1. Background
Currently data and information in an organization or a company was rapidly generated in line on business growth. The Information can be on forms email, chat messenger, spreadsheets, document, faxes, case notes, web pages, voice mails, contract, and presentation and so on (unstructured content).
The all data and information that was generated not all needed in this time (present), some data maybe needed on this month and the other data maybe needed in the next month. To easy recognise or find the data that needed, an organization or a company need a system that handle the data. EMC is a tools and method that able to meet requirement of an organization or company to organize the data and information.
There are a lot IT vendors that able to provide EMC for an organization, for example Microsoft (with its SharePoint product family) and Oracle Corporation (with Oracle Content Management) joined established leaders such as EMC Documentum and entered the entry-level "value" market segment of ECM.
Open source ECM products are also available, including Campsite, WebGUI, Alfresco, Sense/Net, eZ Publish, KnowledgeTree, Jumper 2.0, Nuxeo, and Plone.
1.1. Definition of ECM
What is enterprise content management?
Enterprise content management (ECM) is a set of tools and methods that allows a corporation, agency or organization to obtain, organize, store and deliver information crucial to its operation. The fundamental objectives of ECM are to streamline access, eliminate bottlenecks, optimize security, maintain integrity and minimize overhead.
According to the Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM), ECM can be broken down into five major components called capture, manage, store, preserve and deliver. The purpose of each component can be briefly defined as follows:
- Capture: Create, obtain and organize information.
- Manage: Process, modify and employ information.
- Store: Temporarily back up frequently changing information in the short term.
- Preserve: Back up infrequently changing information in the medium and long term.
- Deliver: Provide clients and end users with requested information.
Figure 1 Flow chart EMC Implementation
ECM has become increasingly important and complex in recent years for a number of reasons. Financial fraud and data breaches -- and regulations designed to prevent them -- have made effective information governance essential. There are new sources of content, such as unstructured data from social networking websites. Enterprises also need to manage content effectively for integration with business intelligence/business analytics (BI/BA) applications that help them to use the available information to guide business decisions(Gervais, 2006)
1.2. Four key force driver for ECM
Four key forces are driving organizations to adopt a strategic, enterprise-level approach to planning and deploying content system:
1.Compounding growth of content generated by organization
2.The need to integrated that content within business process
3.The need to support increasing sophistication for business user content access and interaction
4.The need to maintain governance and control over content to ensure regulatory compliance and preparedness for legal discovery (Turban & Volonino, Enterprise Content Management, 2010)
1.3. Difference with Electronic Document Management
There are lot of similarities between ECM and EDM (Electronic Document Management), it’s no wonder companies find it hard to understand what the differences are.
Content management systems vary from document management systems in one key area – the type of information they manage. Document management solutions are designed specifically for data contained in structured documents and files like Word, PowerPoint, Excel spreadsheets, PDF, and other popular formats. Their purpose is primarily to digitize and archive files, and track and manage new documents throughout their lifecycle, as they are written, revised, and updated. Many of them include advanced imaging and scanning capabilities (for digitization of hard copy files), that can’t be found in most content management systems.
Content management systems, on the other hand, are more about the logical organization and improved accessibility of various types of structured and unstructured electronic information. This includes not only the kinds of files that are managed by document management applications, but a broader range of digital assets. For example, audio, video, Flash, and multimedia files, as well as raw data collected from various third-party Internet sources(content-management-vs-docement-management-whats-the-difference, 2011).
2. ECM Implementation
A successful Implementation cannot be undertaken without at least some planning to ensure that all involved understand what is it that we are doing (Scope), why we are doing it(Requirements), how we are going to get it done (Resource Planning), how it will fit (systems Integrations & customization), what will users do with it (User Policies, Access, Training & Change Management), that it will actually work (Testing) and how to put it all together without disruption to the business (Delivery).
People who participate (Resource) on EMC Implementation usually are technical architects, technical consultants, project managers, developers and support specialists who are responsible for designing, implementing and supporting project team(Turk, 2011).
The steps of EMC implementation generally as below:
1.Business assessment and designing EMC system as users needed in an organization
2.Gathering data to meet requirement of users
3.Technical implementation (create database and system integration)
4.Testing the EMC system
5.User acceptant test form EMC users
Figure 2 Flow chart EMC Implementation
2.1. Benefit of ECM for organization
The benefits of EMC for organization are below:
1.Reduced storage costs are a direct result of only storing what is absolutely required to be kept and getting rid of everything else. A properly implemented ECM solution eliminates redundant or out-of-date copies/versions of content (physical and electronic) which leads directly to a reduction in storage requirements.
2.Reduced operating costs can be achieved indirectly through reduced storage costs. A reduction in operating costs can also be achieved directly by implementing, for example, imaging and workflow components of an ECM solution.
3.Reduced e-discovery costs are an obvious benefit of an ECM solution; less content kept means there's less for the lawyers to get their hands on and less to have to examine.
4.Increased productivity is achieved by having the right information in the right hands at the right time. Also, using workflow to automate routine or low-value tasks leaves more time/resources to execute the high-value tasks.
5.Improved work-life balance is realized because information workers that have good tools to work with spend less time working overtime and more time with their families. This is one of those benefits that is typically harder (but not impossible) to quantify.
6.Increased customer satisfaction is a result of getting the answer the customer needs (not wants) when they want it. If your Customer Service Representatives can solve the customers' issues right away, your customers are going to be happy customers and stay with you.
7.Better decisions made faster can enable organizations to take advantage of opportunities and avoid unnecessary costs.
8.Business continuity is served by making certain that the content you need to run your business is available, always
One of the benefits of properly implemented ECM solutions is that they are cumulative. Do not think that just deploying an ECM solution will automatically provide benefits. The solution needs to be deployed in a manner that supports relevant controls and is planned out in a logical manner. You also need to put a benefits realization plan in place and stick to it. Lastly, it's important to understand that an ECM solution that doesn't integrate into line of business or other systems (eg, business intelligence) will not provide as much benefit as an ECM solution that is part of an organization's comprehensive information management strategy (ie., the whole is greater than the sum of its parts)(Walker, 2010).
2.2. Best practice to implement ECM
One of the important things on EMC implementation is change management, The implementation of several ECM technologies such as document management, records management, workflow, web content management, content security and portals is always a challenge as it touches on the way every knowledge worker performs day to day work activities. In large organizations with geographical spread it becomes an even greater challenge. Therefore, such a challenging ECM implementation mandate the introduction of significant change at organizational structure, people skills and IT infrastructure.
Change in organizational structure is mandated by the need to have "Owners" at process level that have an authority level empowering them to make decisions across the entire process, and change is also mandated by the need to create a new job position for "Records Officers". Change at people skill level is mandated by the need for knowledge workers to learn how to participate in a structured workflow process and how to collaborate with others in portal discussion threads within boundaries of new information governance rules. Change at IT infrastructure level is mandated by the introduction of new systems that require a higher standard of connectivity across all office locations, and is also mandated by the need to obtain licensing for new products in document management, records management and workflow technologies.
Managing change is a continuous process which should span the entire project lifecycle. The following change management tasks have been identified and should be implemented and monitored throughout the lifecycle of the project to ensure that the adverse consequences of change are being avoided and/or treated:
1.Assessment of information maturity within the organization to help project sponsors establish a sense of urgency for the need for change.
2.Align project objectives and deliverables with organizational Strategic Change Drivers such as emerging markets, compliance with new regulations, need for cost reduction etc.
3.Establish awareness of Information Governance across all knowledge workers to help ensure proper application of content management policies and procedures.
4.Getting business users actively involved in requirements definition for taxonomy and metadata will also help reduce their resistance level to new ECM technologies.
5.Early identification of user needs for training and for manuals of operation and administration of the ECM system, and proper planning of training activities.
6.Prototyping will enable early realization of business benefits and thus rallying in more support from senior management.
7.Deployment in a Pilot environment where there is a small community of users, preferably familiar with the use of technology, increases chances for success and user confidence.
8.Load ECM system with relevant and adequate data to be referenced by knowledge workers when the system goes into deployment, will not give users an excuse to stop using the system.
9.Implement user Incentive Schemes based on their level of utilization of the ECM system.
10.Capture negative comments and deal with them responsibly and honestly to defuse negativity regarding the ECM system.
Many ECM projects are doomed to failure due to improper management of change and because customers pass it to the vendor for convenience. The responsibility of managing change is best kept under the control of the organization in which change take place. Vendors of Content Management systems can only assist in identifying change tasks and advice on the methodology of managing change, however, they cannot possibly be in control of implementation of the change process within the organization. The customer must be in driver's seat(Jaljouli, 2010).
3. Conclusion
ECM is helpful tools and method to provide data and information for an organization or for a company. The data and information that was generated by business growth mostly unorganized or unstructured (unstructured content), EMC will organize, collect, and selected properly so that easy to deliver if needed by people (employee in an organization) who need the data.
Hard to understand what the differences between ECM and EDM.The main difference from ECM and EDM are as below:
·EDM designed specifically for data contained in structured documents and files.
·ECM are more about the logical organization and improved accessibility of various types of structured and unstructured electronic information. This includes not only the kinds of files that are managed by document management applications, but a broader range of digital assets.
EMC implementation should be planned properly, start with Business assessment and designing EMC system, gathering data, technical implementation, testing the system and user acceptance test. The benefit of properly implemented ECM solutions is decisions made faster can enable organizations to take advantage of opportunities and avoid unnecessary costs.
4. References
1.http://searchwinit.techtarget.com/definition/enterprise-content-management-ECM
2.Turban,Erfaim,. Volonino, Linda. : Information Technology for Management , Enterprise Content Management, 2010, 7, p. 103
4.Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/5839972
6.http://www.itecj.com/blog/352-change-management-implementation-enterprise-content-management-ecm
