Category: Digital Transformation

Digital Transformation

Digital Transformation
Live From info360 Is ECM Morphing Into the Platypus of Enterprise Software

Live From info360: Is ECM Morphing Into the Platypus of Enterprise Software?

If the session content being presented at the AIIM/info360 conference over the past two days is any indication, it appears that strong environmental factors (AKA, the market) are driving ECM vendors into a period of significant evolution and adaptation. Now you may be thinking: “Ok Burnsy, I get the idea that ECM vendors and their products need to evolve. But, c'mon dude, where are you going with the Platypus analogy? What does an egg-laying, venomous, duck billed, beaver-tailed, otter-footed mammal have to do with ECM software?” The answer to that lies in the usage scenarios ECM solutions are increasingly expected to address.
Digital Transformation
AIIM and Info360-Systems of Record vs. Systems of Engagement

AIIM and info360: Systems of Record vs. Systems of Engagement?

I'm spending the next day and a half in Washington, D.C. attending the info360 conference (formerly known as the AIIM Conference & Exhibition). This has always been the showcase event for all the vendors and technologies that fall under the enterprise content management (ECM) market umbrella. At its core, however, the big focus has been on ECM offerings that support transaction processing and formal record keeping (i.e. systems of record).
Digital Transformation
Are you ready for the Microsoft Internet Explorer 9 release

Are you ready for the Microsoft Internet Explorer 9 release?

After many months of beta, Microsoft will be officially releasing Internet Explorer 9 tonight at 9 p.m. PT. There's been plenty of talk around the pros and cons of the features and functionality. Some highlights: It has a brand new scripting engine under the covers thats's expected to render many websites and web-based products faster (possibly 10 times faster!). It’s definitely an improvement and a continual step forward by Microsoft. Chances are very good that you’re going to want to get it rolled out throughout the company. But are you ready for it? Here's the problem. The new scripting engine from Microsoft is significantly different from all prior versions, and although Microsoft has made attempts to make web-based products run the same as they did in IE8, there’s no guarantee. This means that if you are running any web-based products that you’ve built or bought, those products may not work properly, or at all, on IE9. Clearly, this could result in a disruption of your business processes.
Digital Transformation
A lesson in data storage, starring WikiLeaks and pizza

A lesson in data storage, starring WikiLeaks and pizza

How many scanned electronic documents might represent 5GB of storage space? This is the question posed to me last week by New York Times reporter Nelson Schwartz. You can read more about why he wanted to know in his article “Facing Threat From WikiLeaks, Bank Plays Defense” (see page two, paragraph one). My response? That’s like figuring out how many slices of pizza fit in a large pizza box. The answer depends on how large the slices are. A pizza box could hold 100 little slices or eight large slices. Similarly, the size of electronic documents absolutely impacts the answer to the original question. Before we start calculating, we need to understand that calculations are based on pages, not documents. This is an important distinction. Documents can vary in the number of pages, so we count pages to get an accurate picture. There are then a number of variables which will profoundly impact the final size of an electronic document.
Digital Transformation
Transactional content management: The rising star in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for ECM, 2010

Transactional content management: The rising star in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for ECM, 2010

According to Gartner, the ECM market can be divided into four subsets. * Transactional Content Management (TCM) (a system of record for managing process-related documents) * Social content management (team collaboration extended by social media tools) * Online channel optimization (WCM, digital asset management and social media tools serving as systems of engagement) * ECM as infrastructure (domain of IBM, Oracle and Microsoft) While the MQ graphic continues to represent an aggregate view of the ECM market, vendor placement is now better aligned (not perfectly mind you!) with each vendor’s strengths in one or more sub-segments of the ECM market.
Digital Transformation
A new kind of “Leader?”: Gartner Magic Quadrant for ECM, 2010

A new kind of “Leader?”: Gartner Magic Quadrant for ECM, 2010

The Gartner Magic Quadrant (MQ) for Enterprise Content Management (ECM) is, at once, the most influential, misunderstood and misrepresented assessment of the ECM marketplace. I know this well because, for the past six years, I’ve had the pleasure of being Hyland’s principle point person for articulating our position in the MQ and other analyst reports to customers, prospects and partners. To a large degree I owe my role to the sales departments of “BIG ECM”: IBM, EMC, Oracle and Open Text. You see, these vendors are tenured members of the MQ Leader quartile. Hyland Software, on the other hand, retained an exclusive position in the Challenger quadrant for five, consecutive years from 2005 through 2009.
Digital Transformation
“I don’t care if you can afford to buy and install the initial software licenses, can you afford to run the system?

“I don’t care if you can afford to buy and install the initial software licenses, can you afford to run the system?

In my last post, I said that CFOs are asking IT the question in the title of this piece when it comes to enterprise software. The lifetime, total-cost-of-ownership of IT investments can no longer be an afterthought; it has to be a deciding factor when evaluating new technologies. I see this new way of thinking as being a good thing, applying to the world of transactional document management and document-intensive process management solutions.
Digital Transformation
Does risk trump ROI when making enterprise IT investments?

Does risk trump ROI when making enterprise IT investments?

I'm attending the Gartner ITxpo/Symposium this week. Each year, conference sessions feature a healthy mix of hot button issues purportedly keeping CIOs and IT managers up at night. This is my seventh year attending Symposium. In the past, the angst projected by session topics felt somewhat manufactured, in my opinion. This year is different. The angst appears genuine. And, it's very concentrated on a few key issues, issues that are undoubtedly driven by the fallout of a lingering and far-reaching recession. It's evident from the sessions that CEOs and CFOs are casting a harsh spotlight on IT. CEOs are looking for IT to help them innovate and achieve organizational goals in the face of regulatory and market forces that are increasingly complex, dynamic and systemic. In light of the CEOs demands, CFOs are putting the CIOs' feet to the fire with respect to: