Boosting the value of SharePoint with ECM and document management

"Built-in, targeted ECM and document management functionality boosts the value of SharePoint as both a rich collaboration portal and a centralised document repository, which creates a better and more comprehensive platform for managing, searching and tracking all the content that exists across an organisation's ecosystem," says Vanessa Miller, Managing Director for VM Consulting, a firm specialising in document management and business process management solutions.

Commenting on a whitepaper recently released by M-Files, an award-winning ECM and document management solution, Miller adds: "For many organisations, it ultimately comes down to choosing between developing one's own custom document management capabilities in SharePoint, or employing a solution that augments and complements SharePoint with out-of-the-box features."

As SharePoint's growth has increased, most ECM and document management vendors have responded by offering some level of SharePoint connectivity. But for many organisations with specific and/or mandatory requirements related to document management, it takes much more than just connectivity to get the job done.

These businesses are turning to purpose-built solutions that offer deep integration of document and business process management functionality with SharePoint's collaborative capabilities. Furthermore, the specific features that purpose-built solutions can deliver - from compliance support to business process automation and intelligence - ensure that structured and unstructured data is uniformly stored, indexed, secured and available for routing, editing and tracking.

Having this functionality readily available out of the box can give an organisation the specific document management capabilities it requires right out the gate, without the need to invest in and wait for a custom solution. ECM and document management solution providers in the SharePoint market today are keenly aware of this need - especially those serving highly-regulated industries, such as pharmaceuticals and life sciences, manufacturing, financial, insurance and legal - where regulatory compliance is an essential part of the daily routine.

There are areas within every organisation, such as human resources or accounting, which deal with sensitive corporate data and have specialised documentation and information needs. An effective document management system will provide robust and easy-to-implement security measures and access permissions for such data, ensuring that policies and procedures are followed at every point in a document's life cycle.

Miller concludes: "Efficient document management can deliver dramatic gains in efficiency and productivity for your organisation, by improving the way you organise and manage your business documents, information and processes."

For a copy of the whitepaper, please visit www.vmcs.co.za or e-mail info@vmcs.co.za.