Hyland Software's Document Management Blog

How higher education can get the right things done now: Don’t wait to go digital with your data

// May 14th, 2013 // No Comments » // Higher Education // Laurel Stiller

I was recently speaking with one our customers who is converting their older documents from microfiche to OnBase because the microfiche are quickly deteriorating. Kudos to them for having gotten the documents into microfiche in the first place – that’s better than paper!

However, does it take the imminent risk of losing information to motivate higher education to become better stewards of its institution’s valuable information? Now, I certainly would hope not, but I’m starting to think that might be the case to spur them to have, at a minimum, images of critical documents strategically stored electronically and backed-up in multiple locations.

Once those documents are digital, the customer I mentioned above will have instant access…and backups…and security around critical data…and document retention policies. They won’t have to keep those microfiche readers alive with parts they bought from eBay or explain to young, new employees what microfiche even is or why it’s worth saving. (I imagine the conversation would parallel the one I had with my kids about how cutting edge I felt when I got an 8-track player. But, I digress…)

And there is hard ROI from this process. Eliminate storage fees. Eliminate temporary employees. Have the information that you need when you need it, readily accessible thanks to a real-time integration with your ERP system. Answer questions correctly the first time. Sail through accreditations and audits. Make faster admit decisions. Check data entered against original documents easily. Award transfer credit before a student registers for classes they don’t need. Oh, I could go on and on.

Now, if we’re hoarding thousands of documents in storage vaults just so we can say that we have them, then this blog is a moot point. But, if we really need the information that’s on those documents then we need to escalate the issue to the “right” people and get some technology funded.

There are a lot of priorities for an institution and funding is declining. So, for us, making a case for an investment might be what is getting in our way. We have to show return. We have to show value.

And, we can.

Hyland is your partner to get this problem solved on your campus. We’ll do a discovery and our higher education team will help you craft a compelling case so you can make a difference at your institution. So call us and let’s solve very real higher ed problems by leveraging the work you’ve already done and extending the value of the investments you’ve already made. Except the 8-track players and microfiche – it’s time for those to go.

I’m listening … Learning more about the information management needs in higher education

// April 12th, 2013 // No Comments » // Document Management, Enterprise content management, Higher Education, Workflow // Laurel Stiller

I have an enviable job. For the next 100 days, my first priority is to listen to the voices of our current and prospective customers. I’m listening in on phone calls, watching video testimonials, reading case studies  and attending sessions that Hyland customers are presenting at conferences. And I’m hearing a lot.

Let’s start with the bad. In prospect calls, I’m learning that, on average, students are showing up with three transcripts that need to be evaluated and reconciled.  I’m hearing that institutions continue to struggle just to keep up with the volume. Many are experiencing their longest turnaround times ever for transcript evaluation. In fact, just this week I heard one institution say they’ve hit a four-week turnaround. Another institution shared they’re at an eight-week turnaround.

But, here’s the one thing I heard that really scares me: On separate occasions multiple institutions admitted that their school’s course articulation database is “stored” in the head of one person.

One person!?

Someone please hand me the bubble wrap, because whoever that one person is needs to start walking around wearing that – or a suit of armor.

I’m risk averse – I admit it.  But these conversations lately leave me downright squeamish about the amount of risk institutions are assuming, what, with one person keeping course equivalencies in his or her head and transcript evaluations taking longer and longer. Meanwhile, students wait. They wait to learn if they’ve been accepted to an institution. They wait to find out what credits transferred. They wait to register for classes.  That’s a lot of waiting.

Okay, time for some good news.  I’m hearing about the ways OnBase is helping our customers. OnBase customers are telling me how they’ve eliminated risk and reduced their turnaround times for transcript equivalencies by implementing our Transfer Course Evaluation.

Some processing times have shrunk to just three business days! I’m hearing that institutions are using fast transcript evaluation as a recruiting tool for the applicant pool.  I love that idea. (Full disclosure here: I’m the parent of a high school senior who has leveraged Ohio’s PSEOP program. He’ll go off to college this fall having taken courses at Kent State University for dual credit this past year. He’ll arrive with a transcript that needs to be evaluated and I’d like to know before he chooses a school what credits will transfer.)

One institution is crediting OnBase for helping them meet the aggressive  goal of expanding their out-of-state student population by 40 percent. Another institution is able to easily change their OnBase workflows to roll out a smart process around Curriculum Management.

And, by the way, these stories are coming from customers who use Colleague and Banner and PeopleSoft as their ERPs. It’s great to know they’re extending the value of their ERP.

Oh, I like what I am hearing. You can hear it, too. If we didn’t cross paths at Ellucian Live, I’ll be at AACRAO where our clients are presenting. Email me at Laurel.Stiller@hyland.com for details. It’s worth a listen.

More and more, business leaders turning to mobile to stay connected; make decisions

// April 8th, 2013 // No Comments » // Cloud Computing, Document Management, Enterprise content management, Financial Services, Government, Healthcare, Higher Education, Insurance, IT, Mobile // Gabriel Baird

Put mobile in the pocket of your decision makers

What do business leaders and their teenage children have in common? In most cases, it’s not the belief that the greatest singer of all time is Justin Bieber.Both young people and decision makers, however, are together in leading the Internet migration from the desktop to mobile devices.The Washington Post reported recently that a study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project found about 25  percent of the nation’s youth connect to the Internet primarily using mobile devices.The study doesn’t provide data on adults. However, social contact manager Gist, which Research in Motion acquired in 2011, has an excellent infographic about “The Mobile Workstyle.” The graphic shows that 87 percent of IT managers have handed out mobile devices and that mobile access climbed 36 percent between 2009 and 2010.The number of workers going mobile continues to climb. That’s obvious in any airport where business travelers are glued to their handheld devices, answering emails and making business decisions from the concourse.

Critical business information needs to get into the hands of the right people at the right time. In today’s global marketplace, the right people are often on the road. This often creates bottlenecks in workflows until those road warriors can take action. Your ECM vendor provides access to documents from anywhere allowing decision makers to – for instance – review, approve or deny requests.

At Hyland, we’ve seen the trend accelerate since leading the ECM industry into the mobile frontier. Hundreds of our customers are using mobile modules for OnBase to access and act on key documents using their Android phones, Blackberries, Windows phones, iPads and iPhones.

“We’re constantly extending OnBase features so our customers can evolve their solutions in lockstep with the latest devices and get even more and better results,” said Bill Filion, vice president of development for Hyland Software.

The Pew report has prompted talking heads on TV to raise concerns about teens connecting to the Internet without adult supervision. Certainly, music snobs are just as concerned about adults using the Internet to watch performances by Bieber.

The company you keep … Reflecting on how ECM helps higher ed work smarter, not harder

// March 29th, 2013 // No Comments » // Document Management, Enterprise content management, Higher Education, IT // Laurel Stiller

As I am brand new to Hyland Software, my inaugural post will be observations on a technology company working to skyrocket efficiency in higher education.  In my third week at Hyland as the Industry Marketing Manager –Higher Education, I’ve put this company through an exhaustive personal review so that when I look at my many clients and co-workers from 20+ years working and serving higher education, I am confident I can recommend Hyland without reservation.

A company I can keep…

So let’s start here.  Evaluating the company I chose to keep.   Let me say that ECM companies – document imaging, managing business process more efficiently and leveraging technology that will compliment and maximize your ERP -  was where I wanted to go in my career.  There are a lot of documents to manage in higher education.  I saw the stacks of paper firsthand working at Dickinson College helping dedicated people in the Admissions, Financial Aid and Registrar office move paper around making critical decisions that impacted the college in a substantive way.  We used the “sneaker-net” back then – student workers racked up miles walking across campus routing folders with documents that need to be reviewed to admit students, award aid and scholarships, and register students. Not incredibly cost effective.  Neither was the practice of annually hiring temp workers to enter massive volumes of data.

Fast forward to today.  As a parent about to send a child off to college, I see the other side: families have to submit a lot of paperwork and encounter a number of problems if we don’t.  I now see how the admissions process can be done better, faster and easier by leveraging the ERP that enrollment management staff already use every day – with increased accuracy and less lost paper.  I’m hearing about schools that, with technology and more efficient process, are decreasing decision times to more than two weeks earlier than previous years.  Let’s be honest, the first acceptance letter a student receives carries a lot of emotional weight that a second third and fourth  cannot quite match.   Enter OnBase at Hyland Software.

A company that wants to keep you…

So I chose Hyland Software for my career next step.  I want you to know I chose a company that wants to keep you – our clients and prospects.  I value the life-long client partnerships that higher education can bring.  I know you don’t have time to keep implementing solutions, nor do you have money to waste on false starts or products that don’t work.  Staff have to “work smarter, not harder” as my favorite VP used to say.   At Hyland, we are going to prove our ROI when you choose OnBase as your ECM solution.  And we can.  As I get started, I’m hearing great stories about eliminated file cabinets, eliminated warehouses filled with boxes of papers, faster decision making and smarter processes.  I’ll showcase and introduce you to our clients who tell these stories and we’ll figure out together where we can save you money.

Hyland Software is the company you can keep for imaging, routing and so much more.  And the savings you’ll get when we are done?  Yeah, you can keep that too!

Admissions Application Processing: Are You Prepared for the Seasonal Tsunami?

// December 7th, 2012 // No Comments » // Admissions, Higher Education // Tom von Gunden

Turn paper piles into electronic files

Well, Admissions folks, here’s wishing you a restful holiday season. Come January, you’re going to need a well-stocked reserve of energy. If the recent NACAC report is any indication of operational stress heading your way (and I fully believe it is), application volumes are yet again going to rise – perhaps in record numbers.According to the study, for each of the past 15 years several key metrics have continued to exceed those from the previous year:  number of applications received, percentage of students submitting three or more applications and percentage of students applying to seven or more schools. That’s a recipe for files turning into piles.

How to keep up? Well, if your office has already transformed its operations from paper-based to electronic processing, you may be well positioned to absorb yet another wicked wave of incoming applications.  Not only are you already likely to be scanning application-related supporting documents as they arrive in paper and adding them to the electronic file, but you may also be managing the review and decision process in an electronic, automated fashion.  You may even be further speeding the process by updating the document checklist in your student information system (SIS) automatically, in real-time.

For those offices that haven’t made the transition from paper to electronic processing and routing for review, well…all I can say is that you may want to resolve that the upcoming season will be your last in paper-based application hell.  Unless, that is, you’re truly enamored with time-consuming, staff-draining, decision-delaying tasks such as the following:

• Manually updating  the checklist in your SIS with received documents
• Sifting through folders of miscellaneous, pre-app documents to see if any match newly created student records
• Conducting filing cabinet search parties to locate documents for  answering student inquiries
• Manually managing file completion and routing of paper files for review (involving filing cabinets, color-coded labels, photocopying, campus mail, etc.)

And, speaking of review, the NACAC study shows that, just since 2005, the average number of applications assigned to each counselor for review has risen by a burden-escalating 73%. In a paper-based world, delayed decisions will be hard to avoid. That means more opportunity for those institutions with efficient operations to secure coveted students and meet or exceed their enrollment goals.

Meanwhile, their less prepared competitors will remain weeks behind, still struggling to process paper files and get them in the hands of reviewers. For the slowest of the slow, knowing who is actually in the review pool  may not occur until after the streamlined schools have already been issuing decision letters to that pool.

If you’re one of the laggards, that thought can’t feel good. Make it a New Year’s resolution to join the ranks of the speedy in 2013.

Chicken or Egg? Three Simple Ways to Jumpstart Enterprise ECM Expansion

// November 19th, 2012 // No Comments » // Document Management, Enterprise content management, Higher Education, IT // Tom von Gunden

At the recent EDUCAUSE annual conference, I heard a theme repeatedly entering into conversations among IT professionals:  When it comes to pushing use of core enterprise software platforms across the institution, what is the role of IT? What role do functional area business owners have in doing the same?  In terms of advanced departmental use and steady cross-campus expansion, the answer echoes that age-old question: Which came first – the chicken or the egg? Does the push come from the “chicken” – IT’s technical understanding of a platform’s true capabilities? Or, does it come from the “egg” – departmental improvement initiatives which uncover the need for new or enhanced technologies?

The answer, of course, is both. Taking enterprise content management (ECM) software as an example, let’s consider ways to leverage both perspectives to drive system growth and ROI.

Share Successes – As with any platform deployment, departmental ECM rollouts will reveal varying degrees of power and sophistication – particularly if the initial departments are still only in early stages of use. But by the second or third year, some pockets of envelope-pushing use of the system will have emerged. Seek out champions on the “egg” side of the house – those innovative departments and functional area leaders who are raising the bar.

Lean on those folks to communicate proven best practices and demonstrate optimized use cases to the larger campus constituency. You can do this through departmental open houses, collaborative retreats, and the like. And, remember to bring the Swedish meatballs: Combine food with food for thought, and the wheels of enhancement and expansion will likely start spinning.

During these sharing sessions, here are some things to investigate and build upon:

• How, when and why did particular departments evolve from a basic scan-and-retrieve use of the ECM system to utilizing its more sophisticated capabilities, such as business process optimization (i.e., workflow), application integration (particularly with the student information system), mobility, and so on? What results did they achieve?
• What kind of collaboration occurred between IT and the functional areas that fostered and supported the success of these advances?
• What recommendations do the departments that have successfully evolved have for others that want to leverage the ECM system to its fullest potential?

Take a Tour – Similar to #1, this is about leveraging the larger “egg” by tapping into the experiences of the broader peer group using the same ECM platform. As we know, higher education is, by definition, “collegial,” and its tight-knit professional organizations – including EDUCAUSE – are a testament to that. Folks in the IT and functional areas of higher education are delighted to share their stories of implementation success. Seek out institutions in your peer network and/or in the user community of the ECM platform at hand that are more advanced than yours in terms of both usage within particular departments and the sheer number of departments that are up-and-running on the system.

Here are some additional things to investigate:

• How did they handle budgeting and planning for expansion?
• Were there formal timetables, milestones and benchmarks established as the system began to grow more overtly at an enterprise scale?
• How are they handling administration and governance of the system as its usage grows?

Show (Technology) and Tell (Stories) – Okay, this one starts with the “chicken.” Have IT take primary responsibility for keeping up with the development roadmap and enhancement offerings of the ECM platform. Make sure IT thoroughly understands the full range of capabilities available in the system and is prepared to disseminate and illuminate those capabilities to the campus at large. Then, complement that understanding with the ground-level, department- and process-specific knowledge of the business units.

Schedule periodic meetings in which IT meets with departments that are either not using the ECM system at all or using it only in basic ways. Provide a forum for departments to describe their business goals, processes and needs, and allow IT to then help identify and align advanced ECM capabilities. Without collaborative discovery sessions such as these, IT is often left in a state of uncertainty about which departments to contact regarding potential ECM initiatives and projects. Similarly, departments are left unaware of capabilities that could well ignite the fires of innovation and improvement within their areas.

Bottom line:  If you want to fully leverage a core platform investment across your college or university, it’s time to start sharing, touring, showing and telling.

Seven Signs You Need an ECM Makeover

// October 9th, 2012 // No Comments » // Cloud Computing, Document Management, Enterprise content management, Higher Education, IT, Mobile, Workflow // Tom von Gunden

As we head toward the EDUCAUSE Annual Conference in early November, I’m pondering ways IT organizations can address item #4 on EDUCAUSE’s list of top IT trends for 2012: “Improving the institution’s operational efficiency through information technology.” Why this item? Frankly, I’m honing in on this one because operational efficiencies can be greatly impacted – for better or worse – by the range of capabilities (or lack thereof) provided by one critical component of an IT infrastructure: the enterprise content management (ECM) platform. That’s assuming, of course, there is one in place at your institution.

Unfortunately, many colleges and universities have neither a roadmap nor a solution for getting them to true enterprise-supporting ECM. Instead, the IT landscape is often dotted with departmentally disconnected bits and pieces of basic document imaging and basic workflow routing capabilities. Useful but extremely limited, these are the barest bones of an ECM framework. This non-governed, piecemeal approach blindly ignores a comprehensive ECM strategy – the kind that drives and supports operational efficiencies across a wide and complex range of cross-campus processes and needs.

And, even if an institution has deployed a centrally managed document management system used by various departments, a study of its functional area use and a look under its covers – from a design and administration standpoint – may reveal significant limitations to optimal, efficiency-driving utilization and to cross-enterprise expansion. What can an institution do when it finds itself backed into ECM-stifling corners? In a word, convert. Move to a single, comprehensive system that doesn’t force departments to bump their heads against a low ceiling of capabilities and doesn’t require a heavy reliance on central IT to administer, upgrade and expand.

How do you know when it’s time for a conversion? Look for these tell-tale signs – first from the perspective of functional area users, then from the perspective of IT.

Functional Areas:

1. Workflow – Business process workflows are limited to basic point-to-point document routing, with little or no capability for complex parallel or non-sequential processing. Want to send a notification from one process workflow to a user queue in an entirely different workflow? Want to do a sophisticated call-out to an external service? Forget it.
2. Mobility – Functionality is not available on a variety of (or any) mobile devices – smart phones, iPads and the like. Or, if it is, the functionality is limited to basic document retrieval. Think you can execute workflow actions from a mobile device? Think again.
3. SIS integration – At best, users are able to retrieve documents from student information system (SIS) screens. Wish you could automatically update the SIS document checklist as new documents enter the ECM system? Wish you could automatically update it with decisions users make in process workflows? Wish your document management system could get real-time updates from the SIS when key data values change? And, wish all those updates could occur in real-time, at the database level? Keep wishing.
4. Office applications – Users who are heads down in applications such as MS Office, SharePoint and Outlook can’t easily – if at all – interact with document management tools without leaving those application interfaces. Want to execute a workflow task while working in your Outlook inbox? Want to move SharePoint document libraries and list items to a permanent, secure archive while retaining links to those objects within the SharePoint interface? Yeah, right.

IT:

1. Configuration – Building out and altering business process workflows is a laborious, cumbersome process, characterized by a heavy reliance on scripting and custom coding. Want to hand off configuration tools for functional area technical leads and business analysts to tweak their own departmental workflows? Thinking about mapping and building your next five department workflows without relying on outsourced vendor services? Dream on.
2. Upgrades – The thought of moving to the latest version of the document management software (if there is a new release, which is rare) is an anxiety-inducing nightmare. Wondering how you’re going to unbuckle all those custom-coded workflows, workarounds and bolt-ons and then put it all back together after the version upgrade? Sure you are. But, forget about ease and speed. Instead, prepare yourself for months of head-scratching – and headaches, otherwise known as downtime, delay and user outrage.
3. Deployment options – Essentially, you have none. The document management system is designed for point deployment, department-by-department, and/or it has architectural limitations when it comes to scalability. Worse, your only deployment option is premises-based, on your campus – a campus already overloaded with applications to manage and administer. Hoping you can offload your ECM needs to a secure, proven and stable environment in the cloud? Sorry, but your head is the only thing currently in a cloud – your existing document management system can’t live there.

Face it. You’ve been in this neighborhood too long. It’s time to bring in the moving vans.

Live at OTTC 2012: 5 Ways OnBase Makes Your Life Easier

// September 20th, 2012 // No Comments » // Back Office, Document Management, Enterprise content management, Financial Services, Food and Beverage, Government, Healthcare, Higher Education, Insurance, IT, Mobile, OTTC, Workflow // Tom Tennant

Before we say goodbye to another OnBase Training and Technology Conference (OTTC) and start planning for OTTC 2013, let’s take a moment to check-in with some friends, our OnBase users and administrators. They’ve spent the week learning from and networking with industry peers and OnBase experts from all walks of life. And they’ve had a chance to share their experience with our enterprise content management (ECM) software solution.

What we wanted to know, though, is how OnBase has made our customers’ lives easier. So we asked. And we got five great answers.

1. “It’s helped our company reduce and, in some cases, eliminate paper.” – John Anderson, senior software application developer, Noridian

We hear this one a lot. After all, paper, by way of applications, resumes, receipts, work orders, invoices, bills, and more, consumes time across an organization because of the way the company interacts with it. Human resources, accounts payable and receivable, facilities management – even the holy grail of all business, customer service – are all affected by the way paper is handled. Slow processing, difficulty retrieving files, incomplete information, duplicate work – all are productivity killers and customer service nightmares for a business just trying to stay competitive. A smart, easy-to-use document management solution can seamlessly collect, organize, and index the multitude of documents and content into a single 360-degree view for smart decision making a streamline process.

2. “We wouldn’t always know where information was. It could have been on anyone’s desk. We had to track down paperwork. Now we scan it, send it to OnBase, and can see right where information is – and where it is in the process.” – Teresa Rayburn, materials coordinator, Flexco

That’s the other thing about paper. It gets lost. Easily. And when it gets lost, so does the information it carries. And information is the lifeblood of a company. A strategic ECM solution should bring clarity to all of your data, electronic and otherwise, and allow for easy tracking of critical documents. That solution should allow for complete document life cycle management, from input through destruction. Documents that are centralized, searchable and, with the right solution, automatically linked to the appropriate account, customer, patient, employee and so on.

3. “I like OnBase so much it’s hard to come up with one example. It’s made our AP process much more efficient. Not only has it streamlined our process, it’s streamlined other processes across the company at the same time.” – Sharon Ricci, finance manager, FM Global

Ricci further explains that the speed and efficiency, with which her office can capture, approve and process invoices extends to her internal clients who would otherwise be waiting for a slower, paper-based process. OnBase automates that business process so that files are shuttled from office-to-office. It’s all accessible with the click of button, and it’s easy to see where information is in that process.

4. “Hyland Software is so passionate about training its user base and is so transparent about the technology.” – Eric Lohr, senior programmer, Sharp Healthcare

Last year we talked a lot about how training and education might be the single most important software investment you can make. That’s why a robust training program, one that encourages customer involvement and customer connection, is vital to the longevity of any technology solution. It also allows companies to become vendor independent – even promotes it – so that a company can attack a solution on its own with confidence and expertise.

5. “OnBase makes my job harder because there’s so much it can do it makes my to-do list long!” – Kim Dale, senior project manager, Northwestern University

A surprising answer, we have to admit! But trust us when we say that Dale’s answer was given with good humor. What she’s talking about is how OnBase offers a wide range of functionality in one core product. Functionality that isn’t cobbled together from separate, disconnected products and doesn’t require custom coding and services costs to grow the solution. It’s tailored for departments but comprehensive for the enterprise, designed to give you what you need today and grow with you over time.