Ecm Concept
- 1. Enterprise Content Management Breaking the Barriers to Broad User Adoption By - Dhiren Shah ECM Concept Paper
- 2. 2 Executive Summary............................................................................................................................3 Overview of Enterprise Content Management Drivers and Challenges ..................................................................................................................................4 Keys to Successful ECM ...................................................................................................................6 Maximize User Acceptance .............................................................................................................6 Minimize the Burden on IT................................................................................................................6 Meet Diverse Organizational Needs ................................................................................................7 Enterprise Content Management
- 3. 3 Executive Summary Enterprise Content Management (ECM) has become a strategic imperative for organizations experiencing tremendous growth in their volume of information, the need to differentiate themselves through the creation and protection of intellectual capital, and increased legislation requiring access to auditable records. This concept paper is aimed at organizations that are considering implementing an ECM system, are in the process of implementing ECM systems, or are rethinking ECM practices as they refine their content management goals. This concept paper examines the state of content chaos that exists in many organizations and provides a view of the major factors to consider in taming the chaos, such as legislative requirements and information management goals that must drive the development of ECM solutions. This paper also reviews the challenges that many organizations face in making information quickly and easily available to users at all levels and in preserving that information for audit and compliance purposes. These challenges are explored both from a technology perspective as well as from a user- adoption perspective. Also considered is the overall importance of implementing an integrated solution that meets specific needs in all the major ECM areas—records management, document management, Web content management, and forms management. These needs must be met in such a way that the end results benefit information workers across the organization. Finally, this paper provides a view of how broad set of ECM functionality on a unified platform that scales to meet the needs of the most intensive ECM tasks and makes ECM available to every information worker in the organization. Enterprise Content Management
- 4. 4 Overview of Enterprise Content Management Drivers and Challenges By now, the notion of Enterprise Content Management (ECM) is hardly a new concept for most organizations. As the digital age has facilitated communications, it has brought with it a greater wealth of “content” than ever, in a multitude of formats such as images, text documents, Web pages, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, drawings, e-mail, video, and multimedia. This explosion of structured and unstructured content can be complex and difficult to manage, and the problem is growing rapidly. A recent study conducted by Accenture indicates that more content will be created in the next two years than in the entire previous history of humankind, and over 93 percent of it will be in electronic form. Moreover, these electronic documents must be integrated with an already complex assortment of paper-based information. Several major drivers influence ECM platform development. At the forefront are pieces of legislation like the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which has moved ECM from being a nice-to- have system to being a must-have system. Enforceable document retention policies, systems for managing unstructured information, and consistent records management are all key requirements from a legislative standpoint. Yet, while concern about legislative requirements and audits may be the key driver for many companies, several other factors are also influential. First, there is the obvious need to exert control over an abundant volume of records and documents, with the resulting benefit of reducing task duplication and minimizing time spent wasted looking for old documents (or worse, re-creating documents from scratch). Then, there is the need to automate business processes in order to facilitate content handling and replace existing manual paper processing, which ultimately results in streamlining workloads and creating greater throughput. And finally, organizations are looking to ECM solutions to help with the process of authoring and publishing this information to the intranet, extranet, and Internet without burdening the IT department. No doubt, many organizations have already spent time considering strategies for how to structure their content, both from a records-keeping and a document-management standpoint. Some may even have implemented solutions for organizing this information, to varying degrees of success and user satisfaction. Yet in these preliminary considerations and tentative implementations, major challenges to ECM success remind organizations to be thoughtful in finding a solution that is right for them. For instance, among the most overwhelming challenges is the need to ensure user acceptance. Even if users are on board with implementing an ECM solution in principle, they will not embrace a system unless it integrates nicely with their current work style. Such a system must be intuitive to use, and not require users to rely heavily on the IT department. The solution must also fit into the organizational culture; for instance, an organization that operates with strong individual teams is not likely to embrace a solution that rolls out enterprise-wide. Yet these same departments may embrace an overall solution that makes collaboration easier for their teams. Explicit requirements within each of the major categories of document management, spreadsheet management, records management, Web content management, and forms management need to be addressed in the context of an overall ECM strategy. For instance, in dealing with document management, some of the particular requirements include establishing standardized content types, version control, workflow process, and collaboration; with spreadsheet management, one must have the ability to preserve the integrity of the data, ensuring a “single version of the truth” while at the same time Enterprise Content Management
- 5. 5 protecting confidential information with comprehensive security controls. In records management, the requirements include establishing retention and expiration policies, and minimizing outdated information within the organization. In terms of Web content management, the requirements include finding a way for non-technical personnel to take control of Web sites within their departments without the need to constantly rely on the IT department. These specific requirements, and more, should all be addressed by an overall ECM solution. Another challenge that an organization needs to overcome is integrating the various components of ECM. Typically, an organization starts with a need for one or more ECM components to meet a particular business need, but once these components has been deployed, the requirements grow to include other components as well. For example, an organization may start by implementing a records management solution and then quickly find that they also need Web publishing functionality first for their intranet portal and then for their Internet site. So how does an organization gradually build up its ECM strategy by deploying these components in a way that does not require constant user retraining and an architectural and deployment challenge for IT? An organization usually has one or more ECM solutions already in place that have been deployed in a particular department to address very specific needs. As the organization moves toward having a company-wide ECM strategy, it becomes important for any new solution to be able to interoperate with existing solutions using industry standards. An ECM solution that is scalable, easy-to-use, integrated, and interoperable with other applications ultimately has the best chance of being successful. Since user adoption is a key contributor to the system’s success, ensuring that users recognize ECM’s usefulness in streamlining their own workloads is very important. Enterprise Content Management
- 6. 6 Keys to Successful ECM Anticipating and responding to potential ECM challenges goes a long way to ensuring a successful implementation. Often these challenges can cause organizations to be paralyzed by fear of choosing the wrong system, but at the heart of that reaction is sometimes a failure to drill down and figure out what the challenge really entails. While ECM goals may be expressed with clarity (e.g., to audit-proof records, to enhance collaboration), ECM challenges are generally more vague and elusive. What does “user acceptance” mean? An organization knows that user acceptance is important, but may be unable to predict the aspects of a system that would trigger resistance in their particular organization. By breaking down some of the barriers to success more directly, the real requirements for overcoming each become clearer. Three major factors to successful ECM implementation will be examined in greater detail here: first, the elusive user acceptance; second, the need to find solutions to minimize the burden on IT; and third, the need to find a solution that meets diverse organizational needs. Maximize User Acceptance Perhaps the most critical factor in ECM success is how well a system is embraced by its users. Even if every other ECM goal is met, any system that fails in this regard will have limited success. On the flip side, users will extol a system that they perceive as streamlining their workday, improving their productivity, and making their jobs easier. So how can an organization ensure user acceptance? Start by considering the individual user’s goals and needs. Most users already have more work than hours in the day and may not be enthusiastic about a system that adds to the complexity of their tasks, so a successful ECM solution is one that will fit into the user’s routine rather than making the user change to suit the system. If users are asked to add properties to a document, for instance, they will do so more willingly if the opportunity to add these is provided right within the authoring application they are working in. Systems that require minimal training and enable workers to proceed on their own will ultimately be embraced. Familiar and intuitive interfaces will also help users to accept the system as something that is merely an extension of their current workload rather than an entirely new procedure. For example, providing easy-to-use authoring tools for creating Web content and automating the publishing process encourages business users to embrace ECM and use the Web to communicate with their customers. Finally, user acceptance will be fastest if users actually recognize the ECM solution as making their personal work life more efficient and streamlined. Solutions that help them find documents more quickly, that expedite approval processes, and that minimize task duplication will be embraced and championed. Minimize the Burden on IT ECM also presents a great challenge in terms of implementation. Every solution will no doubt have some bumps in the road to user adoption, but the best fit will be one that minimizes IT input and empowers users to integrate the solution into their own work schedules. If the ECM solution requires extensive IT involvement, professional developers, or consultants to set up new sites and workflow processes, many business needs will be left unresolved even though the organization has invested in the Enterprise Content Management
- 7. 7 technology to meet these needs. Providing a solution with a manageable learning curve and minimal IT reliance is therefore critical. By making the responsibility for records management an easy extension of users’ existing workflow, an effective system distributes the responsibility for ECM more evenly across the organization instead of burdening IT. Charging records keeping and document organization to the users most familiar with the records makes sense also from the standpoint that those users will derive the greatest benefit from the organizational system and so will have the greatest personal investment and interest in making sure those records are updated day-to-day. Perhaps one of the most currently dismal IT bottlenecks is in the area of Web updating. Finding an ECM solution that enables non-technical personnel to take control of their department’s Web properties will not only minimize IT time expenditures, but also give those departments a new confidence to view their Web properties as an opportunity rather than a burden. Neglected intranets may be revitalized and actually become the hubs for information-sharing that they were meant to be, when the departments that benefit from their use are in charge of their updating. Using Web sites for business development will be more attractive for departments when they realize that they do not need to approach IT every time they want to try out a new initiative. Web content management systems that have quality controls built in instill greater confidence in managers who are concerned about new pages matching the high standards already set in the initial site development. Besides empowering users to be self-reliant and minimizing IT support calls, a solution that is well integrated allows IT to manage a larger system in a centralized manner. Centralized deployment enables the IT department to manage the system consistently across all areas using common tools and deployment models, an equally important time savings for IT. Meet Diverse Organizational Needs Finding a suitable ECM system may require a lot of consideration; yet ideally, once that choice is made, that solution will suit an organization’s ECM needs for many years to come. Exercising some foresight as to the long-term goals for the ECM solution is therefore essential. While the initial requirement for ECM development may be limited to a single business function or process, it makes sense to choose a solution that is scalable and could potentially meet wider needs down the road. With a well-integrated solution, the organization is free to ease its users into the content management process; for instance, by starting with a records management initiative that performs the double duty of immediately ensuring compliance but also getting users accustomed to the system. As users realize the benefit of the records management system, the organization can then proceed to deploy document management or Web content management functionality. A unified solution is critical to this scenario, allowing the second and third deployments to occur smoothly, without extensive IT investment or user re-training. The goal of a single coherent ECM architecture is inherent in this overall approach. At a macro level, meeting diverse needs means selecting a solution that is highly configurable and a deployment that fits into the organization’s culture. If the organization works most effectively in teams, a departmental- or team-based deployment may be an effective starting point, with a larger overall deployment to follow. In this type of culture, the teams will be more likely to embrace an organization- wide rollout if they first witness its success within their department. On the other hand, if the organization is centralized and accustomed to systems, an enterprise-wide rollout Enterprise Content Management
- 8. 8 may be most effective from the start. Choosing a system that is extensible enough to be deployed in either manner will provide the greatest flexibility. Another reality of an organization’s IT environment is the multitude of applications that are currently in place to support different business processes. An ECM solution that integrates easily with a company’s existing applications using industry standards will ultimately have the best chance of success. This way, an organization can continue to reap the benefits of its existing applications that may serve specific functional areas as it deploys an enterprise wide ECM strategy. Lastly, while an out-of-the-box solution will handle most functions, organizations will have some need to build functionality that is specific to their vertical or compliance requirements. As such, it is important to have a solution that is configurable and customizable without excessive deployment costs or IT/developer training. Enterprise Content Management