by Tom Beasley

We wish you a joyous holiday season and a prosperous new year! Thanks for your support this year! We look forward to working with you in 2009 and achieving much success together.

As we look ahead to 2009, we are facing a change in political leaders, an economy in flux, and for all businesses, a year where concern for the bottom line tops the list. We understand that the IT projects of tomorrow must be able to produce measurable results in order for them to remain viable projects, gain management buy-in and pass budget approval. And we can show you how.

We often talk about the benefits of scanning documents, converting them from paper form into electronic form. Doing this conversion and then backing up your documents electronically ensures that you'll be able to recover in the event of a disaster, since original paper documents can be irreplaceable if lost. And to have electronic versions of documents computer-accessible is certainly an invaluable time-saver. It means not having to collect paper documents from file cabinets, rifle through boxes or search entire file rooms for the information you require.

But to achieve the true benefits of document management, you need to look beyond scanning. Document scanning can serve as a springboard to other productivity-boosting applications like workflow and collaboration. With full integration of all documents, records and forms into one, enterprise-wide solution, you can improve data management, ensure regulatory compliance, streamline business processes, protect information assets, improve customer service, and much more. These are the benefits that are going to directly and positively impact your bottom line.

This issue of The AccuView encourages you to look beyond document scanning to uncover the real productivity-enhancing tools. There's so much more potential in the document imaging and content management solutions of "tomorrow" - which are here today. We look forward to learning about your needs and presenting comprehensive solutions that are aimed at delivering the highest business value. I invite you to call me at 615.242.7226 to get started.

All the best from us to you this holiday season!

Tom Beasley
tom.beasley@accuimagellc.com

Content is used to drive business processes, and information workers can work with content in ways that maximize productivity and their ability to execute on stated objectives.

From Content Control to Content Transparency

Traditionally, organizations have treated content management as a cost of doing business and have dealt with it to a large extent on a regional or departmental basis. Content was considered an element that needed to be controlled - captured, stored and tracked throughout its lifecycle. As a result, departmental silos of content are commonplace and business systems housing critical structured data are isolated from unstructured content repositories (document and records management systems, customer relationship management systems, media stores, etc.).

This fractured IT environment generates a number of areas for concern, including inability to define and implement a consistent enterprise-wide content management strategy, difficulty in achieving compliance with regulatory mandates due to requisite information residing in disparate repositories, and disjointed records management and retention practices across various content stores and business systems. Addressing these concerns demands that organizations embrace the idea that content management is not just about technology. Rather, it is about placing enterprise content and know-how at the center of things - thinking of it as the engine of the business.

Ensure compliance, generate new business opportunities, increase customer retention and improve productivity levels while cutting costs. This is the mantra throughout many organizations today. In response to these challenges, many organizations are assessing how to best align IT systems to support core business objectives. Gaining clarity and insight into how technology systems create and store business content is a critical aspect of achieving this goal.

The idea of enabling a centralized view of content across all lines of business and the systems that drive them is leading forward-thinking organizations to embrace the concept of enterprise transparency. At its core, enterprise transparency describes an organization's ability to consolidate and work with vital information and business records across the entire landscape. It creates a centralized, holistic view of content and addresses the main aspects that information workers and decision makers require to deliver on objectives of increased productivity.

• Accessible. Content is not useful if it cannot be located and retrieved. Powerful enterprise search functions, security controls to ensure appropriate access, metadata capture and intuitive retrieval capabilities are all required to ensure content is available to users when they need it and in the context of how they are working with that content.

• Actionable. Simply finding and retrieving business content is insufficient. Enterprise content needs to be usable and consumable across lines of business. Forecasting, customer services, research and outbound communications all require accurate and timely access to current and accurate content. In order for workers to execute on tasks and objectives, content needs to be delivered in the workspace they are most comfortable in, and enable them to modify and leverage content as required. Information workers need supporting business content accessible and actionable within their familiar environment.

• Adaptive. Effective decision-making, support and service depend on the ability to take swift and informed action on content that is presented within the context of business activity. This demands well-defined business processes and a streamlined information flow to ensure users have a consistent view into the content that drives their daily activities. As opposed to placing the onus of content collection, organization and analysis on information workers (and separating these tasks), adaptive content provides an automated, simplified and consolidated view of relevant and related business content.

From Content at Rest to Content in Action

Over time, IT infrastructures have evolved to include an array of hardware and software solutions that generate, house and process business content. Organizations have deployed enterprise resource planning systems, line-of-business applications and other solutions aimed at streamlining operational efficiencies and improving processes. Meanwhile, legacy applications and data stores housed on mainframe and midrange systems continue to deliver value to organizations. Emerging solutions that facilitate improved collaboration and knowledge sharing are being deployed. E-mail and new forms of digital media are widely considered business records and require dedicated archival solutions along with appropriate retention strategies.

Inevitably, the adoption of new technology has led to extremely complex infrastructures. However, current trends and business drivers clearly point to the need for a consolidated, streamlined and holistic approach to content management - ridding organizations of unnecessary IT "clutter" while ensuring that intellectual capital is preserved. As IT infrastructures have evolved so has the way that organizations think about and manage business content. The approach to content management, or stage achieved, can be mapped along the following lines:

1. Content at Rest

Companies in the early stages of content management often rely on traditional file systems and data stores. Structured application data often shares disk space or network access with unstructured data in the form of documents, spreadsheets and presentations. Enabling search and retrieval of content by information workers in this environment of disparate repositories is difficult. Employing proper security policies and access permissions to sensitive information is also hindered, resulting in a "lockdown" approach that limits the ability of information workers to locate and leverage required information without going through other channels.

Companies at this stage of the maturity model generally use a basic platform or file system, limiting the applications and interface options for users to those available on that platform. Backup, recovery and archiving functionality is usually dictated by the server or storage vendor, further limiting flexibility for access and movement of content across storage media and systems.

The "Content at Rest" phase is characterized by the goals of simply controlling the influx of business content, minimizing associated costs and managing its storage. Content is more a cost of doing business at this stage than it is a corporate asset. Content accessibility is an issue during this phase as organizations struggle to provide search capabilities that span different repositories. Information workers struggle to locate and retrieve required content, and IT staff is frustrated by having to track down information, generate reports and perform other content-centric tasks that, ideally, information workers should carry out on a self-serve basis. Given the number of systems and repositories that remain disjointed at this stage, making business content actionable and adaptive is unrealistic for organizations in the "Content at Rest" phase.

2. Content at Risk

The second phase of the content management maturity cycle involves the adoption of discrete and basic solutions with functionality aimed at better managing business content. Document management systems with check-in/check-out, version control, simple search and retrieval, and other core capabilities are an example. Knowledge management initiatives are undertaken in an attempt to enhance the capture, retention and use of intellectual capital throughout the organization. Technologies that centralize administration and access permission management across content repositories are also deployed during this stage to improve security and help with organizational compliance and governance mandates. This phase involves moving beyond simple capture and control, and aims at enhancing the value of content by enabling information workers to leverage it for competitive and business advantage in their day-to-day activities.

Portals, team collaboration sites, and web content management solutions implemented during the "Content at Risk" stage provide some basic management and protection capabilities for business content. However these solutions are often spawned on an ad hoc basis and are typically departmental, regional or otherwise disconnected. As a result, these content management solutions are not integrated on an enterprise-wide basis across geographies, workgroups, lines of business or organizational functions. Organizations are still faced with challenges in implementing an enterprise-wide content management strategy and face limitations in their ability to apply organization-wide retention strategies that can be managed in a holistic manner.

The "Content at Risk" phase is characterized by an "experimental" approach to content management. Organizations deploy and test new point solutions aimed at simplifying access to business content and capitalizing on opportunities to leverage it for revenue gains, to reduce IT costs and improve information worker productivity levels. Content is "at risk" during this stage because, while access has been opened up to information workers, new issues have been introduced. Securing information across various systems is of greater concern; departmental silos of content increase the risk of inconsistent, stale or inaccurate information being leveraged for decision-making; and ad hoc and non-standardized solutions add complexity to IT infrastructure. Content is definitely accessible during this stage, although security issues introduce new risk, and ensuring that content is actionable and adaptive by integrating it within business processes and established workflows remains a challenge.

In short, organizations at this stage have taken a step in the right direction, but more is required to truly take advantage of the benefits offered by a holistic content management strategy.

3. Content in Action

Content in Action represents the most strategic phase of a content management strategy and, ultimately, results in enterprise transparency for organizations that achieve it. At this stage, organizations implement an enterprise-wide content management strategy and deploy a corporate repository to centralize business content security, access and retrieval. This corporate "enterprise library" then allows IT to facilitate comprehensive archiving, records management and enterprise search capabilities. As the expression of a mature, enterprise-wide content management strategy, the enterprise library stores metadata for both structured and unstructured data from all business systems and content sources - spanning across enterprise applications and productivity suites.

The goal of an enterprise library is to implement an entire content infrastructure that facilitates seamless connection and integration of common line-of-business applications with business processes and the information workers that leverage them. Ultimately, this lays the groundwork for the successful implementation of enterprise-wide retention strategies and streamlined content archival, as well as simplified repurposing of business content. By automating and consolidating the flow of content across various systems and presenting it in familiar user environments, organizations will enable workers to access, analyze and execute faster.

Organizations at this level of content management maturity are free from limitations of platform, server and storage vendors or operating systems. With the enterprise library in place, organizations set content in motion - creating content- and process-centric solutions, automating repetitive activities, and eliminating the bottlenecks that impede worker productivity.

The "Content in Action" stage is characterized by the realization that content must be considered more than just an element of business that requires control. It involves deploying an enterprise framework aimed at unleashing the value of enterprise content to support key business objectives, including compliance and governance initiatives, cost reduction mandates, increased productivity levels, and improved operational efficiencies. Organizations start profiting from business content by leveraging and repurposing it as opposed to spending time, resources and money to control it. Powerful search capabilities enable true unified search across both structured and unstructured repositories. Content is used to drive business processes, and information workers have flexible interface options that enable them to work with content in ways that maximize productivity and their ability to execute on stated objectives.

[Source: ECM Connection]

Document imaging of the future will change how businesses connect, communicate and accelerate overall access to information - anytime, anywhere.

The document imaging industry is moving along a clear path of change. Capturing, managing, storing, retrieving and sharing documents are just a small part about what it's about today. The main objective is moving beyond how we use documents; it is about the value of information.

At the current pace of business, information needs to be readily extractable and usable at, or very near, the point of capture. With immediate access to information, business professionals are more efficient, their offices are more productive and businesses are in turn more profitable. For this type of work environment to become the common standard for all businesses, the technology and means to implement it must evolve from a focus on individual components to total solutions.

Our economy is a key driver of this shift. The economy is transforming from manufacturing enterprises to service-based businesses. With a service-based economy, business knowledge management has become the lifeblood of organizations, making rapid access to information critical. One study noted that contemporary information-dependent executives spend up to 25 percent of their time looking for data. That's a large expense in terms of nonproductive time.

One industry executive estimates that managing documents and information likely costs businesses 15 percent in revenue, and the amount of information doubles approximately every five to seven years. When considering there has been more information generated in the past 30 years as compared with the previous 5,000, the growth of information becomes of even greater concern to businesses. Top reasons customers cite for investing in information technology include improved efficiency (74%), better customer service (29%) and risk management (27%).

Another economic factor is the rise of small to medium businesses (SMBs). These businesses outnumber large corporations by about seven to one in the U.S. and are growing at about 20 percent yearly. They are discovering that to be efficient in extracting information value enables SMBs to better serve their customers. This provides a competitive edge and helps small players operate and market themselves beyond the traditional boundaries of SMBs, allowing for greater growth potential. These factors also motivate large enterprises with specialized information management personnel to stay current or ahead of the technology curve, implementing solutions that consolidate various processes through intelligent automation.

Lastly, today's digital environment is another factor. Largely due to the Internet and its effects, information is exploding in volume around us from a variety of sources - voice, e-mail, video, and of course paper. Accompanying this is our digital age impatience with gaining access to information. We want it when we need it - not a nanosecond later.

Much of the imaging and software technology for this transformation to be successful already exists. Some is mature, widespread and affordable, such as optical character recognition (OCR) to extract information from forms. Other technologies, like content understanding and handwriting recognition for extracting information from unstructured data sources - such as voice and email - are just in the infancy of their development.

In short, document imaging of the future will change how businesses connect, communicate and accelerate overall access to information - anytime, anywhere. And that future is here today.

[Source: Eastman Kodak]

Capture documents, send them anywhere, and leverage the information for new efficiency.

Business processes are often initiated with a paper document, form or record. By scanning documents, forms and records at their point of entry into your organization, you can initiate your processes faster and enable more efficient and timely workflow. Doing this will require that an affordable, easy-to-use scanner is available at one or more locations within your office. The Kodak Scan Station 100 Plus is ideal for this type of distributed scanning environment.

This Kodak Scan Station offers easy-to-use, one-touch functionality for simultaneously sending documents to multiple locations. You can scan to e-mail, print, specific folders, an FTP site, or portable USB drives. You can upload documents into your document management, content management, workflow or other systems for immediate accessibility. This device offers a small footprint for cramped workspaces and an intuitive touch-screen display for the casual user.

The Kodak Scan Station 100 Plus is packed with functionality and efficiency.

• Combines multiple office products into one.
• Intuitive touch-screen display makes it easy for everyone to use.
• Automated workflow configurations for more efficient time utilization.
• Share information between departments quickly.
• Centralize documents for faster retrieval.
• Standardized solution reduces training time and support needs.
• Improves customer satisfaction through quicker response and higher quality.
• Perfect Page imaging ensures high image quality of scanned documents.
• Handles a wide variety of documents, including IDs, insurance cards and licenses.

For additional information or pricing, please contact AccuImage at 615.242.7226.

AccuImage, LLC is a systems integrator that empowers their customers with solutions designed to gain the maximum value from their information at every point in the information lifecycle. Founded in 1996 and headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee, AccuImage specializes in the design, installation and support of document and content management systems, forms processing solutions, and electronic workflow systems. The company offers hardware and software from leading companies - AnyDoc Software, Böwe Bell+Howell, Canon, Captaris, Captovation, EMC Documentum, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Kodak, Kofax, Panasonic, Plasmon and Verity - as well as consulting, document conversion and professional services.