Capture is the oldest of the enterprise content management (ECM) technologies. No surprise that it’s still very much in use – most often as a means of “digitizing” the inbound paper documents that enter into an organization’s business processes.
In my last post, I looked at what makes for a good capture application. Right up there among the very best capture applications are those I’m calling administrative applications – the types of back-office applications that are common across most businesses: Accounting, Human Resources (HR), and Customer Service. But beyond this commonality, there’s also the face that these are functions that present a need for ECM applications in multiple areas: Accounting includes both Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable; HR includes functions such as recruitment, training, employee record-keeping, and benefit management; and Customer Service can include customer support, help desk, and technical support.
Contrast these administrative applications to what I call line-of-business (or LOB) capture applications. Examples would be capture applications for loan processing in financial services or claims processing applications in the insurance industry, where the underlying process the imaged documents enter is central to the organization’s bottom line.
The table below outlines some examples of applications in each of these back-office areas, along with the drivers and the capabilities required within each:
Administrative applications can be a good place for an organization to begin rolling out capture capabilities – before attempting to tackle the more business-critical LOB applications. The administrative applications offer moderate benefit, in the form of improved efficiencies and productivity – but at the same time they present relatively low risk. So if you’re rolling out capture, cut your teeth (and make your mistakes) on an administrative application first – because if you mess up AP or HR, your business won’t come crashing down. Then you can apply what you’ve learned to go after those higher-risk capture applications where the business benefits can really have an impact on the bottom line.
As the table suggests, these administrative applications have a range of application requirements. They range from standard out-of-the-box “capture, manage, distribute,” to more highly configured applications, where the imaged documents enter workflows and potentially the organization’s ERP system as well.
The one caveat: Administrative departments are cost centers. So to get funding for an administrative capture applications, you will have to demonstrate clear hard-dollar savings. But note that one major exception is risk reduction and compliance.