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If you're like thousands
of businesses across the globe, you are evaluating the opportunities to "go
paperless." Recent mid-market surveys indicate that document management is
ranked in the top five IT initiatives being undertaken.
Why the surge in interest in document
management? For many companies, it's
because IT projects involving document management have an extremely high return
on their investment. For others, it is compliancy issues from increased federal
regulations legislating privacy and fiscal reporting. And for others, it may be
a "green" initiative. Or simply, because of the strong productivity gains and
cost reductions.
A common concern when evaluating
document management solutions is to understand what questions to ask to decipher
the true competitive differentiation between solutions. The following 8
considerations will help guide you through the vendor selection process and
ensure that you are making the best decision for your organization.
1. Is the solution
fully integrated?
Document management systems integrated with
your ERP application generally provide the greatest productivity gains and
strongest ROI. However, not all
integrations are created equal. The most common areas of integration
are the ability to automatically index documents with data from the accounting
application, the ability to view documents from within the accounting
application and the ability to keep the document management system and the
accounting application synchronized. Be sure that the vendor can actually
demonstrate the depth and completeness of the integration. Ask to review
documentation that clearly explains how the integration works. Does it actually streamline your
process or just file your documents after the process is complete? Does
it automatically index documents for future retrieval? Does it allow you
quick and easy access to your documents?
2. Does the solution respect the integrity of the core software application?
A document management solution should never
try to replace or modify the actual functionality of the core software
application. The role of the document management solution is to
streamline processes and provide easy access to digital documents. If
integrated to an ERP application, the document management system can't
circumvent the rules in the accounting application. Make sure you
understand if the integration is writing directly to the accounting
application, and if so, are any rules of the accounting application being
circumvented? If this is the case, this
should be an immediate red flag.
3. How extensible and scalable is the solution?
Key considerations/questions to be
asked include:
- Can the solution integrate with other systems within your
business?
- How easy is it to set up new documents in the system?
- How are the documents stored? Make sure the documents are not stored in a
proprietary format.
- Are documents stored in the SQL database or in the file
system?
- What happens when you need to add more storage? Is it transparent to the user?
- What kind of volumes can the document management system
support?
4. Is your software consultant involved?
As a
trusted advisor to your organization, they can be a key resource helping to
ensure maximum utilization of the document management functionality to
streamline your business processes. They generally know of any screen
customizations and can save time and expense in the overall project. ERP
software consultants are generally experts in business transaction processing
and can provide invaluable support and direction in charting your paperless
course.
5. Are you provided references to call and offered site visits?
Reference
calls and site visits can be immensely beneficial and insightful into a
vendor's performance and commitment to a market space. If the document
management vendor has few sites running and is hesitant to arrange a site
visit, it's important to understand why.
6. Are total solution cost stated up-front and how self-sufficient can your organization become?
There
are certain requirements you should insist upon:
- You want the ability to control change management to allow greater
product modularity and scalability.
- You desire open architecture solutions so as to be able to
make modifications with your IT staff or contract out as needed.
- You don't want to end up with obsolete technologies. You
desire software that is configured rather than customized.
- Lastly, you want an affordable solution with no hidden costs,
including future service engagements and upgrades.
7. How tight is your data security?
Threats from
outside (competition, identity thieves) and inside (disgruntled employees,
employee theft) threaten the integrity and value of your most important
information. Document management systems
can provide several layers of security:
- Multiple levels of password-protected access for groups
and individuals
- Encryption of document contents
- Audit trails showing who and when
documents have been accessed or updated
8. Pricing: How much should I expect to pay?
Ask your vendor to
analyze the costs of your current paper system and provide you with a ROI
calculation. Most well-designed and
implemented document management solutions will provide a payback of less than
12 months. Key considerations
to minimize risks are to go with an industry leader with a proven integration
methodology. Look for certifications and
endorsements that are credible in your industry and marketplace. Ask for costs
to be clearly broken down for software, services, support and maintenance.
Services as a percentage of software should generally be 50% or less and, if possible,
quoted as a fixed price so that you know the total costs of ownership up-front.
While you may
eventually want a comprehensive, company-wide system, document management
vendors strongly recommend you start by implementing a solution for one
application in one department. It's much easier to gain management support for
a new effort that only affects a single department at a lower cost. Tackling
one problem at a time also makes installation less disruptive.
Vendor selection is perhaps the most
critical decision you will make in your document management review. Going with
an industry leader with a proven track record can save you thousands of dollars
down the road and get you started on your paperless migration in the smoothest
and most efficient manner.
BRANDT
MORRELL is the president and COO of Altec, a leading provider of Integrated Document Management
solutions. They offer accounting-centric "paper to paperless" solutions,
including their comprehensive IDM solution doc-linkĀ, output management, MICR
check disbursement and paper documents that serve more than 13,000 customers. Altec works with alliance partners such as
Epicor, Microsoft Dynamics, Sage and SAP to provide the most comprehensive,
integrated enterprise document management solutions to its customers. For more
information, visit Altec at www.altec-inc.com or call 1-800-997-9921.
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