Turn on the Power with Agile ECM

UnityECM in the Community

2012-05-16T18:32:55Z

Unity ECM’s Chief Stewardship Officer Paul Neal is the founder and Chairman of the RunWalk for Kids, an event benefiting the Children’s Hospital of the Kings Daughters. Paul started the RunWalk for Kids after his infant daughter received outstanding care at CHKD several years ago. The event has since grown from a few hundred people to an anticipated participation of over 4000 people this year. Unity supports the event as a corporate sponsor and wants to recognize Paul’s continued success with this event. For those who are interested in participating in this worthy cause, registration information can be found on the RunWalk for Kids website. CHKD is a not-for-profit hospital that provides pediatric care for infants, children, and adolescents in the greater Tidewater area.

Norfolk Human Services Escapes the Grip of Bad Technology

2011-05-27T20:55:20Z

: Robert Frost via last.fm

Robert Frost‘s heart-stirring poem, The Road Less Traveled, expresses the idea that the sometimes seemingly small choices we make in life can truly impact our experience of it. And his tome, in particular, helps us to see that following the path of the “crowds” is not necessarily the best direction to follow. This may be true in life, and definitely is in many instances, but it is a real gamble when you are talking about implementing a department- or enterprise-wide systems change. The risks of failed implementation, or that the system does not live up to its billing, are very real, and they can be very painful.

The City of Norfolk, VA, Department of Human Services faced this decision point with its document management system some years ago. The Human Services Department is tasked with meeting the needs of the city’s thousands of residents with various assistance programs, such as Medicaid, Child Protective Services, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and Workforce Development. As one of the top 2 highest “in-demand” Human Services departments in the Commonwealth of Virginia, they have no shortage of paper and they have stringent program and procedural requirements. Recognizing the need to move to a paperless environment some years ago, they adopted a document management system, EZ Filer, which had been adopted by several other Human Services departments in the Commonwealth. Even though many other Norfolk City departments had very successful implementations of Laserfiche Enterprise Content Management, and the fact that EZ Filer was relatively unknown and unproven, the city selected EZ Filer. Over time, the limitations of the EZ Filer system became apparent to the Norfolk department, and workarounds were created to compensate for some of the key limitations of the system such as: limited storage space, limited search capability, very slow response times and no records management rules. The final decision to move to a more robust enterprise content management system came when the company who developed the EZ Filer document management system filed for bankruptcy. According to Bonnie Spence, Programmer Analyst for the city, “we are no longer able to upgrade or modify the system.”

Norfolk DHS chose UnityECM to partner with to solve their daunting problem. Besides the EZ filer trainwreck, Norfolk identified 9 other key reasons to commission UnityECM to completely overhaul their records management and document management processes and workflows, including: automated scanning and indexing into their system and a records management system that was compliant with the Library of Virginia, and which runs completely in the background with no end-user training curve or intervention. (Get all Top 10 Reasons here)

According to Mark J. Formella, IT Application Development Supervisor for Norfolk, “Successful implementations do not happen by accident or luck. Planning, communication, training, dedication and hard work are all keys to making LaserFiche work for DHS. Everyone who is involved with this project deserves a huge thank you…Change is never easy, but all of our staff who were accustomed to EZ-Filer, made the leap to make LaserFiche work. In the weeks and months to come, we will take advantage of additional LaserFiche tools and implement improvements which will make many tasks easier and faster to accomplish. We will also be bringing other units onboard, so they can too can manage their documentation electronically.”

So thus goes the story. Sometimes, even Robert Frost I’m sure would agree, that the best road is the one that is well-worn for a reason. For more information, contact UnityECM.com today at 888-400-9064.

The New UnityECM – We’re Agile to Serve You Better!

2010-09-22T17:43:59Z

For over fifteen years, Unity Business Systems has established a reputation for providing quality enterprise content management solutions and support to its thousands of users. Our dedicated and experienced professionals deliver innovative solutions and a firm commitment to superior customer service, one customer at a time. Our clients include a large array of municipalities, federal agencies, international corporations and many private firms.

To continue the mission of providing quality delivery of innovative services that maximize the productivity of our customers, we are excited to announce the formation of a dedicated new division: UnityECM. Our vision has always been to have mutually beneficial and lasting relationships with all of our stakeholders, and this new division will better enable us to accomplish this. As a top Laserfiche Value-Added Reseller for over 10 years, and now a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner with special emphasis on SharePoint deployment, we believe that UnityECM is uniquely positioned to help our clients tackle their ECM challenges with robust agility well into the future.

Laserfiche and Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Obtain Joint DoD 5015.2 Certification (eon.businesswire.com)
Laserfiche Supports Launch of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 (eon.businesswire.com)

eDiscovery – Pay Me Now or Pay Me Later

2010-09-14T20:34:15Z

Image via Wikipedia

“You can pay me now, or you can pay me later®” was the way the old Fram® oil filter commercial went in 1971. Remember that? Whether it was true or not with Fram® (they still seem to be thriving as a company…), the concept is axiomatic. Like getting regular excercise. Or eating a good, healthy, balanced diet. The “today” price of establishing healthy, disciplined habits is much smaller than the “tomorrow” price of terrible health and the dis-ease that stagnation and bad diet engenders. And so it goes with compliance and e-discovery…

It stands to reason that investing some organizational resources now in prevention is definitely better than spending millions of dollars muddling through a non-compliant audit or e-discovery request gone awry later. Kind of like, if your kid sits in the beanbag everyday playing Xbox® and eating HoHo’s® he is going to be fat and out of shape (and possibly get Type II diabetes – but I digress…) No responsible adult would ever allow that to happen if they care about their child. And along the same lines, we know that in today’s litigious society, the registered letter will arrive. Your organization will face a lawsuit. Do you just “hope” that things will work out well? If there is one thing that I have learned in 23 years of business, it is this: “hope” is NOT a strategy. So what do you do?

You don’t focus on the audit or the e-discovery problem. You build the right foundation today, before the issue attacks. And you do that by focusing on getting the right people involved in drafting and adopting the right policies which are managed and enforced transparently (more or less on autopilot) via the right technology; and all done consistently across your enterprise and business processes. And the natural result is proper preparation. No worries. Your framework is in place. Time for a HoHo!

For more information on how to achieve this Information Governance “Nirvana,” visit us today at UnityECM.com.

Does it pay to scan in-house?

2010-09-14T15:00:37Z

The only thing worse than having to pay to convert (scan) your documents from paper to electronic images is when you have to do it twice. This summer a customer decided to save some money and hire a couple of college students to scan their case files during the summer. A noble thought and a practical way to put interns to work. Just plug the machines in, point to the cabinets and let them “have at it”. Afterall, the cost of a couple scanners and 2-3 hungry college students would be certainly less than paying a firm that specializes in this service, right?

However, a recent query of the files (all with “Scanned” boldly stamped in red on each case file jacket) found that a 7 page document (with 3 pages that were double sided) only had 7 images and not the 10 (7+3) it should have. Other files were double in size as the “blank page drop out” feature was not activated on the scanner. Several documents still had staples in them: meaning a second page of the document (possibly) was not scanned and a metal staple was pulled through the machine which leads to damaged parts, paper jams and scratched glass surfaces on the scanner. Scanning appears to be easy, but without proper knowledge, training, supervision, quality checks and experience it can make a difficult task even more difficult to fix. Remember the old addage, “Garbage in, Garbage out”?

In today’s economy everyone should be looking for the most economical way to accomplish their goal, but not at the cost of quality, especially when it comes to mission critical, historical, or personal data. We are now re-scanning the entire project.

Work with a vendor to find the best solution, do business with a creative firm that can think outside the box and create a budget friendly solution (i.e. maybe you don’t need to scan everything right away and a hybrid storage “scan on demand” solution may be able to meet your needs?) Look for a vendor that has more than 3-5 years of hands on experience and can give you specific references (my company has been scanning since 2000 and can provide an active list of at least 10 customers we are currently working with).

Hungry college kids are great (I have two of them) and can perform many tasks very well, but there is more to scanning than dropping documents into a feeder and hitting the start button. The care of your mission critical, historical and personal records are your responsibility, if you have a ”back file” of information you need scanned make sure you have have the expertise and are able to put into place the quality checks, procedures necessary for a great job… or hire a great company (like mine) that offers you a money back guarantee so you will never have to pay twice!

For more information, contact Unity Scanning Systems today!

Does Quality Matter? Who Cares, We Got a Great Deal!

2010-09-03T20:00:35Z

: Image by ecastro via Flickr

It’s not surprising to me that during harder economic times people tend to look for bargains when they buy goods and services. It just makes sense. In fact, it should be axiomatic that we always look for the best deal…it’s just good stewardship of our resources. But, as experience tells us, if it’s too good to be true, then it probably is – right? Times like this should focus our efforts on determination of the best value, not the best price. I mean, the Maytag washing machine that my parent’s bought 25 years ago still works, while we have been through 2 washer “deals” in just the past 8 years. Who really got the best deal? (Maybe our parents actually do know something, huh?!) And inherent in the definition of value is not only the actual lifetime cost of the item, but the qualitative aspects as well. Like, the actual performance of the product or service. Like its ease of use. Like the service after the sale. I see more and more (particularly government…) “Invitations to Bid” on projects, where the absolutely ONLY factor they are considering for their buying decision is the lowest price. What a terrible, short-term benchmark to base a decision on. There seems to be a general disconnect from the product or service end-users and the folks signing the purchase order. Maybe the real answer is that we don’t expect quality anymore. Perhaps this is a result of living in an “Priceline” world. (Is that why the domestic air travel experience is so horid today?) Or maybe it’s a result of living in a Twitter-Focused, Headline-Selling culture that bombards us continually and where depth of research is replaced by 20 second sound-bites…

So I guess I am calling out here for a return to a higher expectation…let’s start looking “beneath the surface” again. Let’s start looking long-term again. Contact UnityECM to have that discussion today.

Laserfiche in the Cloud? Agile ECM at it’s Best…

2010-08-26T21:02:03Z

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could always be running the most recent release of your Laserfiche software? I mean, you have paid your annual maintenance fees, so you do qualify for the latest and greatest with no additional charges…but the rub is, your IT department (who is typically already overworked and understaffed) still has to budget the time and energy to make the upgrade work. At least they did in the past…

Laserfiche in the Cloud

Welcome to the new Laserfiche in the Cloud solution! Not only will you be running the latest and greatest Laserfiche versions as they are released, but there are some other big-time advantages for your organization going forward:

No internal server hardware, server software or backups to administer;
Installed on Amazon data centers, assuring quality and continuity and compliance with multiple site requirements;
Option for no up-front server costs – simply a monthly fee for the service period;
No change to your Laserfiche licensing or VAR agreements;
Delivered by your trusted Laserfiche VAR, Unity Business Systems
Includes backup and multiple site redundant server instances;
Includes secure data transfer;
Maintains full Laserfiche administration and configuration rights;
Can have separate instances for Laserfiche and SQL Server;
Transferrable, can always be moved back to an on-premise server, if desired.

Laserfiche clients connect by simply registering their server with its unique name (e.g. mydocs.docsonthecloud.com ) Server instances can be created in minutes. Existing on-premise Laserfiche servers can be migrated easily, or may be extended in a hybrid private cloud as an overflow or backup.

So, a new day has definitely arrived. The most up to date software running on the most current and most powerful server technology available…So maybe now your IT folks will have the time to tackle that ERP project that noone wants! Maximize your productivity now with Agile ECM.

Contact Unity Business Systems today for more information on the Laserfiche in the Cloud solution!

Store Documents, and Don’t Be Held Hostage!

2010-08-25T18:50:15Z

: Image via Wikipedia

Don’t you just love “Jack-in-the-box” pricing?! You know, all of those hidden fees that spring up when you buy a home or a car? Or when you get a credit card with “0% annual interest”? Or how about this – when you store your business documents with most of the national brand names? That’s right…easy in the front door, but it’s going to “COST YOU” to ever see them again. Yes, they do tell you in the fine print…there is nothing illegal about it. But do you like the idea of not really knowing what it is going to cost you in the end?

I mean, you know the reasons why you need to store your documents offsite:

Your office is expensive real estate
The mountains of boxes can be in the way
You have better use for the space – so there is a big opportunity cost
The logistics of access and holding – and retrieval – time, energy and money
It’s unhealthy – mites and mold – and bugs love them
It’s a potential fire hazard
And many more…

But up until now you had to either settle for some rinky-dink storage shed next to somebody’s old furniture or get into a “we’ll let you in…he he he…but it’s going to cost you to get out!” contract with a large, national “mountain” of a company. But no longer!

Unity Scanning Systems has developed an innovative approach to solve this problem. We call it, Access-Plus Records Storage, giving you for the first time: Predictable storage. Predictable access. And most importantly, predictable budget. Access-Plus Records Storage is an innovative solution designed for organizations who recognize the benefits of moving bulky business records offsite but who are not comfortable committing themselves to risky, hard-to-decode pricing models and records “hostage” fees. Its hallmark is its simple, all-inclusive pricing model. You simply pay one flat monthly fee per box of records stored – regardless of whether you need to access 20% of your files, or none at all. It makes budgeting a breeze.

Visit our Access-Plus Records Storage website today, or contact us and we’ll show you how our innovative solution will save you money and give you the clear-cut budget you deserve.

Do A Good Deed & You Could Win An iPad!

2010-08-24T13:48:42Z

My daughter ,Carla Mei, a future mechanical engineer attends Summit Christian Academy in Yorktown, Virginia. Kohl’s department store is currenty awarding $500,000 to each school that gets enough votes to put them in the top 20. All of the voting is being done through Facebook. Each person is alloted 20 votes and can vote for the same school up to five tmes. So I am asking for your help to make it into the top 20. Please follow the link below and vote for Carla’s school. The addtional funds will give us the ability to improve our facilities and buy new computer and lab equipment for the school. Please vote and tell your friends about it. By voting you will also be entered into a drawing to win an iPad. Thank you. Vote4sca.com

Cloud Computing – Is Business Agility Important?

2010-08-26T21:02:52Z

: Image via Wikipedia

According to CIO magazine, “Business agility, not cost savings, is the leading reason U.S. companies are interested in cloud computing, according to a survey of 500 senior-level IT and business-unit managers Sand Hill released in March.” What an interesting concept! It’s about business agility…which gets to the core of why IT exists in the first place, right? I mean, whoever went into business with the goal of having an efficient, effective IT department? That’s closely akin to the idea that the goal of business is to employ people. No, the goal of business (at least one that intends to stay in business) is to make a profit. And businesses make profits through service. Those businesses that can serve their customers the best, over a protracted period of time, are typically the most profitable. They understand that customers, especially today, have many options, and that loyalty is something that is won everyday. It’s not as the grumpy old guy told his wife, “I told you I loved you when we got married 30 years ago…” – thinking that was it. No, it is about a long-term relationship with your customers. And to do this effectively, the bulk of your organizational efforts need to be focused on delivering those solutions. Resources and energy wasted because of bloated, slow and potentially bureaucratically inflated systems and processes that actually inhibit the main objective represent an opportunity cost of doing business that is just not acceptable – particularly when those precious resources are strained as they are today.

Cloud computing may just be the solution to this craggy dilemma. For the first time in years, business leaders are getting a glimpse of how they can tame the technology gorilla. And finally giving rise to the opportunity for IT leaders themselves to focus on adding true value to their own (internal) customers, not just being a cost center focused on duct-taping the multitudinous legacy systems and applications together. According to the National Institute of Standards and Testing (NIST), cloud computing is defined as:

Cloud computing is a model for enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications, and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction.

The NIST goes on to identify the five key characteristics of cloud computing as:

on-demand self service, which allows business units to get the computing resources they need without having to go through IT for equipment.
broad network access, which enables applications to be built in ways that align with how businesses operate today – mobile, multi-device, etc.
resource pooling, which allows for pooling of computing resources to serve multiple consumers.
rapid elasticity, which allows for quick scalability or downsizing of resources depending on demand.
measured service, which means that business units only pay for the computational resources they use.

Cloud computing represents the future of business empowerment – and isn’t that what technology is supposed to do in the first place? Leave the IT stuff to the companies with core competencies in those areas, and the economies of scale to manage it effectively. More functionality in more hands on more devices all at less cost. Cloud computing sets the business free to focus on its absolute core mission – serving its customers better than anyone else.

For more information on cloud computing or agile ecm, visit our website.

EZ Filer or Laserfiche? Two Enterprise Content Management Roads Diverge…

2010-08-06T15:03:32Z

: Robert Frost via last.fm

The City of Norfolk, VA, Department of Human Services faced this decision point with its document management system some years ago. The Human Services Department is tasked with meeting the needs of the city’s thousands of residents with various assistance programs, such as Medicaid, Child Protective Services, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and Workforce Development. As one of the top 2 highest “in-demand” Human Services departments in the Commonwealth of Virginia, they have no shortage of paper and they have stringent program and procedural requirements. Recognizing the need to move to a paperless environment some years ago, they adopted a document management system, EZ Filer, which had been adopted by several other Human Services departments in the Commonwealth. Even though many other Norfolk City departments had very successful implementations of Laserfiche, and the fact that EZ Filer was relatively unknown and unproven, the city selected EZ Filer. Over time, the limitations of the EZ Filer system became apparent to the Norfolk department, and workarounds were created to compensate for some of the key limitations of the system such as: limited storage space, limited search capability, very slow response times and no records management rules. The final decision to move to a more robust enterprise content management system came when the company who developed the EZ Filer document management system filed for bankruptcy. According to Bonnie Spence, Programmer Analyst for the city, “we are no longer able to upgrade or modify the system.”

So thus goes the story. Sometimes, even Robert Frost I’m sure would agree, that the best road is the one that is well-worn for a reason.

For more information about Laserfiche, enterprise content management, or Agile ECM, contact Unity Business Systems today.

Microsoft and Laserfiche Joint DOD 5015.2 Certification – It’s Great to be First!

2010-07-21T17:55:56Z

: Image via CrunchBase

FROM CMSWIRE.COM

Laserfiche has become the first Microsoft Partner to achieve joint DoD 5015.2 certification for its integration with SharePoint 2010.

SharePoint and DoD Certification

The US Department of Defense Records Management certification — DoD 5015.2 — is a standard used not only by the DoD, but also by many federal, state and local governments. This is why most Enterprise CMS vendors work hard to get the certification.

Microsoft has a bit of history with DoD certification and SharePoint. At one point SharePoint 2007 did have a DoD 5015.2 certification in the form of an Add-On Resource Kit. But that certification lapsed in May of 2009, probably because Microsoft had SharePoint 2010 in the works with much improved Records Management capability.

There are also a few enterprise cms vendors which have integrated solutions with SharePoint that extend DoD 5015.2 certification to the platform, Open Text being one.

But now that SharePoint 2010 is out, organization’s are likely looking for Microsoft to get its own certification and/or for ECM vendors to get certified with the new version.

Laserfiche and SharePoint

Laserfiche is one of these enterprise cms vendors that offer integrated records management capabilities with SharePoint. Built on Microsoft.NET and already tightly integrated with SharePoint 2007, Laserfiche will add the following capabilties to support the 2010 version:

ADO.NET provider to enable access to Laserfiche data from Business Connectivity Services
Federated Search
Records Management document categorization using SharePoint’s BCS

According to Laserfiche, they are the first ECM vendor to partner with Microsoft for a DoD 5015.2 certification for SharePoint 2010. Testing for the integrated solution was completed last week (see the details here) and is the certification is valid through June 22, 2013.

The need for transparency and accountability continues to drive the adoption of DoD 5015.2-certified records management systems across all industries,” said Tom Wayman, vice president of product strategy at Laserfiche. “Our joint, DoD 5015.2-certified solution allows organizations and agencies to leverage the strengths of both Laserfiche and SharePoint Server 2010.”

Files Held Hostage? You Do Have Options…

2010-07-19T15:14:58Z

The salesperson says that they can store your boxes in their facility for pennies per month. The facility looks like Fort Knox – is heated in the winter and cooled in the summer, video surveillance (armed guards, with helicopters and dogs) and exceeds all fire and safety codes.

But then they pull out the five page contract with the “other” fees: Set-up the account fee, pick up the boxes fee, “handle the box” fee (every transaction has this fee) close the account fee, a fee for the different levels of how they will bill you, (yes, they are charging you to bill you). Then what happens if you need a file that you have stored with that company? You guessed it…more fees: pull the file fee, scan a file fee, deliver the file (with 4-6 different escalating fee choices), return the original to the file fee, destroy the file fee (of course add the “handle the box fee” at each point here) Now you know why the facility looks like Fort Knox, you are paying for it. It’s kind of like once you give the box to them those files are held as hostages and if you ever wish to see them again you are going to have to pay.

Unity Scanning & Storage has a different approach. We have a great “Fort Knox” facility (uhm… except the guards are not armed and there are no helicopters or dogs). Yes, you are paying for it too, however, we set up a reasonable up front fee that takes into account that you will need some percentage of access to your files. While within that percentage there are no extra fees, none, period. This gives you a simple, no surprise, budgetable solution that can save you a significant amount of money.

A budgetable figure, with a safe, secure facility and no surprises?

Call our hostage files negotiation team at 888-400-9064 and we will make “IT easy” to break free! Or visit us at www.UnityScanningSystems.com .

ECM, The Constitution and the Agile Millennial Generation

2010-07-06T17:35:55Z

I am the “instant” generation. I’ve got to have it now. No waiting…for anything. I’ve been weened on a system of me first and right now. The idea of writing a letter by hand, putting a stamp on it, and physically mailing it to someone is as foreign to me as popping popcorn on the stove. Email is the next shoe to drop. I would rather have instant messaging, instant Google results, instant book and music downloads, instant, real-time video collaboration, instant entertainment – whenever I want, on whatever device I want. Instant everything. It’s all about instant results. And this is how I want to work. I am the “Millennial” worker. Like it or not, here I come…

Sounds a little like a bad late night movie, doesn’t it? But it is the new reality. Our workforce is transitioning, and it is happening now. According to Accenture‘s research report, Global Research on Millennials’ Use of Technology, “To engage Millennial workers requires finding the right balance between boundaries and freedoms, as opposed to blanket control that will increasingly send them to more flexible competitors. And the balancing point will no doubt move every year, maybe every quarter.” Wow. Is your IT department prepared for this kind of change? Do you have the right foundation, the right infrastructure? And it’s not the Millennial workers’ fault – they are just a reflection of society and culture as a whole.

So, with the myriad of personal mobile devices exploding onto the market, and the Millennials’ growing sense of individual freedom and empowerment, how can a centralized IT department keep up? Do you mandate the technologies that all workers use, and limit the flexibility and ingenuity that freedom offers, or do you allow your people to make their own independent decisions on what technologies work best for them and their personalities and habits – within a loose framework of controls?

The answer is that we must develop and cultivate a philosophy of agility. The ability to adapt our enterprise within the framework of our core values and mission – our organizational ‘constitution.’ When our Founding Fathers penned the Constitution of the United States on July 4th, 1776, they realized that times would change and that their foundational document would need to outline the framework of the their most-cherished ideas and beliefs, yet at the same time allow for modernization, in order to stay relevant. Today, like the Founding Fathers, we need organizational governance, but we must have the tools, i.e. technology, to allow not only implementation, but also our ongoing future relevance. We need an integrative ‘middleware’ that ties together various technologies and systems; that not only manages the organizational data assets and policies, but seamlessly ties together our disparate line of business applications. A ‘middleware’ with the flexibility to allow specific groups or departments to manage their own processes effectively and efficiently within the context of the whole. That ‘middleware’ is here – it’s called Agile ECM.

For more info on Agile ECM, please contact us @ 888-400-9064, or visit our website.

Info Governance Isn’t So Bad: Part II – Risk Management

2010-06-30T20:01:40Z

(This is the second of 2 posts taken from an article written June 23, 2010 by Kimberly Samuelson, Director of Government Strategy, Laserfiche. Click Here to read the article in it’s entirety.)

Kimberly Samuelson writes:

Risk Management – From an information management perspective, risk management means identifying the magnitude and impact of non compliance; most often as it relates to record-keeping. As regulators and agencies have increased their scrutiny on organizations, it is more crucial than ever to be sure that information is consistent, reliable and available. A well-vetted records management policy is crucial here.

Remember that records management needs to be deployed from an enterprise perspective across the entire portfolio of information assets. Technology is really effective as it ensures consistency. Ideally, the records management structure can be implemented transparently. This allows business units to work in the most efficient way possible, but the organization’s record-keeping integrity is still intact. Technology also allows you to establish monitoring and auditing processes to ensure proof of compliance and transparency. Look at the risk mitigation effort in a positive light. As crazy as it may sound, regulatory oversight can be a unifying concept for business.

One of the most intrusive risk management situations is the e-discovery process. At its most elementary, e-discovery is enterprise search, production and auditing of information. This is an arduous process that can be somewhat alleviated by an established information governance framework and stringent records management policies. Technology is again helpful as it allows you to cast a wide net and narrow down as needed. The framework you proactively build on the front-end will make this process less painful.

Disparate governance efforts, no matter how well they are implemented, cannot alone promise information governance. Mature organizations rely on organizational structures such as frameworks that are simple, coherent and transparent and that engage both staff and management. If we define successful organizations as those best able to thrive in their current environment, and we consider information the lifeblood of organizations, then an information governance strategy is crucial for all organizations to implement. Agile, adaptable organizations leverage their information as an asset. These organizations have mitigated risk, established standards and, most importantly, leveraged their information into quality decisions.

Visit our website to learn how Agile ECM can transform your organization today!

Info Governance Isn’t So Bad: Part 1 – Technology

2010-06-29T15:55:16Z

: Image via Wikipedia

(This is the first of 2 posts taken from an article written June 23, 2010 by Kimberly Samuelson, Director of Government Strategy, Laserfiche. Click Here to read the article in it’s entirety.)

Kimberly Samuelson writes:

Technology – Technology is a foundational component of the information governance framework. When planning your enterprise, be agile in your systems approach. Consider implementing an enterprise content management application or a lot of organizations use applications such as a geographic information system (GIS) or enterprise resource planning (ERP) as points of control or platforms to deploy shared services.
Implementing this type of technology will introduce automation to your information management and automation ensures consistency. There are three common avenues you can take in terms of ECM implementations:

The first is ECM as the single point of control for complete information lifecycle management. A rules-based structure is the key, but don’t forget about the quality of the information you capture. Remember a content repository is only as good as the content it manages. As a wise person once said, “Garbage in, garbage out.”

The second approach involves looking at your information architecture from the user perspective. Here’s your opportunity to be agile in your technology implementation. This method is known as “dynamic personalization.” Dynamic personalization allows the user to access information in the manner and environment in which the user is most comfortable. The user can access the ECM application directly or through any other application through which the user works. In this case, think of ECM as a sort of integrative middleware. Middleware, by design, makes the sharing of information resources transparent to users. It provides consistency, automation and security.

The third approach is the implementation of ECM as a shared service platform. This is most often implemented by governance-mature organizations. Enterprise information management is literally that — information shared across business units or functions. This is particularly attractive to technology departments as it allows them to develop business processes that can be repeated across the enterprise allowing optimal resource efficiency, cost and service performance.

Visit our website to learn how Agile ECM can transform your organization today!

What CIOs Need – Stiff, or Agile ECM?

2010-06-25T20:09:05Z

: Image by jpctalbot via Flickr

Yesterday, I had the fortunate opportunity to have lunch with a group of top CIO leaders from various agencies in the Commonwealth of Virginia as we discussed topics for an upcoming technology show that we share sponsorship. What struck me as fascinating is that these top IT professionals, many from very large organizations, shared a common frustration: that the information world is moving at the speed of light, and they were concerned that their organizations were falling behind. Comments like “When are you going to embrace the cloud?” and “How do you manage or control employees’ use of personal mobile devices?” or “How do we get anything done with 2-3 eDiscovery cases hitting us each week?” popped all around the table. The common denominator from the forum was that rapid and accelerated change and expectations were driving them, not the other way around. And so it occurred to me yet again that the best defense against massive change is a good offense – Agile ECM. Having the framework in place for:

Rapid Deployment
Streamlined Development
And Central Control with Local Flexibility

Giving these top IT leaders the agility to move fast and stay ahead of the change curve, and also the governance framework to manage the information assets of the enterprise. How agile is your ECM today?

For more information, visit us at Unity Business Systems today.

D.I.Y. or Outsource? What You Need to Know Before You Start Your Scanning Project

2010-06-25T15:04:57Z

Image via Wikipedia

So you have some documents that need to be scanned and you’re wondering whether you should scan the files in-house or outsource the project. There are several questions you should answer before deciding.

Do you already own a scanner?
YES! If you have a scanner, is it capable of keeping up with your intended output? Most desktop scanners are not rated for the kind of throughput a medium-to-large job would entail. Other details to consider when setting up your project are: color versus black and white, simplex versus duplex, and document size. Some scanners are better than others at dealing with these variables.

NO! If you don’t have a decent scanner, that is the first expense you should take into account. Scanners can run anywhere from hundreds of dollars to tens of thousands of dollars. Depending on how many documents you have to scan and how quickly the project needs to be finished, you may want to opt for one of the higher end models.

Do you have a deadline?
YES! If you do have a deadline, is it reachable without overstretching your resources? In order to most effectively progress through your project, you will want at least one dedicated scanning technician. If your documents need any preparation beforehand (i.e. removing staples, taping torn edges, and so on), chances are you will need more than one person. If you have a lot of data entry work, that would also increase your time greatly.

NO! If you don’t have a deadline, this can be a blessing or a curse. From the start of the project, make sure that you have dedicated a certain amount of time every week to working on the project. A dedicated scanning technician is your best bet. Adding scanning to someone else’s list of job responsibilities may sound like a good idea at first, but the scanning will most likely end up suffering (or being pushed to the wayside) in the end.

Is quality a big concern?
YES! On average, employees that are dedicated to a line of work will produce a higher quality product than a temp or someone who has divided responsibilities. If quality is a big issue when dealing with your project, a dedicated scanning team (whether internal or outsourced) is the way to go.

NO! No? Well it should be! Even if your main concern is just getting the pages imaged so that you can get them out of your office, you still should look for a quality product. The pages are useless if you cannot read them or if they are missing altogether. As stated above, a dedicated scanning team will excel here. A benefit of outsourcing in this instance is that the files will be out of your office more quickly.

Outsourcing to a scanning services company may not always be the way to go, but for most sizable jobs, it may be the option that makes the most sense. If you have any questions about where to start with your scanning project, or if you’d like to know more about how a scanning services department works, feel free to contact me at Tim.Ilardi@UnitySystems.biz, or visit us at UnityScanningSystems.com.

Director of SharePoint Partner Marketing at Microsoft Weighs In on Laserfiche

2010-06-16T16:15:00Z

: Image via Wikipedia

(Reposted from Laserfiche Staff Blog dated May 12, 2010 – Author: Sarah Kellison)

“Adding Laserfiche to SharePoint Server 2010 helps accelerate deployment, simplify workflow design and minimize the need for customization and development,” said Meera Mehta, director of SharePoint Partner Marketing at Microsoft Corp. “It offers customers an easy way to achieve enhanced productivity using SharePoint Server 2010.”

Laserfiche’s support for SharePoint Server 2010 maximizes the strengths of both systems. SharePoint Server 2010 provides a unified business collaboration platform, while Laserfiche provides document imaging and turnkey transactional content management for core business processes.

Whether you already have SharePoint, already have Laserfiche, or don’t have either Meera Mehta’s words are powerful:

1) Accelerate deployment

2) Simplify workflow design

3) Minimize the need for customization and development

So if your organization finds itself looking for ways to leverage SharePoint in accounts payable, case management, contract management, HR onboarding or other critical business processes, visit our Agile ECM page to learn how Laserfiche can help.

FIFA World Cup Soccer, Oil Spills and the Secret…

2010-07-01T19:11:36Z

Setting up the team score!

More than ever, we live in a world of uncertainty. Businesses that were behemoths yesterday are shells of their former selves today. The speed and deluge of information has accelerated our pace of life, and as such it has never been more evident that the concept of “status quo” or “holding your ground” is just not a reality anymore. Building a mote around your castle doesn’t work. Today, it is clear that we are either moving forward or we are moving backwards. There is no in between. And as such, the job of leadership is to empower your organization to solve whatever problem, or take whatever opportunity that comes your way in the most expeditious and effective manner possible, and in a win-win way. It’s about leveraging your people assets by giving them the tools and authority (within certain pre-determined governance boundaries…) they need to shine.

Watching World Cup Soccer over the last few days has really epitomized this idea for me. You have world-class talent, each with specific duties, operating within the boundaries of the field of play, governed by the rules, lead by a coach who sets the vision and who leverages his player assets; and these guys are just amazing. The way they move around the field, pass the ball, protect and assist their goaltenders, and orchestrate a winning corner-kick shot reflecting off the head of the incoming flanker to score the goal. This is magic. This is what a truly “agile” team is all about.

Contrast this to the terrible oil tragedy in the gulf. People with terrific ideas abound. But there is no empowerment. There is no coordination. There is no leadership. It appears to be more of an opportunity for finger pointing, political advancement and protecting one’s backside, than a display of the character and resourcefulness that made our country great. Companies and organizations have operated like this in the past, but there is no room for this in the future. The competition is too strong. New ideas and technology are obsoleting old practices faster than we can keep up. To survive, and better yet to thrive going forward, we have got to all think like the soccer professionals, not the political professionals. This is the secret. True selfless leadership that empowers people to operate in the gifts that each of us has been given.

To learn more about how Agile ECM can empower your organization, contact Unity Business Systems today!

[podcast]http://www.unitysystems.biz/podcasts/FIFA_Podcast_7_1_10.mp3[/podcast][podcast]http://www.unitysystems.biz/podcasts/FIFA_Podcast_7_1_10.mp3[/podcast]