Document Management

For many organisations the biggest use of PCs and laptops, is the creation and maintenance of documents using Microsoft Word. As most authors recognise, documents often kept locally on PCs or specific sections of shared network storage. This frequently results in staff not being able to find documents or not using the right version of documents. The end result of thesse situations is that mistakes are made and documents are "re-invented".

Some organisations have attempted to devise policies and procedures to make effective use of the shared storage areas, by using naming standards and structured hierarchies of folders. By implementing such disciplines a number of problems can be reduced, but is an on-going challange as staff recruitment, the use of contractors and outsourced operations, means that there is a need for continual training and monitoring to encourage compliance.

Oracle ECM provides a repository solution to these challenges, by delivering the ability to store the documents in their native format and tag the files with metadata. It is through provision of easy facilities to interact with the repository authors can benefit from the functionality without encountering barriers to utilisation. The functionality of security, version control, notification of new versions through subscriptions, the easy allocation of metadata for criteria and full text searches, ensures that authors can obtain the benefits from the implementation of the repository.

As documents are the life blood for organisations they need protected like other assets, through the use of effective back-up and contingency plans. The Oracle ECM repository creates the potential for such plans to be realised by organisations.