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Digitization and innovation in companies

Written by Ana Canteli on June 17, 2022

Digitization allows organizations to benefit from new consumer trends and jump on the bandwagon of innovation, applicable from multiple points of view.

 Technological innovation can contribute to achieving ecological objectives, reducing paper consumption, facilitating labor conciliation, and retaining human capital, not to mention the usual benefits of cost reduction, the impact of human errors, increased efficiency, etc.

But before getting into the matter, we should clarify some concepts.

What is digitization?

It is the result of using new technologies and digital formats to pursue specific objectives: productivity improvement, introduction to new marketing channels, and the conquest of new sectors.

Digitization means, in turn, converting physical documents into digital format; for example, scanning paper documents to convert them into PDF files.

What is digital innovation?

It is using new technologies to solve existing problems in the company to improve business practices. They often represent a disruptive change in business management, but on the other hand, they help sustain the business in the long term.

What is digital transformation?

Digital transformation includes multiple digitization activities. It is a long and strategic process that results in an essential change in organizations. Digital innovation occurs on a comparatively smaller scale than digital transformation.

New technologies can drive more inclusive and sustainable growth by stimulating innovation, generating efficiencies, and improving services. They are also an important tool to help society face and recover from the health emergency that has affected all kinds of organizations globally.

For this reason, organizations are moving faster and faster toward digitization to generate value and improve the customer and employee experience. The digitization process has a direct impact on the business model. The goal is to make this structural change create value, provide new revenue, and improve the flow of communications and interactions. And if done right, the benefits will be felt inside and outside the company.

Apps are at the heart of digital transformation and efforts to improve the user experience. In this regard, information silos continue to be a significant barrier to creating an integrated flow of information throughout the entire entity, a problem many companies are victims of. In addition, all organizations are looking for ways to capitalize on the opportunities presented by the digital economy, which is why selecting the right digital tools affects their business model directly.

Document management in the digitizing process

Document management software is essential to creating an organization's transversal document management system. After all, organizations with a well-defined digital transformation strategy, even those that innovate when they have no choice, have a technological legacy that must be integrated to avoid silos, amortize old investments, respect contractual commitments, etc.

OpenKM, document management software, does not present any technological barrier to integrating with third-party applications. The documentation attached to the system and its complete API allow transparent and versatile integrations. The system can be used as a front-end or back-end, depending on the use case.

Among the resources included in the document management solution, a series of satellite applications, in continuous expansion, facilitate the execution of document management tasks. One of them is the OpenKM scanner station. We had already mentioned above that an example of essential digitization is the scanning of paper documents to convert them into digital files.

OpenKM helps to apply the company the ISO 32000-1 standard, Document Management- Electronic Document File Format -First part: PDF 1.7.

This standard recommends converting formats to PDF, especially those tending to obsolescence. The aim is conducive to the protection of information and access to documentation in the long term. Thanks to this standard, the practical and universal PDF format will also be available to all interested parties, both developers and end-users.

A durable format is a legal concept introduced by the European Union in 2007. It requires financial institutions, organizations in strategic sectors such as insurance, the health sector, telecommunications, and a durable document format that guarantees unalterable records and access to them after the client cooperates with a given institution.

Examples of documents and data that can be archived and made available to clients with a guarantee of their immutability:

• contracts for the provision of services.
• regulations, legal requirements, and price lists.
• invoices and settlements.
• accounting vouchers and inventory documents.
• transaction confirmations.

Creating automatisms, workflows, and streamlining the company's business processes are some advantages of digitization and innovation efforts.

Advantages of digitization and innovation

• Business process automation.
• Improvement in data analysis.
• Greater computer security.
• More means for collaboration and improved coordination of work teams.
• Leveraging new monetization models.

Throughout this digital transformation process, we must not lose sight of the human factor. Innovation is a beautiful word, but it can also be an intimidating concept. To facilitate the implementation and acceptance of OpenKM as part of the business innovation strategy, from OpenKM Academy, we offer online training services adapted to the profile of each group of users that will participate in the plan developed by the organization.