Digital Landfill

Projects in the content management space -- which often occur at the complex and volatile intersection of content and process -- can often be challenging.  Organizations are often at a loss to figure out where to start and turn to consultants and SIs to help plot a course.

The challenge, of course, is finding a consultant or SI that is actually good.  The first question, before thinking about what makes a good ECM consultant is what makes a good management consultant in the first place.   The Institute of Management Consultants has put together some thoughts on this question.

And then from there you must consider what makes a good ECM consultant. Does he/she understand the core concepts of information management? Can he apply those concepts to YOUR business environment? Does she understand and focus on industry best practices?

This presentation by my colleague Atle Skjekkeland offers a few thoughts on this topic.  Check it out.

We are in the process of consolidating and redesigning our space at AIIM HQ in response to changes in the way that we work.  In doing so, one of our tasks is to go through a bunch of old stuff and figure out what to do with it.  

One embarassing aspect of this exercise is coming upon all of those strategic plans that attempted to predict where the industry was going.  Any of those plans from my tenure will not appear in this space.  

However, I came upon an AIIM Strategic Plan from 20 years ago (before my time), and thought it might be of interest.

It actually is pretty good when you consider that twenty years is a hell of a long time.  As someone once said (it seems to have many authors), "It's dangerous to predict, especially about the future."

To put it in perspectivein everyday terms...In 1992...

• Year End Close Dow Jones Industrial Average = 3301 
• Average Cost of new house = $122,500
• Average Income per year = $30,030
• Cost of a gallon of Gas = $1.05 
• 1 LB of Bacon = $1.92 [Note: This is a core metric that I think should be a part of any "happiness index"]
• Average cost of new car = $16,950

To put it in perspective in technology terms...

• Windows 3.1 was released by Microsoft
• Microsoft Works was released by Microsoft
• AT & T released a video telephone for $1,499.
• All the data traversing the global net in 1992 totaled 48 terabytes. Today, YouTube alone streams 48 terabytes of data every 21 seconds. [Bret Swanson]
• Browsers, PDFs, JPEGs, and e-mail were either non-existent or in limited use.

So taking all of that into account, the AIIM prognosticators from 20 years ago were remarkably good. A few excerpts (HERE is the more detail):

• Information devices will converge.
• "Documents" are now multimedia, with more information and greater interactivity.
• "The knowledge worker has changed the way work is done, accessing many sources of information quickly and easily from any remote place and time."
• The "office" as we know it will be a much more flexible place, with fewer boundaries.
• Portable, high-resolution devices with access to millions of pages of information.

And in the "if they only knew" category...

• "Work from home. Work from the road. Work from vacation. Work, work, work."
• "Marketers will know a lot more about you -- what you watch, what you buy, what you're doing."

So download the summary, and enjoy.

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And also in the realm of prognostication...

Systems of Engagement and the Future of Enterprise IT: A Sea Change in Enterprise IT

C-Change: The Impact of Consumerization of IT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the prowl for disconnects Between Systems of Record and Systems of Engagement...

Here's one from AirCanada.

I got a convincing phishing spam theoretically from AirCanada today.  I thought I would help them out and let them know about it via email.  Here is the auto response...

This is to confirm that we have received your  correspondence and there is no requirement to re-submit your information. Our processing time is currently 25 business days for general customer concerns, 25  business days for baggage related issues and up to 4 weeks for baggage tracing. We will make every effort to respond sooner.  

We appreciate your patience and understanding as you await our response.

25 business days for an email reply?

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Some Do-It-Yourself Guides that might be useful to readers...

1. How to Achieve Best Practices: Records Management
2. How to Conduct a Social Business Assessment
3. How to Unclog Your Business by Automating Content-Intensive Process
4. How to Assess Scanning and Capture Requirements
5. Automating ERM with SharePoint
6. How to Develop Taxonomies to Support Navigation, Information Discovery, and Findability
7. Enterprise Content Management: Impact on Collaboration and Social Business
8. How to Use SharePoint as a Self-Help Knowledge Center

 

 

 

 

Well, today is the third World Paper Free Day.  I just got off the Tweet Jam, and there was a host of ideas for getting rid of -- or at least reducing -- paper.

When we first started talking about "paper-free" most of the reasons raised to pursue this direction were "green" reasons.  I'm glad to see that the thinking has moved on to questions about how getting rid of paper and digitizing processes helps improve customer engagement.  And the bottom line.  And process responsiveness.  Not that the "green" reasons have gone away, but it's nice to see a maturation in the BUSINESS reasons to get rid of paper.

Our World Paper Free Handbook (do not, do not, do not print it!) looks at how less paper in the workplace delivers significant benefits. Key findings show eliminating paper from processes can improve the responsiveness of customer service by 300 percent. Removing paper from business processes and moving content to PCs and tablets has the added advantage of helping companies adopt mobile-enable processes and eliminate elapsed time, lost forms, poor data and re-keying.

To effectively mobile-enable processes and reduce reliance on paper, data should be captured as close to the point of origination as possible, which makes information easily available to whomever needs it, wherever they are, in the shortest time possible. This handbook summarizes the value of automating manual, paper-based processes. It then goes a step beyond to provide actionable steps that will set you on the path to productivity, profitability, and, yes, less paper. 

Get your copy today and send the link around to your peers and colleagues.  Here's the link; please share it!

http://www.aiim.org/Research-and-Publications/Research/AIIM-White-Papers/WPFD-Revolution-Handbook

 

 

Here are recent posts on content management and the cloud that I found interesting...

Seven Questions to Ask Cloud Content Management Providers

blogs.alfresco.com10/8/12

The more we talk to customers about Alfresco in the cloud, the more we're hearing about the limitations and frustrations customers are having with basic cloud file sharing services. 

Double standard--corporate banking transactions, cloud file storage ...

www.fiercecontentmanagement.com10/1/12

In our guest post this week, Shadrach White wonders how people could possibly hold content in the cloud to a different standard than content stored on traditional mainframes.

As #BoxWorks 2012 Wraps Up, Here Are 10 Words With Box CEO ...

techcrunch.com10/9/12

 Box provides more than 8 million users with secure cloud content management and collaboration. They say their platform “allows personal and commercial content to be accessible, sharable, and storable in any format from ...

Cloud Content Management Is Not A Cure-All

blogs.gartner.com5/2/12

I am not yet fully converted to the gospel of Cloud Content Management. The data center is undeniably in decline, but it's not quite dead yet...

A Reality Check On Cloud Content Management | Business ...

www.businesscomputingworld.co.uk7/9/12

There's been a lot of hype recently about moving enterprise content to the cloud. There's no doubt that the cloud has the potential to truly disrupt the way enterprise software is delivered, but the reality is still a long way off.

New share-and-sync file services stoke feature-vs-product debate ...

gigaom.com9/17/12

New updates to Alfresco's content management system and Box's cloud sync service renew questions about whether these file-share-and-sync services are best offered as part of a larger, legacy product or by an independent ...

Brisbane TimesCloud collaboration battle in full swingFierceContentManagementIf you had any doubt that the battle for content management, file sharing and collaboration supremacy is going to take place in the cloud moving forward, two recent announce ...

Future of the Cloud, Suite or Best of Breed - Word of Pie

http://wordofpie.com/Oct 13

SalesForce announced Chatterbox which makes Content Management a native feature to their platform. If SalesForce decides that building Content Management was a mistake, that is lost time and money. Box announced new partners and new tools for integrating Box with all sorts of other cloud-based applications.

A few data points from our recent Industry Watch Content in the Cloud: Making the Right Decision illustrate some of the above...

• 30% are seeing increasing use of unofficial cloud content management and file shares. Only 5% have an “official” cloud-based option. 19% prevent access to non-approved sites.
• Of those organizations with a defined cloud strategy, 20% intend to move their document and content management systems completely to the cloud, whereas 38% are choosing a hybrid of linked cloud and on-premise.
• 68% are looking to use cloud collaboration within the business and between remote sites.
• Most cloud users are uploading files one-by-one, although 28% are synchronized to an on-premise repository. 26% are archiving content or emails to the cloud.

 

 

Using Social tools in business processes

Social isn’t just about marketing. There are a whole host of processes that can benefit from social technologies as built-in steps in the process workflow. Product development, recruitment, innovation, market testing, diagnosis/fault-finding, help desk, employee relations, project management, publishing, procurement... these and many other processes can all be transformed through both internal and external social engagement. We’d like to know if you are already using these techniques, could use these techniques, or haven't even started to think about the opportunities. We'll look at the potential rewards, and also the issues that may be holding you back.

Take the survey http://www.aiimhost.com/survey1

Signatures – how are you dealing with them?

How important are signatures in your organization, particularly for process sign-offs and professional authorizations? Are you using digital or electronic signatures, and if so, which type? If not, why not? And how much paper gets printed and filed directly as a result of the signature process? How many processes are held up waiting for a physical signature?

Take the survey http://www.aiimhost.com/survey3

 

Here they are -- for Q3 -- these are for SharePoint only...

1. SharePoint Consulting Best Practices for a SharePoint 2010 Enterprise Deployment
2. SharePoint 2013 Preview Summary - Managing Your Current SharePoint 2010 Initiative with 2013 in Mind
3. 5 Myths about SharePoint Records Management
4. My Site Implementation in SharePoint 2010 – A Best Practices Strategy
5. SharePoint 2010 - A Learning Management System (LMS) for Government\DoD, Private Sector\Fortune 1000, and Educational Institutions | (SP vs. Blackboard)
6. SharePoint Alternative?
7. User Profile List in SharePoint 2010
8. High Level Best Practices: SharePoint Source Code Management and the Related Deployment Process
9. Best Practices for SharePoint Cultural Change Management - From the SharePoint Consulting Trenches
10. The Role of the Business Analyst in SharePoint

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Memo to file -- smokes this list.  Thanks for being an Expert Blogger.

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Want to understand the challenges that you will encounter as you move towards a more collaborative environment, both in terms of technology and culture?  Get this HOW-TO Guide.

 

Here's the list of the top blog posts for Digital Landfill for Q3 -- I'm always amazed at the long legs some of these posts have, perhaps prooving once again that electrons are forever...

1. 8 things to consider when decommissioning legacy data to your ECM Suite
2. 8 Factors to Consider In Creating an Information Management Strategy--#1
3. 37 Really Cool Statistics About Social Media
4. 8 Things that will Improve Team Productivity
5. 5 Myths about Taxonomy and SharePoint
6. Are we nearing the end of the reign of Solution Selling?
7. Extreme Information, Surviving a #Derecho, and Cleaning out My Mother-in-Law's House
8. 8 Fast Facts About the State of the Document Management Industry
9. 6 Free How-To Guides on #ERM, #SocBiz, #BPM, #Capture, #SharePoint and #Taxonomy
10. 8 Ways to Increase User Adoption of ECM and ERM systems

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Wondering how to get funding for your ECM project?  Look no further...HERE...