I recently came upon this white paper from Docuware – Plan Your Move to Cloud Office Automation. There’s a lot to like in this white paper.  This particular section caught my eye – particularly re organizations that are still “philosophically” resistant to the cloud – “Why cloud matters to you. And your customers.”

Reason 1 -- The “weight” of on-premises.  Despite the commoditization of storage, on-premise scale is difficult to achieve. And enterprise software, typically consumed by licenses, is expensive to buy, install and integrate.

Reason 2 – The “lightness” of cloud.  Benefits of cloud solutions include:

• employee “centricity” (anywhere, anytime, any device);
• cost structure -- the entire model of expense is flipped: lighter subscriptions to services can be categorized as operational expenses rather than capital expenditures.
• scalability and operational flexibility
• simplified maintenance
• rapid deployment
• security leverage by scale

Reason 3 – Benefits of scale available to even the smallest players.  Cloud services now enable even the smallest competitor to deliver a game-changing experience via massively scalable storage and computational firepower to crunch the largest sets of data, to provide the analytics to understand it, and the security to lock it all down.

The cloud content management gap is closing; we are approaching a tipping point. In a recent AIIM survey, 78% of organizations say that “if they were considering a new, replacement or consolidated ECM system,” hybrid cloud capabilities would be important. 18% say these capabilities would be “vital” and an additional 32% say they would be “very important.”

I’ve posted a copy of the free white paper HERE. Check it out. 

 

As part of our Certified Information Professional Spotlight series, I recently sat down with Joanie Erickson, Global Records and Information Governance Leader at Molex, an electronics manufacturer specializing in connectors. We talked about how the certification has helped her establish credibility among her teammates and even get a new job!

Yes, I know "ECM" is supposed to be passé now. 

Per Merriam-Webster, the three definitions of passé are:

1. past one's time
2. outmoded
3. behind the times

Now I would be among the first -- and have been saying so for the past three years -- to say that the "ECM" term is in need of a makeover. Witness the work we have been doing re Intelligent Information Management.

My main concern is that I don't think the "ECM" term does justice to all of the incredible things people are doing with content and information. But that DOES NOT mean that content management capabilities are irrelevant; in fact they are more important than ever, albeit in new and changing forms.

In the midst of all of the "ECM is dead" conversations, I recently participated in a very refreshing and passionate panel at one of the #IBMContent2017 summits. The two end user organizations on the panel took great objection to the "ECM is dead" conversation and insisted that rather than being dead, content management is more important than ever to their organizations -- and in fact, content management is a core enabling set of capabilities to everything they do and in their efforts to drive digital transformation in their organizations.

These two organizations have been doing ECM at massive scale for a LONG time -- 3 decades -- and shared some important lessons about how their content management capabilities and requirements have changed over time, the lessons learned along the way - warts and all, and how they are continuing to morph their capabilities in the era of analytics.

I was so impressed with their passion that I asked them whether they would be willing to recreate the conversation we had on a webinar so that it could be shared with a broader audience.

And so that's what we're doing on August 9 at 2 pm eastern. Here are some of the topics we'll cover...

• How can you use a shared services approach to expand and evolve your initial content management investment?
• How do you “sell” – and deliver – content capabilities to the “business”?
• What does it mean when content management capabilities become mission critical – i.e., content systems can never go down?
• How do content management challenges change when the scale is massive – millions or billions of documents?
• How have the content and information management skills needed to support your operation changed over time?
• What comes next? How are you using analytics to push your content management investment to the next level?

Join us at 2 pm on August 9. I can guarantee the conversation will be fun and energizing.

You can register HERE or by clicking on the image below.

 

In a recent AIIM survey we investigated the question of what information capture “leadership” looks like in user organizations. What does information capture look like in leading organizations that want to position this competency not only as a source of immediate competitive advantage, but also as a long-term competency critical to the coming era of machine learning?

What are the problems that organizations are experiencing with their capture implementations as they consider this evolution? Here 4 key problem areas that surfaced in our survey; we’ll also be discussing this survey and its implications in an AIIM webinar on September 19.

4 Key Information Capture Challenges in Moving to the Next Level

1. Multiple document types -- Most organizations are struggling with capture complexity that is driven by the sheer volume of document types that must be managed.
2. Uncertainty about data accuracy -- Data is at the heart of the Digital Revolution. And data quality is at the heart of the challenge facing organizations as they attempt to make their data fit for purpose and fit for use.
3. Poor usability -- 62 percent of respondents in our survey rate their capture software “very difficult” or “somewhat difficult” to configure.
4. True information capture is more complicated than simple imaging -- Capture is often assumed to be synonymous with scanning. The reality is that most organizations need to do far more than just process images.

Interested in learning more? Download my new free Tip Sheet!

Welcome to the third installment of our Working Lunch Blog Series. For those who are new to the Working Lunch series, the idea here is simple - every Wednesday for the next couple of weeks we'll post a video of one of our most popular sessions from The AIIM Conference 2017. Grab a bite to eat and enjoy an educational video during your lunch hour! Or make it social and invite the whole staff to watch! Our previous sessions include:

• Changing Times: The Future of ECM
• Elevating Content to Make the Unknown Known

This week's session is "Digital Transformation - Your Content In Disguise?" from Glenn Gibson of Hyland, Creator of OnBase.

When asked what the CIP means to me, I immediately smile. This accomplishment means a lot - both on a professional and personal level.

You must be wondering  - how did an accountant become a Certified Information Professional?

Last week we kicked off our "Working Lunch Blog Series" with a great session on Changing Times: The Future of ECM. This week, we're pleased to present you with our second installment of the series. For those who are new to the Working Lunch series, the idea here is simple - every Wednesday for the next couple of weeks we'll post a video of one of our most popular sessions from The AIIM Conference 2017. Grab a bite to eat and enjoy an educational video during your lunch hour! Or make it social and invite the whole staff to watch!

The reality for many organizations is that uncontrolled information – and especially paper -- still has a stranglehold on day-to-day activities. Many tasks requiring review and approval still require physical interactions with paper-based information. There is clearly room and opportunity for business organizations to maximize their information use and value as well as lower operating costs by removing paper from their business processes. 

Information capture is the first step in being paper-free, whether it is digitizing paper using scanners, or capturing digitally created information immediately and maintaining it in digital form. 

Consider the following 11 data points from AIIM research pointing to the challenges associated with managing unstructured information:

1. 65% of organizations say they are still “signing” on paper.
2. Paper is still with us despite everything - only 43% of organizations say paper is decreasing in their organizations.
3. The human factor is still the primary reason for paper use for handling, reading, and note taking (47%), along with lack of a management plan to move away from paper (47%).
4. 39% of organizations say they lack understanding and awareness when it comes to paper-free options.
5. 66% of organizations report rising numbers of digital inbound documents.
6. 38% of organizations say that they now receive more digital invoices than those in paper form.
7. When it comes to converting key business processes, Accounts Payables (AP) is the top priority for 30% of organizations.
8. 36% of organizations say they have a combination of paper and digital content in the same workflows.
9. 43% of organizations say removal of paper from processes should be a constant objective.
10. Key benefits identified in gaining control of uncontrolled information are faster customer response (50%) and higher productivity (42%).
11. 45% of organizations report payback of their information capture investments in less than 6 months.

Interested in finding out more? Check out this new Tip Sheet, Understanding the “Three” Root Causes of Process Inefficiency.

What worries us most is often not what actually gets us—that is, causes us our biggest problems. The enormous human capacity for worry can result in productive focus and taking action. Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) inspires our imaginations, invokes our worst nightmares and touches our deepest fears. Near-term, it threatens to take away our jobs and leave us with no way to feed our families.

This is the fourth post in a series on privacy by Andrew Pery. You might also be interested in Privacy by Design: The Intersection of Law and Technology and What Do the GDPR and new Privacy Laws Mean for U.S. Companies? and Balancing Privacy Rights with Social Utility in the Age of the Internet of Things.

As a direct response to the Snowden revelations relating to the bulk collection of personal data by US intelligence the European Commission and the US Department of Commerce jointly developed a new framework purporting to considerably strengthen the protection of privacy rights of EU citizen data when such data is transferred to US data processors and controllers.  The previous regime under the Safe Harbor was invalidated by the European Court of Justice in Schrems v. Data Protection Authority which held that EU citizen’s privacy rights are at risk given the broad overreach by US public authorities.

Restoring certainly in trans-border data flows is of outmost priority for regulators on both sides of the Atlantic given that the transatlantic economies of the EU and the US are inextricably linked built on a digital backbone supporting virtually every facet of commerce.

The new Privacy Shield considerably strengthens the privacy rights of EU citizens relating to onward transfer of personal information.  Key provisions of the Privacy Shield require adherence to the core privacy principles of notice, choice, security, integrity, access, enforcement and accountability for onward transfer.

Perhaps the most important aspect of the Privacy Shield is more rigorous access, monitoring and enforcement mechanisms that were lacking in the Safe Harbor. According to the European Commission’s statement, “for the first time, the US has given the EU written assurance that the access of public authorities for law enforcement and national security will be subject to clear limitations, safeguards, and oversight mechanisms and has ruled out indiscriminate mass surveillance of European citizens’ data.” By virtue of these strengthened enforcement mechanisms, EU citizens will be able to:

Seek redress for alleged privacy rights against companies who are obliged to resolve such complaints within 45 days;

• Access to an Independent Dispute Resolution at no cost;
• Work through EU Data Protection Authorities who are empowered to work with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to ensure that EU citizen complaints are addressed and remedied; and
• Opt for arbitration should their complaints be not resolved through the independent Dispute Resolution mechanism

Perhaps one of most sensitive matters that the EU-US Privacy Shield is designed to remedy is the overreach by the US government in its bulk data collection practices: “the U.S. government has given the EU written assurance from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence that any access of public authorities for national security purposes will be subject to clear limitations, safeguards and oversight mechanisms, preventing generalised access to personal data.” Finally, to empower EU citizens to seek judicial standing, President Obama signed into law the Judicial Redress Act, which provides EU citizens the same protections under the Privacy Act as are available to US citizens.

However the fate of the Privacy Shield remains uncertain. The policy implications of the new US Administration are of concern to EU regulators.   The Privacy Shield framework is pending review by the Article 29 Working Party (WP29).  There are a number of submissions under consideration, including pending assurances from the new Administration as to their continued commitment to a more robust protection of EU citizen privacy rights.  This includes adherence to the provisions of the GDPR when it becomes enforceable in 2018. 

In the meantime, US entities that are transferring EU citizens personal information may do so by incorporating Binding Corporate Rules (BCR) or Model Corporate Clauses both of which require adherence to safeguarding EU privacy rights for onward transfer of EU citizen data.

The state of the cross border data flows remains unsettled although encouraging signs point to ratification.

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About the author:  Andrew Pery is a marketing executive with over 25 years of experience in the high technology sector focusing on content management and business process automation.  Currenly Andrew is CMO of Top Image Systems.  Andrew holds a Masters of Law degree with Distinction from Northwestern University is a Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP/C) and a Certified Information Professional (CIP/AIIM).