By Corey Smith
Last year AIIM released the Records Management Report.
One of the questions that was asked was why people would consider implementing an electronic content (record) management system (often we simply call it document management). I find the results very interesting, but not surprising.
The two most important reasons that companies want to implement an electronic document management system are (1) efficiency and productivity and (2) compliance to legal regulations (FACTA, SOX, HIPPA, etc).
But, what I think I find even more interesting is what was left off the answers. That was, reduced paper in the workplace.
I find that especially interesting because when I talk to people, the most common thing I hear is when I ask people why they want to scan all of their documents is, "I just want to get rid of my file cabinets." I think that it is admirable to get rid of file cabinets. Heaven knows that I would love to see all of our file cabinets go away, but does that really help us?
Just because our file cabinets go away, do we really increase our efficiency and productivity? Just because our file cabinets go away, do we really become more compliant with regulatory requirements?
The answer is... maybe.
If all we want to do is remove paper from our office, we may not need a document management database. Oh, there are plenty of "document management specialists" or "imaging specialists" that will tell you that their $10K + system is exactly what you need, but with the proper scanning system, we find that there are a lot of things we can do with document management that many people may never consider.
That is why it is so important to work with someone that understands document systems from start to finish.
Corey Smith is editor-in-chief for OfficeProductNews.net and provides a common sense approach to business and technology in his blog.
Datamax Communications Department, on Mar 27, 2012 11:30:00 AM
