29/05/2013
Document Management | Paperless Office
If you are not planning for it you will be left behind.
Document Services Australia understand that business success depends on the ability to secure, centrally manage, and quickly disseminate critical information in a document format. But in most organisations, as much as 80 percent of its information is locked up on user’s computers and e-mail servers,. This content is difficult to access and it is almost impossible to ensure that the most current versions of documents are shared across the organisation. What’s more, these vital business documents can easily be corrupted or lost and is extremely costly to re-create if an employee leaves the organisation or it is not properly backed up.
No matter how you look at it, there are some scary facts and figures about the cost of managing electronic and hard copy documents. It is said that for every $1 you spend to create a document, you’ll spend as much as $9 managing it. Companies can spend $20 in labour to file a document & $120 in labour to find a misfiled one & $220 to re-create a lost document.
So what is Document Management and whaEnter document management, whose aim is to create an environment in which a piece of information can be easily located, tracked, accessed and sent instantly to the people who need it. Document management systems can now
Business success depends on the ability to secure, centrally manage, and quickly disseminate critical information in a document format. But in most organisations, as much as 80 percent of its information is locked up on user’s computers and e-mail servers,. This content is difficult to access and it is almost impossible to ensure that the most current versions of documents are shared across the organisation. What’s more, these vital business documents can easily be corrupted or lost and is extremely costly to re-create if an employee leaves the organisation or it is not properly backed up.
Failing to manage documents properly is costing small business fortunes.
Enter document management, whose aim is to create an environment in which a piece of information can be easily located, tracked, accessed and sent instantly to the people who need it. Document management systems can now integrate and provide all the information necessary to make business decisions quickly, regardless of the data’s source and form, from a variety of sources.
Converting paper documents into scanned digital images is. The ability to merge the worlds of paper and digital documents into one and access them instantly via your PC is now an affordable reality. As a result, document management can unify document types that previously were worlds apart.
The Document Management process comprises several components:
Image Capture
In the past a dedicated scanner was needed. The problem was that price determined the size, quality and ease of use of a scanner. Most business’ simply had a small desk top scanner which was ridiculously time consuming to scan even one page. Then came the ability to scan via the low cost desk top multi-function copier/printer. Although these machines are an improvement on the single page scanner they are ineffective and when scanning multiple complicated batches of documents and lack the software to do anything with the document after being scanned
When you scan a paper document, you capture a digital image of that document.
This has become the major driver as scanning has become readily available and easy to use it has become a standard inclusion in most office copiers
Data Capture
Indexing your documents, either scanned or digital, is vital, as this is how users will be able to find what they’re looking for. Users can manually index a document based on keywords, (or metadata) as they scan documents. In addition, if the DM program can perform optical character recognition (OCR) the computer can index every word in the document or pre-defined areas on a page and auto-populate the index fields.
Retrieval
It goes without saying that it’s got to be easy to locate the document you’re looking for.
It’s important to consider which members of staff have access to which documents.
There are several advantages of digital document storage over relying on files stored in file cabinets. First, electronic files cannot get misfiled in the way paper files can. Firms can also save costs because they no longer have to expand office space to accommodate ever-increasing onsite storage needs.
With a document management system, instead of using a filing cabinet, you turn to a PC, search for a document and display the file that you want on your monitor. With such a system, all your files become true resources for you and these files can then easily be faxed or emailed to someone else.
Modern document management systems also allow the opening up some parts of it to the outside world in a secure way: this would allow customers or suppliers to access specific documents through your website or extranet in a controlled way.
Another huge benefit of electronic document storage is the security of knowing that you can backup your documents and store them offsite for quick retrieval in the event of an emergency. Being able to search every e-mail or fax as well as letters and memos is tremendously useful to companies as this data was typically ‘lost’ to them, before the days of Document Management.
Today’s modern document management systems have matured greatly. They come with plenty of ready-to-use features and are easy to install and maintain. It’s also easy to integrate them with archiving and back-up products.
A small office can pay less than a thousand dollars to obtain a starter document management system.
OK, so your company can make a business case for DM. But before rushing out to spend money on hardware and software it’s important to remember that the principal benefits of DM derive from a change in business process and practice and not purely from the technology alone. Before you purchase a system, examine your processes and see if they can be improved before, during or after the purchase of new Document Management systems. Only then will you receive the full benefit of the technology improvement
