The Datamax Thinking Blog

In the spirit of cloud vs on-premise engagements, here is a starting point for deciding your best route for harnessing the power of a Document Management System.

Consider documents as the building blocks of everyday business workflow. Now imagine building a Lego set. Instead of having blocks packaged into groups and a list of instructions, you empty the bags and scatter the 500 or so pieces across your living room floor.

A security checkup for those utilizing SMB (Scan to Network Folder) solutions with your office’s multi-function printer.

AAA Security — it's not a common term in today’s growing discussions around system and database compromises. But it should be. 

Workflow efficiency, the evolution of production print, cloud migration – all topics covered in our January trends as well as the blogs seen below – continue to drive many business technology topics of interest.

When compiling the list of most read blogs of 2019, we were intrigued to discover that the top read post was a January blog predicting the top 5 business technology initiatives for the coming year.

Do you own the modern collaboration tools that these young professionals will be expecting as they enter the workplace? Time to consider a Communications Platform that translates better with Gen Z's sixth sense - technology?

Baby Boomers, Gen Xers, and even Millennials have adapted to and learned to utilize great technology advancements in the last 20 years. For the emerging generation in today's workforce, it just comes naturally.

Meet Generation Z. Raised on the Internet with a smart phone or tablet in hand, this generation has an ingrained connection to technology from their very beginning. The newest members of today’s professional workplace, GenZers were born between 1997 and 2010,  and make up 25.9 of the US Population.  Technology has often been described as Gen Z's sixth sense. 

How navigable is your paper trail right now? How well is it aligned with your overall business objectives? It may be time to identify both current inefficiencies and explore cost-effective, fully secure practices moving forward.

Have you ever followed your own paper trail? Where does it lead you?

Regardless of the size of your organization – a small work group up to a large enterprise - it has a unique paper trail based on your existing technology and individual departmental practices. Your routine document workflow, files and paper moving from desk to desk both manually and digitally, dictate the route of your trail. Your path can often be cluttered by manual, paper based processing, damaged by inadequate security measures or completely overgrown from simple negligence.

Document automation and workflow solutions help organizations share information not only more efficiently, but with the confidence of enhanced security and the ease of quicker access.

With the emergence of wearable technology, we are quickly becoming a society of health trackers.

Apps, watches and other tracking devices play a growing role in our everyday life, as this technology counts our daily steps, sleeping hours and much, much more.  These wearables keep us keenly mindful of our daily movement during waking hours and our overall health, with more and more data available to track and share. 

The central objective of utilizing EDM is to make your overall business processes more efficient, and specifically to accelerate and properly secure the way you move documents across your office. 

In the months before they toe the starting line, many runners and endurance athletes mistakenly obsess over one attribute through their training plan - speed. However, to maintain top efficiency in their movements and to keep these movements sharp as possible, agility - a combination of speed, control and coordination – is a critical part of everyday training.

Agility is also the key, big picture component to proficient document workflow. It's not just how fast you operate - it's how coordinated and efficient those efforts are.

You have a lot of options on the market when you make a technology purchase. The best solution for your business isn't determined solely by the price, the feature set, or how fast the vendor gets it to your doorstep.

Every year, I learn more about copiers, document management, workflow, and, increasingly, managed IT topics.

I do my best to pass on what I learn to you.

Here are the 11 most popular posts in 2017. They cover a range of topics:

• Why you should update old equipment (while I didn’t get into it, this goes for most office technology – not just your copiers!)
• HIPAA compliance issues
• The value of PDF and automated Bates Stamping for law firms
• And some thoughts on costs

Read on for insights into those topics – and more – to get yourself ready for 2018! 

The average office spends $25,000 to fill a four-drawer file cabinet and $2,000 annually to maintain it.¹

It's no wonder that organizations are more active than ever in pursuing solutions to streamline traditional methods of managing documents. Without the assistance of document management software, organizing documents, emails, scans, electronic faxes, graphics, Internet content, etc., is frequently a manual process that is very time intensive. Essentially, a dated management style that just doesn't work in today's digital, fast-paced office environment. Add in the burden of “Big Data”and the challenge of information management is bigger than ever.

The goal of MEAP (Multifunctional Embedded Application Platform) is to better leverage imageRunner Advance devices to improve document access and integration tasks for law firms of all sizes.

In any law practice, the billable hour is sacred. To maximize those hours you need an efficient workflow, and that requires using the right technology. If the right technology is used correctly, your firm can save time and money by automating a sizable portion of your legal processes.

Canon is a leader in digital imaging solutions and has the hardware and software that can help you achieve an efficient workflow. One of the key technologies Canon offers is its MEAP software, which runs on the imageRunner Advance platform and certain imageRunner MFPs.

But before you can take advantage of MEAP, you have to understand what it is. Knowing that can help your practice take its next steps in optimized case management.