The growth of e-mail is phenomenal. It incorporates nearly every aspect of doing business today. As a result, it has become crucial to consider and manage the lifecycle of corporate e-mail.
E-mail holds a company`s critical information. For the vast majority of organisations, e-mail is a key record of communication in business transactions flowing in, out of and within the company. Research groups suggest that e-mail usage is growing in excess of 40% per annum, as well as the fact that typically more than 60% of business-critical information is stored in e-mail systems.
SA has recently come into line with global e-policies and regulations via the new Electronic Communications and Transactions (ECT) Act. Corporate e-mail messages are now considered legal documents and it is therefore strategically imperative to have a well-structured archive strategy to backup, store and retrieve e-mail messages on demand.
Although e-mail is a valuable technology, the problem facing many organisations is that this explosion of e-mails is resulting in a management dilemma. On the one hand, costs are trying to be contained by reducing the number of e-mails stored, whereas on the other hand, regulatory compliance is forcing many organisations to retain many of the e-mails sent/received.
In addition, to keep disk storage down to acceptable levels, most user mailboxes have a quota, and with many attachments running into several megabytes, this quota is soon reached. To overcome this limitation, people create PSTs (personal storage files) on their workstation (or they spend unproductive time trying to manage their inbox). This brings with it several other more severe problems and risk for the organisation.
Ironically, the major obstacles to achieving these objectives are in fact the technical boundaries inherent in today`s outpaced e-mail systems, which were never designed to accommodate these large volumes of data for such extended periods. With a majority of business users relying on e-mail more than the telephone when it comes to business communications, an ever-increasing amount of critical information is passing through the company`s e-mail system. IT administrators are wasting several hours a week on e-mail administration, failures and recovering old messages for end-users who cannot recover the information on their own.
Businesses are realising they need to show that the content of e-mail systems is organised, managed and easily accessible to avoid risk and comply with regulatory requirements. This includes taking control of the intellectual property contained in e-mail systems and removing the use of PST files in the business environment.
"E-mail management: Managing e-mail as a business-critical messaging and information tool" is a two-day conference that will look at building a business case for e-mail management, the legal and security issues and the implementation of an all round information management system.
e-Mail Management
Managing e-Mail as a business critical messaging and information tool
28 - 29 July 2004, Park Hyatt, Johannesburg
Share
Editorial contacts