management tools and services from Oracle and Mythics, BIA is able to deliver quality services to its over 2 million customers, foster collaboration amongst BIA and Department of Interior employees and make quality content available to their customers.
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