Hyland Software's Document Management Blog

Document management and accounts payable: 3 reasons to go there

// March 28th, 2013 // No Comments » // Accounts Payable, Back Office, Document Management, Enterprise content management, Government, State and Local Government // Terri Jones

Turn paper piles into electronic files

As government begins to turn the corner on budget woes, local government has a golden opportunity to transform their processes and position themselves for quick return on investment – and a conscious movement towards the government that our future constituents will want and expect. It is, at times, overwhelming to look at the potential IT solutions you could implement. But it helps to look at the core processes of government and target your attention, your technology to make these processes more efficient.How do I define efficient? Pretty simply, I see it as taking staff less time to complete processes. Even more importantly, looking see it as ways to reclaim staff time by using technology to eliminate tasks that were previously necessary because government had to rely on paper to get things done.

Document management is a key piece of technology for government. But I often get asked, “Where should we start?” and “where does it make sense to expand document or ECM solutions?” My answer - accounts payable.

Why start in accounts payable?

My first answer is the massive volume of paper processed by accounting departments. But it really comes down to how the paper slows the process of paying all those bills. And it only gets worse if you have been forced to cut some of the staff that works in your accounting department.

My next answer is the speed of retrieval. Your accounting staff needs to find critical information, answer phone calls from vendors or colleagues, figure out whether a bill should be paid and determine whether the goods or services have been received. With the hundreds of thousands of transactions that agencies do every year, finding these answers by going to the file cabinet or going through an inbox or inter-office mail envelopes is not sustainable when your budget and your staff have been cut.

These are reactionary reasons. How about something that will position you for the future?

The best reason to use ECM for AP is transparency and self-service. By digitizing the documents, you not only solve the two dilemmas above, you create internal and external transparency. Internally, the process is entirely transparent. Staff can find invoices and documents they submitted as well as where they are in the process of approval or payment. Managers and submitters can receive emails that tell them when they need to review and approve purchase orders or invoices and they can approve them right from Outlook.

Internal transparency certainly helps, but what if you also met growing constituent demand for transparency using the same solution that help with the challenges above? By digitizing documents, you can make them available online so constituents can see how money is being spent without having to travel to your office or make a public record request. This saves their time and your clerks time too. Some agencies are even using their digital documents and workflows to create vendor portals so vendors can view the status of their invoices without making a call to your staff – using self-service to keep them working on processing instead of answering the phone.

Using document management in your accounting department creates that rare moment when the same investment can solve today’s challenges while also answering a future need.

The HR Compliance Dilemma for Government: 4 Ways Document Management Can Help

// March 20th, 2013 // No Comments » // Document Management, Enterprise content management, Government, State and Local Government // Terri Jones

Government human resources (HR) departments may not be facing the difficulties of finding and hiring huge numbers of staff, but they do face other HR challenges that can have severe effects on funding and legal obligations. From public safety to schools to running federally-funded programs, government staff needs to be credentialed, trained, certified and kept aware of key programmatic rules. The challenge is how to keep track of all of these compliance requirements when staff is reduced and rules change or get more complicated.

One way to manage this across a county, city or state is to use document management. The following four features of document management help government HR departments meet these compliance challenges:

• Central secure repository to store all required documents – Knowing where the documents that prove compliance are and being able to find them quickly is critical to managing compliance with less staff. By storing documents digitally, they are not lost, they are secure and you can find what you need in seconds.
• Automating certification and credentialing processes - If part of your department’s HR work is keeping staff properly certified (including specialized training), workflow capabilities in document management can help. Workflow can time requirements, prompt you for required documentation and email you the next time you need to complete re-certification tasks or courses.  It can also email HR staff to let them know who needs to complete tasks or who is out of compliance. Using workflow transforms HR from constant monitoring to focusing on people that are out of compliance so those situations can be addressed immediately. And, with workflow always running in the background, you can stop worrying about missing a key requirement or deadline due to staff reductions or increased compliance responsibility.
• Automating the distribution of policies and procedures – Few government programs or HR policies stay the same. How do you currently distribute policy changes and track acknowledgement? Are you able to test your staff’s understanding of changes? Can you easily report who hasn’t completed or acknowledged policies when that is required? In many cases, making staff aware of changes is a legal or programmatic requirement. But with less staff, it becomes difficult to accomplish this in a paper-based world. Most of us receive new policies by email, which is fast. But how do you track whether someone actually read the attachment? With document management, you can email people that they have a new policy to review and verify that they review each page. You can also ask them to electronically acknowledge the policy and even administer a test. HR staff can track staff progress and run reports to allow supervisors to view their staff’s progress. With document management, you can stop routing slips and inter-office mail distribution, eliminate printing and photocopying –  freeing up time while improving your policy management.
• Audit trails and tools to find missing documentation- One of the strongest features of HR document management solutions is its ability to create an audit trail and to report or require documents. On the first day of your government job you probably brought some identification, signed some paperwork and an HR employee might have used a paper checklist to be sure that you submitted all required documents. Document management automatically checks the entire repository and tells you across all staff if a document is missing. It can also help  HR employees collect documents and perform necessary tasks using workflow to ensure that everything has been done. How would you handle a requirement to collect a new document from all employees? Perhaps your newer hires submitted the document but now you need to find out which members have not submitted it yet? Using document management, you can run a report in seconds to find every member of your staff that hasn’t submitted the document. By using document management and eliminating paper, your ability to look at your document requirements at every level is enhanced.

Most jobs in government have compliance components. Some, like teachers, public safety officers, or health care workers have massive requirements from training to background checks to reoccurring certifications and training. These requirements, particularly in an era of smaller government, require new tools to meet requirements and assist smaller HR teams to ensure compliance. Document management is the perfect answer to the HR compliance requirements and the staffing levels of government today.

Top 3 New Year’s Resolutions for Government Agencies

// January 7th, 2013 // No Comments » // Government, IT, Mobile, State and Local Government, Workflow // Terri Jones

For the time being, we have averted the fiscal cliff. However, as local governments return from the holidays, they continue to face the same struggles with budget, smaller staffs and continued expectations from their constituents. As cities and counties face the new year, how can they simplify their approach to IT and feel good about selecting the right trends to follow?

Here are three resolutions that will launch local government onto a path for better constituent service and more efficient government:

1. Go digital: By eliminating paper and moving to electronic forms, document management and workflow automation, you save time associated with filing, printing and copying information – a very good thing if you have had to reduce staff. Paperless processes eliminate lost documents and speed up processes, making constituents happy as well as supporting green initiatives.

Automating paper processes also makes it easier for government to collaborate between departments that may be serving the same constituents, whether it’s a case management approach to permitting inquiries, human services or economic development. Eliminating duplication of efforts and tasks that are simply the burden of paper will immediately increase government efficiency. Now is the time to capture some of those savings!

2. Go mobile: If going digital is transforming the core of traditional government, going mobile is the recognition that having the right IT hardware to do our jobs in government is no longer a luxury. Children are using smartphones and will grow up thinking of them as necessities. As a result, it’s essential for government to harness this extreme mobility. Doing so allows staff to do more work in the field. With the prices of handsets and tablets so low, it’s also cheaper than buying a desktop, not to mention the fact that field staff are seldom in the office to work on that desktop.

The additional time available to field staff by avoiding the drive to the office, collecting and re-filing paper documents and the ability to know about an emergency situation instantly will change the backlog of work and the perception of your service. As you move to a paperless world, going mobile gets easier. As a result, it makes sense to couple your paper elimination with departments who need access to documents in the field so you can increase the impact of these two resolutions by making them work together.

3. Go self-service: Some time ago, I wrote that I believed one of the things we dislike about government is waiting – waiting in line, waiting on the phone, waiting for things to happen. Coupled with the availability of so many self-service options through services like online shopping and banking, pressure has been put on local government to offer the same experience. Self-service opportunities are no longer “nice to have.” The availability of the Internet, the smartphone  and the “always connected citizen” have simply changed the game.

Today, constituents expect everyone to have a website with services – not just static text. The good news for strapped government is that this trend has positive benefits in so many areas that it must be prioritized as you look at your IT investment for the coming year. If your most popular paper-based forms were available online, people could conduct their business at their convenience.

And, if they could see how this process is moving forward by visiting a portal, receiving a text message or an email, they would enjoy this convenience rather than waiting for one of your overworked staff members to answer the phone during business hours. Imagine if this could happen automatically so you didn’t have to worry about an application languishing in a backlog or even getting lost in the mountain of paper on a desk.

The advantage of a self-service government process is that it moves faster, keeps constituents informed AND relieves your staff of tasks AT THE SAME TIME. And it all starts with going paperless and being aware of the tremendous opportunity offered by affordable mobile technologies that are now in the hands of many of our constituents.

Technology is always touting the next big thing, and it can be difficult to select or to risk scarce dollars on a trend you aren’t sure about. However, these trends are proven to save money and time while embracing something that our constituents expect. Going paperless, mobile and self-service are the essence of faster, cheaper, better government and will serve your community well if you resolve to make this your IT road map for the new year.

What to Do on November 7th – Driving Efficiency in Government

// October 5th, 2012 // No Comments » // Affordable Housing, Document Management, Enterprise content management, Finance & Administration, Government, Health & Human Services, IT, Justice & Public Safety, Mobile, Public Works, Software as a Service, State and Local Government, Uncategorized, Workflow // Terri Jones

During an election year, the phrase “improve government efficiency” is heard and promised, usually with little detail provided. That’s because until you work in an agency, it’s hard to really understand what efficiency is, let alone how it would improve your working environment. At the same time, there is wide acceptance that technology is essential for government transformation. However, at times there is little guidance regarding how technology can drive your government organization toward that misty and often elusive goal of “efficient government.”

As an IT director, what happens when you wake up on November 7^th to face new directors, commissioners, mayors or governors who were elected on a platform of improving government efficiency? When you’re asked to contribute to briefings for newly elected officials and you sense the opportunity to improve your organization and provide some direction, how do you explain efficiency in government?

Here are three ideas to keep in mind:

1. Time to retrieve – Addressing the time it takes to retrieve critical documents and the information they contain is one of the strongest and most basic ways to improve government processes. Consider how long it takes your staff to find the information needed to move the day-to-day tasks forward. How much time is spent searching for documents instead of focusing on more important tasks?
2. Time to process – One of the reasons improving efficiency is common during election years is because of the time it takes to complete government processes. However, current revenue struggles in government have led to even fewer staff members available to complete processes like human service eligibility, plan reviews and public records requests. Typically, it’s the speed – or lack of it – of government processes that lead to candidates running on an “improve government efficiency” ticket. As a result, targeting ways to speed up these processes despite staff cutbacks will be a winning strategy for efficiency-minded officials while also relieving the pressure on your overworked colleagues.
3. Time to take action – Decisions regarding courses of action define government. How can technology make sure these important decision points aren’t lost in the pile of work? When speaking with newly elected officials, it’s important to consider how long it takes your organization to address problems, issues and requests. Despite backlogs, government must address emergencies – such as child welfare and traffic accidents – in a timely manner.

Now, let’s say these ideas really resonate with your incoming elected officials. Next, you’ll be asked to propose ways to drive efficiency using technology. Consider the value an enterprise content management (ECM) solution offers. Typically, government has a split between data in department solutions and the documents that drive and record actions. Government must utilize ECM to contain costs and position itself to be the mobile, transparent and engaged force that constituents demand.

Here are two ways ECM can improve government processes:

1. Integration – An ECM solution connects all of your data systems and the documents that drive government. When you integrate systems, staff instantly access information, reducing the time spent retrieving information from days and hours to seconds. And, with codeless integration tools, government can implement it affordably across all departments as time and budget permit.
2. Automation – With ECM, government can use workflow automation to route critical work, notify staff of important tasks and digitize paper moving through agencies. Not only does this reduce the time needed to complete these processes, it also allows overwhelmed staff to focus on more important tasks like improving constituent services.

So, this election year, when you are asked to drive efficiency, think about how ECM can make government more efficient while also helping newly elected officials propose and support the technology investments government needs today and in the future.

Why the Latest and Greatest is Important – Software, Maintenance and Enhancements

// September 14th, 2012 // No Comments » // Affordable Housing, Cloud Computing, Document Management, Enterprise content management, Federal Government, Finance & Administration, Government, Health & Human Services, IT, Justice & Public Safety, Mobile, Public Works, Software as a Service, State and Local Government // Terri Jones

Next week, I’ll be attending the OnBase Training & Technology Conference (OTTC). During my time in government, I went to many users’ conferences, mostly out of self-defense. I viewed these events as a chance to lobby for the enhancements and improvements I needed for my department. Unfortunately, the process for discussing these needs was often missing or contentious.

When I reflect on these experiences, I realize it’s essential for government to have an avenue for asking software vendors about their processes for product development, enhancements and bug fixes before investing in an IT solution.

Knowing what I know now, here’s what I would ask vendors:

1.       Do you have a users’ conference?

Users’ conferences are essential in order for you to develop an understanding about how much support you’ll receive once the sale is close. At OTTC, for example, users meet with colleagues to discuss trends and best practices. They can also participate in more than 200 sessions focusing on solutions and industry trends.

To ensure your vendor supports your solution after sale, ask these questions:

• If there’s no user conference, how can I network and discuss issues of common concern with other agencies?
• If there is a user conference, does it offer product and technical sessions for new features and functionalities?
• Is there a virtual community for agencies that can’t travel so users can still network?

2.       What is the process for collecting customer-driven enhancements and how do you evaluate them for inclusion?

Enhancements are essential for government solutions, especially for those who have to respond to changing regulatory environments and own solutions connected to state or federal funders. You also need to discuss enhancements that are not regulatory in function to determine if they’re ranked for priority within the user community.

3.       How often do you provide new versions of the solution? Is it included in maintenance?

Asking about the release schedule and the frequency of new versions is important for your future IT budget. Too often, you pay maintenance for technical support and still have to pay for solution upgrades – or both. This could potentially have severe budget implications for government agencies that may be faced with the choice of keeping their solution and cutting other funding, using an outdated system or eliminating the solution entirely. By reviewing the frequency of updates, along with the provider’s research and development investments, you’ll be able to evaluate whether the solution can service your agency today and in the future.

4.       Do you have examples of government trends you’ve responded to in past solution releases?

Even though agencies don’t frequently make large purchases, that doesn’t mean they don’t need cutting-edge tools. Today, agencies are looking for process automation, easy integration of IT systems, mobile solutions, self-service features and web options as well as flexible licensing and cloud, or hosted deployments. Asking vendors this question will help you evaluate whether they can be a partner that helps you spot useful trends and tools or provide expansion options for your investment.

Overall, the latest and greatest IT solutions solve your needs now and in the future. By asking vendors these questions, you’ll learn how they think about their solution and how they’ll respond to your future needs. That, in turn, will help you make the wisest IT choice – one that will serve your agency beyond your current needs.

Capture Isn’t Just a Scanner – Four Capture Strategies for Government

// September 11th, 2012 // No Comments » // Affordable Housing, Document Management, Enterprise content management, Federal Government, Finance & Administration, Government, Health & Human Services, IT, Justice & Public Safety, Mobile, Public Works, State and Local Government, Uncategorized, Workflow // Terri Jones

When I designed my government agency’s document management solution, I gave little thought to my capture strategy. I was busy trying to design workflows, add document types and create eForms. I bought two large scanners to electronically capture documents and that was that.

Now, several years later, government agencies are re-thinking how they capture documents. Technology offers more options and staff reductions have made it critical to eliminate any manual tasks during the capture process. Moreover, several initiatives – such as transparency, mobile document access and self-service – require government to continually expand the type of documents digitized. The capture of documents, once less complicated, is now at the forefront and a critical element of enterprise content management (ECM).

In order for government to respond to new trends and realities, here are four ways to think about capture:

1.       Align your capture strategy with the way staff works – With so many capture options – electronic forms, machine print forms, paperless processes, etc. – the capture strategy will look different depending on the tasks and the particular way staff need to do their job. Choosing tools that fit in seamlessly with existing technology will be easier for staff to learn and can be leveraged in other departments across your enterprise.

2.       Plan for high volume, but don’t forget low volume – In my agency, the scanner was the single point of capture and it was meant to do thousands of pages a day. But what about the daily trickle of information that most staff handles that also needs to be captured in your ECM system? Be mindful of information like vendor invoices and human services eligibility documents that get captured by staff in places convenient to them.

3.       Carefully consider the intake location – When your agency has many locations, efficiently capturing documents adds another wrinkle to your strategy. If documents are received in many places and reviewed/used in other areas, capturing the information as soon as possible is critical. By doing so, you’ll ensure the documents are available to everyone who needs them. Immediately capturing documents also saves time and money that may have been used to ship documents to a central location for filing or scanning.

4.       Other initiatives may drive your capture – Oftentimes, government utilizes ECM for other initiatives, such as meeting public records requests, providing documents online for constituent self-service and field access for employees. By expanding the reach of your document management solution with capture abilities, you can position your agency to move forward on these efforts – all while driving down costs associated with manual filing and paper storage.

Whether you just implemented an ECM solution or have been using one for some time, capturing documents requires more than simply buying a scanner. Considering the points above will lead to a successful flow of tasks that your agency can easily adopt and, with more and more documents being captured, increase efficiencies and support the critical initiatives of a more effective and transparent government.

Faster, Cheaper, Better Government, Part 3 – Top County Trends to Watch

// August 23rd, 2012 // No Comments » // Affordable Housing, Finance & Administration, Government, Health & Human Services, IT, Justice & Public Safety, Mobile, Public Works, State and Local Government, Uncategorized, Workflow // Terri Jones

I just attended an illuminating technology summit hosted by the National Association of Counties (NACo). The group began offering these summits to help elected officials learn about technology showcasing proven examples of how it helps counties better serve their constituents while weathering difficult financial times.

As I listened to the day-long panels, two themes stuck out in my mind – first, the interest in county government moving to paperless processes and second, the broader theme of consolidation that implies simplifying your IT structure. As I listened to these presentations, I was struck by three things that became huge contributors to their “faster, cheaper, better government” efforts:

1.     The role of technology in eliminating low-value tasks
Officials from Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, and Leon County, Florida, discussed using enterprise content management (ECM) to eliminate the burdens paper-based processes placed on their staff and constituents. With an investment in ECM, these counties:

• Reclaimed employee time spent filing, printing and photocopying documents
• No longer lose documents
• Instantly retrieve needed information
• Eliminate costs associated with paper documents by electronically routing them

2.     Eliminating redundant and under-used applications (and associated maintenance payments)
County officials also discussed the need to review, assess and eliminate some of the many solutions they purchased over the years. In large counties, supporting and upgrading these applications is complex. Many discovered solutions that were abandoned but still a part of the maintenance burden on IT staff.

To solve this problem, IT staff members developed maps of all their solutions and ranked them by age and usage – a tool that helped them focus on applications that should be eliminated or replaced. Doing so supports the overall effort of counties to consolidate and standardize their IT investments. Many are seeing tremendous time and cost reductions as a result. In fact, San Diego County reported a 25 percent reduction in IT unnecessary applications and saved millions.

3.     Speeding up government with technology
All of the above contribute to this category because less paper results in faster processes in areas like accounts payable and property tax work. By reducing the number of IT solutions your county supports, you’ll be able to deploy needed projects faster – like self-service websites, mobility for field staff and transparency initiatives. The potential for faster IT deployment is one way counties benefit from popular trends like mobile solutions and web-based applications.

As you consider how to create “faster, cheaper, better government,” counties are already leading the way. The foundation for this progress is managing the documents that drive government and revisiting your IT portfolio. So, if you’re looking for a place to begin, start with your core – the documents and your IT infrastructure. If you do, you’ll meet the save budget while repositioning your IT investments to support a simpler, leaner and more nimble outlook.

Faster, Cheaper, Better Government – Part 2: Start with the Basics, 5 Ways to Be Faster

// July 30th, 2012 // No Comments » // Affordable Housing, Back Office, Document Management, Federal Government, Finance & Administration, Government, Health & Human Services, IT, Justice & Public Safety, Mobile, Public Works, State and Local Government, Uncategorized, Workflow // Terri Jones

In Part 1 of this series, I discussed my experiences at the Cityworks conference in the context of the historical and continuous reductions in the number of public sector jobs. Despite these staggering job losses, I believe government leadership can transform this bad moment into a watershed for creating the “faster, cheaper, better government” model.

The topic is both important and broad, so let’s start at the beginning with some examples of “faster” government, including:

Providing quicker responses – Government operates faster when information is easy to retrieve. However, when needed information resides in separate databases or filing cabinets, it takes longer to find answers. Since most government information is split between departments and locations, connecting people with information is essential for faster retrieval.

Reducing backlogs – The unfortunate result of a reduced workforce is that less work is done in a day. The good news is that organizations can cope by changing the way they operate – eliminating tasks like printing, copying and filing. By eliminating manual tasks, staff has more time to provide better, faster service to constituents.

Making faster decisions – Increased and backlogged workloads results in slower decision making. Constituents become very unhappy when delayed decisioning slows down critical progress for things like providing shelter for the homeless, emergency assistance during a crisis and the development of businesses that can help the community’s local economy. You can relieve backlogs and improve the reputation of your government by using technology to track and act quickly on these services.

Here are five ways to get your government operating faster:

1. Easy information access – By connecting documents and data with codeless integration, you put all needed information at your staffs’ fingertips.
2. Focus on exceptions – One way to operate with a reduced staff is to use technology like workflow automation.  Because workflow automates repetitive processes, staff has more time to focus on the human side of work. Not only will it shine a light on the places staff should focus their time, it also highlights problems and bottlenecks in your processes.
3. Eliminate tasks – By implementing technology that automates processes, your staff doesn’t spend time printing, copying and filing paper. They now have to time to focus on more important initiatives and deliver faster responses to constituents.
4. Reduce the number of solutions you support – One way to accelerate the use of technology is to reduce the complexity of your systems. You can accomplish this by implementing solutions that are easier and cheaper to support, and buying enterprise solutions that can be used in other departments and for different processes. By reducing the number of solutions, you also reduce the amount of IT support needed to administer your solutions. It’s like having extra staff that is free to develop additional solutions and realize more benefits, faster.
5. Provide self-service – Let your constituents help themselves! This isn’t bad customer service – it’s government using technology the way constituents want to be served, with 24/7 access to information. Since constituents can help themselves, your staff can address other tasks.

Faster government is critical for surviving the current crisis and meeting the expectations of the next generation of constituents. Technology will get you there by realigning the way your staff uses their time. And when that happens, government will not only be faster, but cheaper and better.