September 28, 2012

Technology and Intangibles Lead to Upgraded Records Management for Organizations

By Ed Silverstein
TMCnet Contributor

Records management is undergoing a process of major change at many organizations.

Market consolidation has taken place over the last decade in the Enterprise Content Management sector. Large players such as IBM, OpenText, EMC, Oracle and Hewlett-Packard (News - Alert) have taken over market share from independent vendors.

Mark Mandel recently calculated in an INFORMation Governance report that over 100 independent vendors are now owned by top five players. Here are some examples:

IBM acquired the much smaller Tarian Software, FileNet and DataCap; EMC acquired Documentum and Captiva; H-P acquired Autonomy (News - Alert) and Tower Software; OpenText acquired Hummingbird, Metastorm, Captaris, Vignette, RedDot and Global 360; and Oracle acquired Stellant and Fatwire. 

The consolidation has led to the issue of whether future compatibility with custom solutions could be in question, Mandel said. The consolidation process has also led to major vendors offering comprehensive ECM suites.

“Customers can purchase those suite components they need, and they can add others as needed without (theoretically) having to develop significant custom integrations,” Mandel said in a blog post.

Now, ECM Suites include having Records Management as a component of a larger ECM solution. There is also a combination of electronic and physical records management.

There is integration with MS SharePoint and MS Office as well.

“Users can implement point solutions and add new applications without having to re-architect the infrastructure,” Mandel added. “Customers can purchase the various components from a single vendor and thus manage contracts and support much more easily. Software upgrades (again, theoretically) can be managed in a much more harmonious manner because the components are all from the same code or solution base.”

For federal agencies that require digital records by 2019, under the NARA/OMB directive, solutions from companies such as OpenText are available.

Technology is not the only answer in this challenge. “Intangibles” such as budgets, change management, operational support and training are needed as well.

“Records Management becomes an integrated component of the overall solution,” Mandel said. “Ideally records classification is performed automatically upon indexing of content within a business process.”

Auto Classification helps to classify e-mail and file shares. Business Process Management automates business transactions, as well. In addition, digitized records and business processes lead to shorter cycles, more productivity and savings, according to the blog post.

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO Austin 2012, taking place Oct. 2-5, in Austin, TX. Stay in touch with everything happening at ITEXPO (News - Alert). Follow us on Twitter.

Edited by Braden Becker