If you are storing a large number of documents in SharePoint, then I certainly hope the answer is yes. Here’s why. Content Types allows users to classify their documents as they’re being stored. So instead of having a bunch of documents in a Document Library (just like you might have in a shared drive on Continue reading

At the recent Microsoft Ignite event in Chicago, the keynote address on SharePoint revealed some interesting developments as Microsoft continues their mission of “reinventing productivity”. Not surprisingly, Microsoft’s focus is on moving from email workload to meeting demand for mobile productivity across devices and they had some big questions to answer in this keynote: would Continue reading

Enterprise Content Management started with a single objective:reduce the paper needed to run a business. Over the years, the goal grew more ambitious: to provide digital tools that manage all types of content across the enterprise. To accomplish this broader purpose, ECM solutions evolved in complexity to include the following content management functions:

Businesses and theorists are always trying to anticipate the next big thing. In his 1971 book Future Shock, futurist Alvin Toffler hypothesized how technology would change the way we work, theorizing we would exist in a constant state of shock due to the incredible speed of change. I’m not sure we live in constant shock, Continue reading

Where do you start when your organization decides to go paperless? You may be inclined to start building something right away, or your company may prefer to find a commercial off-the-shelf product. There are even some organizations that choose to hire a consultant to build it for them. But the best place to start is Continue reading

The broad adoption of Microsoft SharePoint provides an option for many IT departments to build a solution which was previously only available as a pre-packaged solution. But because they can, does that mean they should? If your organization is trying to decide whether to buy an ECM solution from a vendor, or build a custom Continue reading

UPDATE February 2015: Microsoft has listed FOSL (Forms on Sharepoint Lists) as cancelled on the Office365 roadmap. This was supposed to be one of the technologies used to replace InfoPath. At the same time on the Office Blog they officially announced that InfoPath Forms Services will be available in SharePoint 2016 on premise and supported Continue reading

A professional organization’s documentation should have branding consistency complimentary to the business workflow. Whether they’re purchase orders, invoices, pick-lists, reports or checks they are brand ambassadors for the organization, and they need to contain information that fits perfectly into the business’ processes. Bottomline Technologies’ Transform Designer and Transform Server are two programs that work in Continue reading

If your organization currently scans or downloads paper documents (e.g. Purchase Orders, Invoices, Student Health Records, Service Requests, etc.), and then manually types new information onto the forms before processing them, auto-populate is time-saving technology you need right now. Legacy ECM solutions that required users to manually type index values are being replaced with improved Continue reading