by Josh Martin - Solutions Product Manager.
Real-time access to information is crucial to operating a successful modern organisation. We have an expectation that information is available instantly, and, as a result, delays can cause significant disruptions to operations. By creating a digital centralised storage system for business-critical documents, users can store, manage and retrieve information quickly and efficiently.
It takes, on average, 18 minutes1 to retrieve a paper-filed document. That doesn’t take into account the information which can’t be retrieved at all:
- 7.5%2 of documents are estimated to be lost completely during the storage process
- 3%2 of documents are misfiled
Being able to quickly digitally upload a digital file or scanned document in to a centralised repository, removes the manual transfer of documents. Advanced capture technology means that, once input, these documents are correctly filed, all at the click of a button.
Now the documents are correctly identified, captured and stored. With stringent paper-based filing, this is also the case. We now come back to that 18 minutes.
Remove the need to get up and walk over to the correct filing cabinet. Remove the need to open it, pulling out the correct batch number. Remove the need to check the index to slowly flick through the mass of paper inside. By using a Document Management System (DMS), simply search for the (automatically captured, remember) document data using the search functionality, and the document is instantly available. What was previously 18 minutes has now become seconds. And this gives back one of the most valuable resources to an organisation – time.
By including additional metadata (descriptive information) when storing the document, you can improve the search functionality to make it even more effective. Once the document is retrieved, utilising a feature like version control removes the need to maintain multiple versions of the same document. Collaborative communication within the document system provides a central repository for everything around the document. The ability to archive older files aids in meeting compliance legislation whilst optimising search performance.
When considering how to manage documents, there are a number of different considerations. However, the ability to quickly file, retrieve and manage these documents shouldn’t be left on paper.
If you are about to start your purchasing journey, speak to one of our Business Solutions Consultants today to see how we can make this a smooth and easy process for you.
1Source: Gartner
2Source: AIIM
