Enterprise Content Management: The Basic Building Blocks of ECM

Now that you’ve learned a bit about the three types of enterprise content management (ECM), know you’re searching for a transactional ECM solution, and identified the business pain you want to relieve, we can start discussing how best to get started with your ECM solution.

To get you started, we sat down with a few of Hyland Software’s product evangelists and subject matter experts and asked these ECM gurus to share their thoughts about five of the top foundational ECM building blocks. We wanted to know what those solutions are, why they’re foundational and how they best benefit a company.

A few things became clear as we chatted with these megaminds:

1. The most important concept to take away from this section of the ECM Business Solution Guide is that an enterprise content management solution doesn’t start its life enterprise-wide. In fact, it’s better if a company starts small and allows its ECM solution to grow with the needs of the organization.
2. Let the problem you’re trying to solve dictate the solution you choose. Don’t get mired in technological bells and whistles. Think about the needs of the company and then find a solution that adapts to the organization. Not the other way around.
3. One size does not fit all (see our note above about an ECM solution not starting enterprise-wide). But a good foundation will let your solution flourish across departments. Start departmental, show the ROI, and expand.

Here are six ways to start building your foundation:

• Business Process Management
• Document Imaging
• Document Management
• Records Management
Software Integrations
Workflow