What is ECM Solutions?
ECM, or Enterprise Content Management Solutions is a consulting service that evaluates all costs associated with creating, moving, storing and retrieving documents in a workflow environment.
How would ECM benefit my Business?
In today’s economy, all companies are looking for ways to reduce operating costs. ECM Solutions help companies achieve these goals in a significant way. When it comes to the cost of documents, many only address small pieces of the puzzle that make up printing and copying costs. ECM captures and evaluates all pieces of the puzzle so you get the whole picture behind what it costs your business to produce and move documents.
How does ECM differ from a Managed Print Assessment (MPS)?
As shown in our flowchart, MPS only addresses a piece of the puzzle that makes up a company’s operational costs around document workflow. Most MPS assessments consist of a data collector agent (DCA) that is installed on your network and monitored over a 30 day period. DCA’s capture data such as; device type, pages printed/copied, color volume versus mono volume, serial number and IP address. That data is then compiled into a brief summary estimating your output costs with a solution to reduce it. Although most MPS assessments succeed in showing some cost savings they fail to address more important issues such as; how are devices being used, are there deficiencies in the workflow surrounding document creation, security vulnerabilities, and more. In some cases, an MPS solution ends up creating more workflow deficiencies in an already inefficient environment. Many companies aren’t sure how to address these inefficiencies. Most are content with the little savings they find from an MPS assessment, not realizing that their minimal hardcopy output savings created more costs by decreasing productivity among employees. ECM evaluates all costs surrounding the entire lifecycle of a document once it is created, while making sure to address productivity and workflow efficiency as well.
So how do I know if my company needs a Managed Print (MPS) Assessment
or an Enterprise content Management (ECM) Assessment?
Any company interested in reducing their operating costs should consider having a complete ECM assessment done. If the problems associated with increased print and copy costs in your environment are not properly addressed they will return. In other words, habits and philosophies need to be addressed in order for a true cost reduction strategy to be successful.
What changes are proposed in an ECM Assessment?
ECM assessments are not designed in such a way that the only way for your company to see a cost savings is by displacing all of your current hardware. ECM assessments look for ways to work with your current architecture,
displacing only inefficient, high cost output devices. In fact, many ECM assessments look for ways of introducing current technology that may be available on your current devices which are not being fully utilized.
In some cases, new software technologies are recommended for streamlining workflow efficiencies and reducing the production of hardcopy output. Whatever the case, a comprehensive step by step plan will be suggested that will allow your company to achieve its goals in a timely manner.
Our goal is to not only help you find improvements in workflow efficiency
and reduce operating costs, but to ensure your company does not slip back into the philosophies and habits that got you there in the first place.
