DOCUMENT Magazine - April 2008 - (Page 12)

Step 1: Engage Librarians and Records Managers A common characteristic shared by many enterprises that are more satisﬁed with their ECM endeavors was the inclusion of nontraditional IT resources in ECM strategy teams. Corporate librarians and records managers were key members of these teams, as they: >> Better understand how the business uses content. Having historically been responsible for ﬁnding and gathering information for businesspeople, corporate librarians (sometimes referred to as knowledge managers, taxonomists or research specialists) have a good working knowledge of the content used by different roles in the organization. In addition, records managers often have direct knowledge of what content — speciﬁcally corporate records — gets produced and used by people and business processes. >> Have connections with important business subject matter experts. “The [corporate librarian] knew exactly who we needed to talk to,” claimed one IT program manager at a life sciences ﬁrm. Historically, corporate librarians and records managers have been in operational roles supporting lines of business and other corporate functions, such as marketing, ﬁnance and research and development (R&D). As a result, they often know which subject matter experts the ECM teams should engage to understand business context for speciﬁc roles and business processes. supporting different brands knew exactly how the use of content would affect speciﬁc business objectives. Step 3: Identify Content Attributes and Questions Best Suited to Your Organization Organizations we’ve spoken to and worked with used questions covering a combination of six different content attributes to help them understand business context. Step 4: Take an Objective, Data-Driven Approach to Gathering Business Context ECM project teams should engage in a formal process of gathering input from identiﬁed subject matter experts throughout the organization. The goal is to develop a broad yet data-driven view of the varying business context for content, organized by line of business, business function and, most important, by role, such as R&D manager, program manager, researcher and engineer. Organizations have taken two approaches to gathering business context from subject matter experts: >> Informal surveys help target large audiences but may not uncover ﬁner points. Web-based surveys or forms can be used to help gather business context from subject matter experts or larger audiences. These tools can provide a quick way to gather data from large populations, but because of their informal nature, they may limit an ECM team’s ability to uncover the ﬁner points associated with the organization’s ECM needs. >> Formal interviews take more time but lead to qualitative ﬁndings. Interviewing subject matter experts to uncover business context can take 30 minutes to more than an hour. Larger organizations with numerous subject matter experts knowledgeable about speciﬁc roles and business processes could face weeks of interviews; however, interviews do allow ECM teams to ask more probing questions to better understand the business context of a role. Often, interviews are done in group settings to speed the process. Step 2: Identify Business Operations Subject Matter Experts, and Focus on Roles Teams responsible for developing ECM strategies and implementations must have sponsorship from senior leadership. But senior leadership often doesn’t have enough direct knowledge of what their people do or which processes they participate in to help I&KM pros deﬁne effective ECM strategies. Instead, I&KM pros should seek out the subject matter experts that businesspeople, in their various roles, rely on to get their jobs done. These subject matter experts often: >> Work in an operations capacity. Many of the ECM team members we’ve interviewed worked with people in sales operations, marketing operations, HR operations and other operational positions to understand how different businesspeople and processes manage and use content. Directors and managers in these operational positions provided ECM teams with important insight into how businesspeople in lines of business and/or functions work with content. >> Have a working knowledge of the content technology in use by different roles. People in these operational positions also had a good understanding of which tools and technologies businesspeople use. They can often describe the technology’s use by role, such as sales manager, account manager and sales support, in a direct sales organization. More importantly, the subject matter experts often understand the shortcomings of the tools in use and know if businesspeople would be willing to change what they’re doing as a part of an ECM implementation. >> Understand how the better use of content will impact business objectives. People in operational roles understand what makes a particular line of business, department or function tick. With that knowledge also comes a good understanding of how better use of content can help the organization achieve its objectives. For example, according to an IT director at a consumer packaged goods company, a line of business VP understood the importance of content, but the directors in marketing operations 12 document april.08 www.DOCUMENTmedia.com Step 5: Segment Businesspeople’s ECM Needs Based on Gathered Input While the content needs of different roles, lines of businesses and functions may vary, they are not all unique. Analyzing collected information for similarities across roles, for example, will help ECM teams develop a model that places different roles in the enterprise into segments that share common characteristics. The more diverse an organization’s roles, lines of business and functions are, the greater the number of segments they may identify. Example segments include research and advisory roles, outreach roles, ﬁeld roles and administrative roles that all create, manage and use content differently. Step 6: Identify the ECM Technologies Needed to Address Segmented Business Needs After completing the segmentation exercise, ECM teams can more conﬁdently identify, from the superset of the transactional, business and persuasive ECM technologies in the market, what would be appropriate to help address each segment’s business context. This step helps I&KM pros look beyond core ECM technologies — such as document imaging, document management, WCM, records management and content archiving — and take into consideration other technologies that help address business context. This step also helps ECM teams avoid missteps, such as assuming that an employee portal based on document management will be used by businesspeople that http://www.DOCUMENTmedia.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Document Magazine - April 2008

Document Magazine - April 2008 Contents Editor's View The Research Desk The Response Center BPM: Improving the Way You Process Contributing Writers Mapping Out Performance Build the Context Before You Move into the House of ECM Taking On the Big 3 The Human Connection Addressing Your Addresses Don't Call Us, We'll Call You The Mulitplying Image Recognizing Accuracy New Products Calendar Advertisers

Document Magazine - April 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.