Higher Education

Document Management Helps Johns Hopkins University Admissions Weather Snowmageddon 2010

With a winter storm revving up to deliver a second blow this evening (the weather cognoscenti are calling it “mammoth,” “massive” and “colossal”), today and tomorrow feels a little like déjà vu for those of us in the Midwest and Northeast. Almost exactly one year ago today, on Feb. 5, 2010, much of the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states were buried under more than 20 inches of snow. The blizzard – designated “Snowmaggedon” by President Barack Obama – left thousands without power and shut down the government. It stranded a number of Johns Hopkins University’s admissions staff at home. Bad news for the admissions staff, which was facing a looming admissions deadline and the largest applicant pool in the university’s history: nearly 2,000 more than its previous record.
Government

Defining Total Cost of Ownership of Government Software – Part II: The “C”

Last time, I wrote about the quest for finding the real "total" in total cost of ownership (TCO). As you consider the "cost" of TCO, I would like to offer some thoughts that might be useful as you evaluate document management projects and cost proposals. During my time at my housing agency, it took me three times to get one line of business application right. I am not proud of this. When the prices came in, I was told to pick the lowest price and I did, despite my knowledge that the product's low price meant that I wouldn’t get updates. Also, I knew my users would hate the interface. But the worse part of the failed deployment was that users had months of discomfort as they transitioned to a new system, only to have to do the same thing again when we brought in another system. How do you estimate this "cost”?
Government Higher Education
Graduation rate expectations and budget cuts: The state of ECM in higher education in 2011

Graduation rate expectations and budget cuts: The state of ECM in higher education in 2011

Ten years ago, the U.S. was considered the most educated in the nation. Today, it ranks 12th among 36 developed nations. Realizing this, the Oval Office is pushing to improve this measure. Specifically, the goal it’s presenting is to increase the number of college degree-holding U.S. citizens from 40 percent to 60 percent in the next 10 years. But, of course, here’s the catch – the keepers of the budgets – the states – are almost all cutting education funding, making a spending increase for universities to get more staffing very, very unlikely. So how in the world are colleges and universities going to graduate an extra eight million people with two-and four-year degrees by 2020 without additional funding or resources? Since the down economy hit, the “do more with less” mantra has been quite loud – and the federal push will likely elevate it to a full-blown yell. If colleges and universities are going to even come close to meeting these goals, they’d better learn quickly to put this mantra into practice. But it’s the question of how to put it into practice that trips them up. Luckily, University Business recently tackled a similar initiative. Throughout the year, they’ve been featuring higher education institutions which have taken steps in the right direction to maximum efficiency, which, most of the time, is led by an enterprise software deployment or two.
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.
Financial Services

No note, no foreclosure: The records management issue in mortgage lending

It’s a delay tactic that might make George Bailey proud. Rather than walk away, homeowners facing foreclosure are asking banks to show proof they owe what the bank claims. Some lenders are failing to do so, turning a follow-the-dotted-line process into both a drawn-out court battle and a tangled, twisted paperwork nightmare. The revelation comes via a recent USAToday article titled “Homeowners use ‘show me the note’ to fight foreclosure.” Struggling borrowers argue lenders’ alleged devil-may-care attitude during the wild days of subprime lending created a document gap that’s muddying proper mortgage ownership. Read the article and you’ll see courts are listening to homeowners who claim shoddy document management by their mortgage lender. For lenders, that means no note, no foreclosure. Or at the very least, time to rethink that denied loan modification.
Healthcare
Best in KLAS rankings are out: Three trends in healthcare ECM software

Best in KLAS rankings are out: Three trends in healthcare ECM software

Every year at this time, KLAS, a healthcare IT analyst firm, releases vendor rankings within several technology categories, including what they call “Document Management and Imaging.” The rankings are based on vendor-specific customer feedback. But every year, when I open it and look at the data points, I wonder “vendor ratings are great, but what does this really mean for the state of healthcare ECM today?” So if you’ll indulge me, here are the three things that that I think stand out in this report: 1. It’s not document management and imaging anymore – it’s enterprise content management (ECM). This has always been a peeve of mine. While the report calls it “Document Managing and Imaging,” KLAS knows well that, today, ECM isn’t just scan, store and retrieve – it’s routing patient charts, integrating with an electronic medical record (EMR), etc. And, because ECM should be ubiquitous throughout the organization (for example, not just in the back office), it is therefore a long term, strategic investment. The market verified this in the report. One of the ratings was if the technology was a “part of long term plans.” The leaders in the report had very high marks here, including Hyland’s ranking where 100 percent said it was a part of long term plans (disclosure: I work for Hyland). 2. What’s increasingly becoming the most common point of entry for ECM in healthcare? Integrating with the EMR. In other industries, most of the paper and process pains are felt in accounts payable and human resources, so these areas often drive ECM strategies. But the customer comments in the report made it clear that, in healthcare, the priorities are elsewhere: the clinical side.
Government
The no wait waiting room in government - document management drives constituent service

A “no wait” waiting room in government? Document management drives constituent service

One of my favorite jobs was working in the National Main Street Program. I love Main Streets because the program focused on making communities inviting and able to serve their residents and visitors better. The idea was that people immediately get an impression about your community or your business according to by the atmosphere that they experience when they walk in the door or drive down your Main Street. I often reflect on the lessons I learned there and how they apply to the long lines and grumpy people at the service counters and waiting rooms of government agencies. When people need to do business with their local government, their first impression is formed by the "waiting room." Waiting is one of our least favorite things in life. And, when this is combined with the fact that government offices are open when most people have to work, you have a situation that puts the constituent in a frustrated mood even before they begin their wait. But, just like the businesses in the Main Street Program, more thought could go into how this experience feels for your constituents.