Our engineering team here at ColumbiaSoft met one-on-one with Microsoft’s top software, database, and network engineers at the Mountain View Technology Center recently in an architecture design summit.  This laid out the groundwork for a co-authored roadmap for the next generation of the Document Locator document management system.

The timing coincided perfectly with our efforts underway here at ColumbiaSoft to evaluate the technological underpinnings of Document Locator. New technology advancements in software development are making entirely new product solutions possible. To take advantage of these technologies, portions of Document Locator’s underlying architecture must be re-invented to support future application requirements.

As we build for the future, being able to work closely with Microsoft is invaluable because it provides an opportunity for the developers to share design ideas.  It’s this kind of engineer-to-engineer brainstorming that exposes details about existing development methodologies and techniques, while providing insight into future technologies that Microsoft is working on. 

Our next generation architecture will incorporate Microsoft’s technology supremacy, along with ColumbiaSoft’s document management expertise, to create a win-win for customers. The new architectural design takes into consideration handheld computing, distributed workforces, multilingual organizations, ever increasing security threats, scalability, cloud computing, and more.

Written by: Scott Zieg

Studies have shown that the average office worker uses as much as 10,000 sheets of paper a year. Where does all that paper go? It’s thrown away, filed away, shuffled among co-workers, and shipped around in slow, costly, delivery processes.  So, going paperless has some real advantages, and here is just a few examples…

First, it eliminates hard dollar costs. Not just the cost of paper itself, but things like storage and mailing, and the cost of using valuable office space for filing cabinets.

Paperless information can be searched and retrieved much faster, without leaving your desk. Filing and retrieval is reduced from minutes to seconds - a real productivity gain.

Plus, it’s easier to share information. Not just because files are electronic; A paperless system supports collaboration tools like check-in/check-out, document version control, email archiving, and remote access.

Even more, in a regulated environment, a paperless document management system reduces risk because you can find documents immediately, control access, and record history.

You can also automate business processes. Electronic notifications, document workflow, and approval steps can be used to automate everything from invoice approvals in accounting, to employee evaluations in Human resources.

Finally, there are advantages for business continuity. Digital documents are more easily backed-up, and can be made available quickly in the event of a disaster.

Together with our partner Kodak, ColumbiaSoft discussed and demonstrated some paperless benefits recently in a webinar that highlighted Kodak’s Capture Pro scanning software together with the Document Locator document management system. If interested in going paperless, you’re welcome to check out a recording of the seminar to learn more.

Written by: Jim Kemp

Successfully incorporating a document management system into your organization requires finding the right software, backed by the right people, to ensure the implementation is a success.  When searching for the right partner, expand your requirements beyond the immediate business objectives and ask the prospective vendor how they plan on serving your needs tomorrow as technology and business process change.

Solving tomorrow’s needs requires solution providers to work closely with customers and prospects alike in order to learn what’s working well for organizations and what potential solutions lay undiscovered in the document management sphere.  Equally as important, solution providers must have partnerships with mass-market software and hardware vendors such as Microsoft, Adobe, Autodesk, and Kodak in order to gain insight into future product directions.

As an established document management provider, ColumbiaSoft is uniquely positioned to work with its extensive customer base and software partnerships in formulating innovative product solutions.  The experiences of working closely with clients and partners are readily apparent in the latest generation of Document Locator.  The next release of Document Locator has been enhanced for increased performance, deeper integration in mainstream applications, and includes expanded features designed to help customers work more efficiently.

Enhancements to Document Locator v5.3 include:

1. Integration into Microsoft Windows 64-bit operating systems
2. Embedded Autodesk’s RealDWG technology for managing CAD files
3. Drag and drop support into Document Locator’s web client (WebTools)
4. Advanced .NET / JavaScript user interface updates for the web client (WebTools)
5. Improved Windows Installer installation packages6. Productivity improvements in the area of scanning, document approvals, records management, disaster recovery, document search, email archive, and more… 

Document Locator v5.3 beta is currently being trialed among existing customers to ensure success across varying deployments and industries, including AEC (architecture, engineering, and construction), government, insurance, consulting, and property management.  ColumbiaSoft is working closely with these beta customers to ensure the application is stable, user friendly, and most importantly is solving real business problems to benefit their organization.

Written by: Scott Zieg

In 1981, New Jersey CPA David Casey founded the Construction Financial Management Association (CFMA) to provide a forum for gathering and exchanging ideas as well to provide educational programs for construction finance professionals.  CFMA has since transformed from a small regional association into a national organization with over 7,000 members including general contractors, subcontractors, developers, construction managers, architects, engineers, and suppliers.

Each year CFMA hosts a conference and exhibition bringing together thousands of like-minded construction finance professionals for several days of education, sharing, and camaraderie.  The conference features educational classes through CFMA’s Schools of Learning in addition to showcased speakers and exhibit booths displaying the hottest products and technologies driving the industry forward.  This year’s CFMA 2009 Conference is being held May 16th through May 20th  at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas – the site of the original CFMA national conference in 1982.

A prevailing theme to this years’ CFMA conference is the need for builders to address the exponential growth in electronic and paper file management involved with construction.  Files include emails, invoices, drawings, insurance records, certification of completions, permits, and more.  The mountain of paperwork required for an average construction project can fill up an entire trailer.   Unfortunately this paperwork robs profits by consuming resources for filing documents, retrieving them, and storage costs.  It also exposes companies to the risk of eDiscovery litigation.

ColumbiaSoft is attending this year’s CFMA conference as an exhibitor demonstrating Document Locator, a paperless office solution for construction companies.  Paperless office solutions, also known as document management solutions, offer construction companies many capabilities.   Document Locator digitally archives paper documents, electronically stores them, and indexes them based on client-specified criteria, and has workflow automation.  In addition, paperless office solutions help facilitate disaster recovery planning and reduce the exposure associated with eDiscovery requests.

Paperless office solutions allow construction companies to amass a central repository containing all of the critical documents typically silo’d by departmental applications.  As an example, users outside of accounting could access all of the invoice documents related to their project without requiring access to the accounting software or directly contacting accounting with their requests.  This type of open collaboration between employees, vendors, and subcontractors provides substantial benefits to project team members allowing them real-time access to the information required to perform their tasks.  If you are interested in learning more about how paperless office solutions could benefit your construction company, please do not hesitate to stop by our booth at CFMA to learn more.

Written by: Scott Zieg

The idea of the paperless office was first theorized in a 1975 Business Week article that discussed how the personal computer revolution would put an end to paper records and book keeping.  Now, some thirty-four years later, while the type of information contained in paper form has changed, more than ever businesses are inundated with paper records.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and others report:

• The average office worker goes through 10,000 sheets of copy paper a year.
• A reduction in a ton of paper production saves the equivalent of 4,100 kWh of energy and 7,000 gallons of water.
• Each employee in a typical business office generates 1.5 lbs of waste paper per day.

Each year, businesses spend significant resources printing, filing, storing, and retrieving paper documents.  Every aspect of the paper storage process adversely impacts a business’ budget and the environment as a whole.  Some of the more obvious financial drawbacks of paper storage include purchasing paper, spending personnel resources filing and finding documents, increasing square footage for physical file storage, and recovering from disastrous flood or fire damage.

In addition to financial costs, the environmental impacts cannot be ignored.  The production process to produce paper stock requires harvesting trees, consumes significant energy leading to increased greenhouse gases, and involves chemicals that we weren’t allowed to touch in chemistry class.  Storing filing cabinets in your office consumes additional real estate which has associated heating/cooling requirements and more.

Now the good news: there is an alternative to using so much paper that reduces your carbon footprint.  Businesses now have affordable paperless office solutions that not only increase productivity, but also make any environmentalist green with envy.  So what are paperless office solutions you ask?

Paperless office solutions are business software applications designed for digitally storing documents into a repository.  Documents can include anything from invoices, to emails, to contracts, to health records - you name it.  As the documents are stored in the system, they are associated with index information referred to as metadata attributes.  The metadata indexes provide users a means to quickly query documents using a web browser or other client application and retrieve the documents electronically on the computer screen.

For many paperless office solutions, also known as a document management system, storing, indexing, and retrieving documents is one of numerous capabilities they offer an organization.  Additional functionality includes electronic routing of documents for approval, email archive, records retention management, document scanning, optical character recognition (OCR), online collaboration with vendors and suppliers, security, disaster recovery, reporting, and more.

To learn more about how a document management system offers companies a sustainable business alternative to paper-intensive processes, read up on our paperless office solutions. Also, we’ve recently been included in Construction Specification Institute’s new GreenFormat listing - it offers a fast-and-easy approach to evaluating green product information.

Written by: Scott Zieg

In these uncertain economic times, most companies are faced with the challenge of how to maximize returns on tighter margins. It’s a do-more-with-less strategy that requires business operations be optimized now to meet current economic realities.

One area to consider for improving the bottom line is to look at how information is managed in the organization. This includes all the content, things like documents, invoices, etc.; all the actions, things like reviews, and approvals; and all the processes, these are the repeatable steps that drive the flow of information. Improving how information is managed, the content, actions, and processes, will improve efficiency, reduce risk, and lead to cost savings.

There is another upside to consider with this as well… and it’s a silver lining. With any change comes opportunity, and the right kind of change now can position an organization for even greater success long term.

There are least seven ways that improvements in how information is managed can have an impact on the bottom line in terms of efficiency, risk and cost savings. These were outlined in a document control webinar we held recently, and are also highlighted in an ePaper.

Number 1: Find information, Instantly
Number 2: Automate business processes
Number 3: Improve collaboration
Number 4: Capture a record of every change.
Number 5: Reduce the risk of email.
Number 6: Maintain compliance with regulations
Number 7: Eliminate paper storage costs and go Paperless.

Check out our document control webinar and request a copy of our Silver Lining ePaper to get more details on each.

Written by: Jim Kemp

Are you grappling with how to automate document version control?

We’re all familiar with this scenario: There’s an important document with a critical deadline that has to be worked on by a group of people. Round and round the document goes, often by email, with edits written over edits. And… as the document progresses through stages, each person appends the file name to indicate their own ad-hoc, individualized versioning scheme. File names like “CustomerRFP-Sally-version 5-June7-DRAFT.doc” start to appear. In the end, it’s impossible to retreive prior versions (stored on individuals’ computers), and it’s a nightmare to assemble all the changes.

This is just one example where automated version control can save the day. There are many others, and we’ll touch on them all in a 20-minute webinar on January 22 called Managing Document Versions - Organizing chaos with a record of every change.

We’ll talk about how standardized version control software improves productivity and collaboration by eliminating ad-hoc and individualized versioning schemes; how document versioning increases accountability by logging information as it changes over time; and how version control reduces information loss and the need to duplicate or recreate information content.

Learn more and register for the webinar on Managing Document Versions.

Written by: Jim Kemp

I hope everyone had a fabulous holiday break!  Here in Portland we were blessed (some might choose other adjectives) with a white Christmas.  Portland typically has a very temperate climate thanks to its proximity to the ocean, however this December we were inundated with snow.  The winter blast provided the local kids with some reprieve from school and wreaked havoc on those last minute holiday shoppers who were trapped by the impassible roads.

For those of us lucky enough to return to work after new years, the calm and relaxation of vacation came to a grinding halt on Monday morning.  What is different returning to work in 2009, as compared with last year, is the slowing economy.  Many employees find themselves conflicted about their jobs.  On the one hand they are grateful for gainful employment while on the other hand they are being stretched by increased workloads caused by companies downsizing their workforce or by freezing necessary employee hiring.

When you are being asked to increase your workload beyond what is reasonable to accomplish during the 8 hour work day, lots of things come to mind.  Once the expletives subside, you can hear yourself asking “how do I work smarter, not harder?”  Conceptually we all know what that means, but how would I do that? Sometimes it is truly difficult for a person who is trying to juggle numerous tasks, interruptions, emails, meetings, and more to step back and truly self-examine how to work smarter.

Some of the more popular recommendations for improving your productivity are to:

• Read email at scheduled times only.  Be sure to close Outlook completely to avoid being interrupted each time a new email arrives.
• Keep detailed task lists indicating what needs completed today, this week, etc.
• Block out time on your calendar to work on larger tasks so you have uninterrupted time to make headway.

In addition to streamlining your schedule, there are ways to work smarter around the documents you create and consume on a daily basis.  For example, how many times have you cringed when you realize the document you want to work on fell off Microsoft’s most recent list – What did I call that thing?  Below are productivity benefits companies realize after implementing a quality document management system.

• Version Control – Eliminate needlessly comparing and merging documents with various extension names attempting to create a new master version of the document.
• Index Searches – Quickly retrieve documents by searching against indexed information including document type, due date, client name, and more.
• Approvals and Notifications – Automatically route documents for electronic review, digital approval, and digital signatures using a robust workflow engine.
• Scanning Paper Documents – Eliminate needless walks to and from as well as rifling through filing cabinets by having your paper documents digitally archived and accessible from every computer in the office.

These represent only a handful of the possible benefits derived by implementing an enterprise document management system.  With the ever increasing demands being placed on employees, providing them the necessary tools to handle the workload will goes miles towards improving employee morale and allows resources to focus on your business’ core competency.

Written by: Scott Zieg

With so much being said lately about all the more flashy benefits of document control, it’s worth remembering one of the more mundane aspects of our digital bandwagon: electronic filing offers some great business values.

About one half of us business people spend about 2 hours of our day just trying to locate the information we need to do our job. (The other half spend 2 hours per day playing golf). Electronic filing systems make the job easier, and make business people more productive. Just imagine playing a 2-hour golf game in 5 minutes. This would leave an extra 115 minutes per day to get more work done!

Document retrieval is just one example where electronic filing systems lend a boost. How? Because files placed in document storage are immediately indexed and profiled with metadata. Information can be instantly retrieved with a simple search on the keyboard. Gone are the days of getting up to search for records in a filing cabinet or requesting files from an off-site storage warehouse. What took hours (or days, even, in the case of off-site storage), suddenly becomes minutes.

Written by: Jim Kemp

For everyone who missed us at the Autodesk University conference last week, I will be hosting a 20-minute demonstration next week online of our latest CAD integration with Document Locator.

You can register for the WebEx here:
https://columbiasoft.webex.com/columbiasoft/onstage/g.php?t=a&d=573524547

I will be covering Document Locator’s unique ability in the area of project file management.  This is the combined management of CAD files along with all the project documents, emails, and virtually any other type of electronic files organized within a single document management system. The benefits include a unified way to approach the organization of related project information that increases re-use, reduces the amount of information lost or duplicated, and improves efficiency.

I hope you can join me next Thursday, December 18 at 10:30 AM PST > REGISTER <

Written by: Scott Zieg