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5 Misconceptions about Document Management Softwares

Written by Ben Rowner, OpenKM USA staff member on April 30, 2020

What will the corporate world look like ten years from now?

How about one year from now?

It is vastly difficult to accurately forecast what will happen with the business world after the COVID-19 pandemic. We have all been taken in by a prediction myth at some point or another. It is essential, particularly in these difficult times, to root our knowledge, and create educated guesses so the choices we make now have a proper impact on our economic future.

How Electronic Document Management Systems fit in the modern corporate world

The pace of changes made to small and big enterprises in the first trimester of 2020 is astounding, and due to the COVID-19 pandemic, companies across all industries have raised and fallen in the light of the new corporate landscape. It’s not a surprise that a large amount of these companies have been looking for ways to incorporate their assets digitally, starting telecommuting practices and looking forward to using document management systems to keep their businesses up and running.

This guide aims to clear up some common misconceptions about document management in the modern corporate world and to show just how beneficial it can be for business owners to implement a document management software. So here are the top five myths about digital document management systems:

1. Transition hassle

Upgrading a company to a paperless office will necessary imply switching some office procedures. Even though it can be a significant change in the workflow, it usually doesn’t take long for a company to get a hold of the new procedures and embrace the changes due to the direct benefits the upgrade to digital document management provides.

The most prominent procedures to be implemented would have to be the document scanning, the process automation setup, and finally, the employee training.

All of these procedures can be done efficiently through the help of a reliable document management software provider like OpenKM. Their estimated time-consumption can be debunked by comparing it to daily problems paper-based companies face, or even companies who have transitioned to digital files but do not hold document management systems.

These companies may overlook the moments they spent looking into hundreds of digital folders, searching for specific emails in a disorganized and bulked inbox, or even getting multiple signatures from different teams within an enterprise.

2. Upgrade cost and hidden fees

Purchasing a Document Management Software may be costly, depending on your needs. Still, this cost is not comparable to the cost of maintaining tones of paper, printers, photocopiers, office supplies, and money invested in fixing the same equipment.

The expenses paper-based companies face concerning associated costs, added to the time spent on daily drawbacks like the ones stated before, can become a significant hidden expense.

Purchasing a solution for digitalizing documents might cost only a reduced amount of money if the user customizes the plan to ensure he is only paying for the services he needs.

3. Technical support issues

Training may be necessary for some employees for them to adequately ensure compliance and get a hold of the document workflows, but this doesn’t mean you need to create a full new department in your company.

One of the misconceptions some old-fashioned companies have is to think they will need to invest more in the system than they are spending to keep their current operations style. The “if not broken, why fix it?” mentality is usually established by overlooking some current liabilities.

Companies transitioning to electronic document management systems do need some training. Still, the provider will guide you through them. The best document management systems offer extensive customer support by phone, email, ticket, or live chat, usually paired with webinars, forums, and online documentation to ensure compliance of all the procedures you need.

4. Information security risks

The increased ability to share information needs to be paired with enhanced security, and that’s something we should all be concerned about before settling with a DMS provider.

It’s understandable to think all digital files possess a high-security risk when seeing all of the usual news about data breaches and their legal repercussions. These risks may exist unless adequate measures are put in place.

Document Management Systems provide you with custom settings to fulfil industry regulations, ethical policies, and compliance regulations to protect you against hacks, which may lead to confidential company information being leaked without consent.

The risk benefits also come in the form of regulatory frameworks to manage all legal issues of each area that makes up your company while providing disaster recovery options.

5. Lack of storage

One of the most common misconceptions is to think that a cloud storage system is primarily designed for small and medium businesses and only certain types of large enterprises with lower storage requirements for storing documents of different media types.

When hiring the right DMS provider, you can request to implement extended functionalities, various add-ons, custom apps, and even custom amounts of storage for enterprises that deal with large amounts of audiovisual documents with a wide variety of formats such as audio or video documents.
These processes allow you to enable different repositories locations and backups, so your company keeps its efficiency and efficacy without losing its ability to recover from document disasters.

Takeaway

At first glance, it might seem more convenient and less expensive to stay with a paper-based company. Still, once you start to consider it as a multi-factor scenario, you will understand that the upsides of a digital management solution go beyond savings in money. The benefits extend to enhanced document security, storage, accuracy, and allow you to automate simple processes to improve your business efficiency.

For most companies, sooner or later, it will be better to invest in either proprietary software or a cloud storage system, and the advantages of being ahead of the industry are yet to be measured.

To sum up, you shouldn’t worry about not finding a proper document management solution for your operations. Before you find yourself reluctant to find a better deal for upgrading your document handling, often for no reason at all, it is a good idea is to consult with a specialist who can correctly assess what would be the best digital file cabinet settings for your enterprise.