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1 BCS CMSG Conference 2003

Implementing CM Everywhere, Change, Configuration & Content Management

Content Management Challenge

Where it began
The mid eighties saw the arrival of the first Electronic Document Management System in the
form of document image processing - DIP. The concept was simple enough: take the innards
out of a fax machine, plug them into the latest in new technology at the time (a personal
computer with a hard disk), and the result is a whole new technology that can capture and
store paper electronically. Was this the new killer application that everyone was waiting for
and the creation of the paper-less office.
Of course, things didnt go quite to plan. With a 10 megabyte magnetic disk representing
state of the art technology, and with compression techniques delivering at best a 50 kilobyte
image, a storage capacity of around 200 images per PC was hardly something to write home
about. And sadly the user failed to be impressed by the salesmans suggestion that his
10,000 image computer was a viable replacement for a 10p manila folder.
Then came the optical disk cost efficient storage at last. There were still some challenges of
course. There was no DOS filing system for an optical disk, so images needed indexing via
a separate database that could point to their physical location on the optical platter. And
retrieval was painfully slow, so the idea of pre-planning work, and pre-fetching images
overnight onto magnetic storage, was spawned - an idea that was later to be badged as
workflow.
People then started to query the time being wasted by users, busy printing their word
documents and spreadsheets, and scanning them as images onto the DIP system. Why not
save them direct to the system, in their native format? And all of a sudden, this random series
of developments became a business solution document management.

Document management
Document management systems (EDMS) opened up new opportunities. Consider a human
resource - HR system. Should personnel files be stored by employee number; by name; by
job application number; by name within department; by employee number within location? It
no longer matters the user can search on whatever criteria are selected, in effect creating the
filing sequence at retrieval time. Whether the user needs to retrieve the full employee file for
person X, or all job applications received in the last two weeks in department Y, or all salary
review letters for the people working for manager Z, retrieval is just as fast in each case.
And because multiple objects can be grouped dynamically, the concept of containers evolved.
A container can hold content generated from multiple sources (compound document);
different versions of the same document (version control); documents that needed to be kept
together for processing purposes (case management or workflow); and it represents an entity
which can be tracked (audit trail) and made secure (access control) in its own right - for legal
admissibility reasons, or for long-term retention and disposition.
Document management systems, often in conjunction with workflow, have become vital
components in many large scale operations. Claims processing applications are an obvious
example, for efficient handling of all the documents which make up a case; claims forms,
correspondence, independent reports and surveys, calculations, procedural guidelines and
regulatory constraints. In life insurance and mortgage loan applications (characterised by an
intense paper chase at set up and then at maturity, separated by perhaps twenty five years of
sitting back while the direct debits roll in), document management can help deliver real
competitive edge.

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24 and 25 of June 2003, Martin Waldron -1-
Homerton College, Cambridge UK
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1 BCS CMSG Conference 2003
Implementing CM Everywhere, Change, Configuration & Content Management

Content Management
In recent years, document management systems have evolved into content management.
While some vendors achieved this amazing transformation simply by rebadging their
products, most have developed genuine added value capabilities that enable further business
opportunities to be exploited.
Put simply, document management is concerned with the external classification of a
document; the index fields and keywords chosen to describe it, and its relationship to other
documents. Content management goes further by taking into account the internal content of
the document, and the metadata associated with it author, date and time of creation, context
etc.
Content management covers a broad spectrum. Many of the attributes of a knowledge
management system full text retrieval, expert search, fuzzy logic searching can also be
applied to content management. A query regarding jewellery lost in a shipwreck? search for
all documents containing Titanic AND diamond. Has anyone else in the organisation
carried out research on asbestosis perhaps confidential research? request an expert search
on asbestos and review the names presented.
Forms capture applications are an obvious use of content, in fact the capture of the form
itself may be only a by-product of the content extraction process. Powerful contextual
verification processes have made such capture operations highly accurate, for example
comparing daily times against the weekly total on a timesheet, check digit verification on a
reference number, or cross matching an address against the post code entered
Increasingly, content management is used in applications that enable information to be re-
purposed. How many organisations, for example, want to develop a new proposal from
scratch these days? At worse, the proposal will start from a template that describes the
standard layout and as much standard wording as possible. At best, an existing proposal can
simply be re-titled (client name, dates, locations etc) in order to provide an immediate first
draft. That draft can then be circulated to relevant people, who can focus on ensuring the
content is right for the job, rather than worrying about layout and similar. Nor should the
creator of the draft proposal be unduly concerned about deciding on access rights; viewer,
reviewer, editor, authoriser and publisher, since these rights can be automatically defined as
part of the creation process. Retention periods, disposal schedules and other attributes can be
automatically assigned at the same time.
The ultimate expression of this approach is to be found with XML. An XML document
contains all of its own embedded rules for style and layout; content is indeed king. An XML
form, for example, can be downloaded via the web for offline completion, with all the rules
for verification, and drop-down lists for appropriate responses, embedded within the form. On
resubmission of the form, the content is easily extracted for further processing while the form
itself is stored in the document repository. Since its format is vendor and system independent,
it can be retrieved by any system and by any application supporting XML; a line of business
application, a word processor, or a thin client browser.
Equally, a proposal developed in XML can contain its own embedded rules; if the costs and
benefits section is missing, this can be flagged and the author prevented from forwarding the
proposal until incorporated, avoiding delay and rework. Nor is the author concerned about
whether chapter headings should be in times roman or arial font; XML does the work.

Web Content Management

Ovum describe web content management as a set of tasks and processes for managing
content explicitly targeted for publication on the Web throughout its life from creation to
archive. In other words, its enterprise content management, but for the web.

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24 and 25 of June 2003, Martin Waldron -2-
Homerton College, Cambridge UK
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1 BCS CMSG Conference 2003
Implementing CM Everywhere, Change, Configuration & Content Management
The web has a number of particularities. Publishing to the web, whether intranet, internet or
extranet, can be as simple as moving a document from one location on a file s erver to another,
at which point it is on view to the entire world, as an official pronouncement of your
organisation. It is highly dynamic; publishing a new price list automatically supercedes any
previous issue. So if you get it wrong, you do so big time.
That is of course, if it gets read. You can judge how many people pick up your brochure at a
show or a point of sale kiosk by the demand for refills but how many people read your
website? And if they do get to your website, can they get to the page you want them to read?
What do you do if the customer responded to the offer of free delivery, on which the time
limit was simply a revised page which no longer made the offer?

Dont forget email

Email is a wonderful thing. Its informal, just like the telephone, casually read and casually
deleted. Unfortunately, a sequence of emails may be the only evidence to justify a particular
decision or course of action, whose loss may have serious implications; either legally, or for
organisations seeking to comply with Freedom of Information. It may be email, but it is still
content, it is still valuable, and it is still just an electronic object that can be stored in a content
management system along with all other content. Some individuals develop their own email
strategy. They print them all off, and then scan them into their EDM.

Enterprise Content Management

Despite the success of content management strategies adopted in part by operational area or
function eg Forms Capture many organisations have still tended to regard it as a back office
activity not as something that contributes to the bottom line. Organisations have to widen
their brief for content management and address what is being referred to as Enterprise
Content Management (ECM).
AIIM describes ECM as the creation, capture, delivery, customisation and management of
content across an enterprise. Gartner broadens this definition to include archive the point at
which the content ceases to be accurate or valid and destroy, for example in accordance
with schedules indicated by the Data Protection Act.
It represents the glue between the front office whether that is a WAP phone, a web
browser, a call centre or a point of sale kiosk and the back office, the people and
applications that will turn that initial query into a promise fulfilment. Put another way, theres
a flood of information hurtling towards you and ECM is a way of channelling it.
Nor is it all coming at you some is coming from you. You produce content internally that
needs to be reviewed, approved, collated, circulated, recycled, stored and ultimately disposed
of. You generate bills, statements and other customer information that you need to retain
perhaps in the same format as you published it, which could be on paper, as an email, a PDF
document or as a text message to a mobile phone.
Companies currently taking their first steps into electronic services delivery and developing
EDMS and Workflow systems may find ECM daunting prospect. This was the reaction of
organisations as they moved from DIP to EDMS in the nineties. The message has to be as
your develop your information strategy make sure you that you retain a wide vision that
enables you to embrace key elements of ECM in your planning.

Martin Waldron
Managing Partner

In-Form Consult Ltd

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24 and 25 of June 2003, Martin Waldron -3-
Homerton College, Cambridge UK
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1 BCS CMSG Conference 2003
Implementing CM Everywhere, Change, Configuration & Content Management
Weathervane House
Oldshire Lane
Chorleywood
Herts, WD3 5PW

Tel: +44 (0)1923 283694

Mob: +44 (0)7976 359161

e-mail martin.waldron@inform-consult.com

In-Form Consult is an independent information & content management consultancy group

that provides a range of services to support an organisation in the design, planning,
development and implementation of e-business, electronic record/document/content
management and work management systems. Our clients include companies in financial
services, banking, government, local authorities, health and the services sector.

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24 and 25 of June 2003, Martin Waldron -4-
Homerton College, Cambridge UK