TakingAIIM

Thought Leaders Meet at ECM Writers Summit

What a great week for ECM, Enterprise 2.0, SaaS and me.

Looking back on the past week, I have to say the ECM techno-geek side of me is smiling.  As I posted earlier, the week stated off with participating in a AIIM New England chapter event that included a panel of users that have adopted a SaaS model to ECM.  As if that wasn’t enough fun and education, the week ended with my moderating and participating in a thought leadership writer’s summit on SaaS & cloud computing, SOA & BPM, Social Computing & ECM, and Text Analytics.

The event was sponsored by EMC.  I again thank them for inviting me to co-host this summit. Some of the brightest strategists and technologists from EMC were there including Howard Shao, Mark Lewis, Whitney Tidmarsh, Razmik Abnous, Michael Hackney, Matt Coblentz,   and Lubor Ptacek.  More importantly, we were joined by a variety of ECM industry thought leaders including Nathaniel Palmer, Barclay Blair, David DeLong, Margie Semilof, Mary Cohodas, Geoff Bock, Bill Trippe, Vincent Berdot, Stephen Cameron, Christian Daems, Christos Varelas, Ron Miller and Beth Pariseau (see her post on this event).  (I apologize for he inevitable omission of others who were there, whose name I fail to recall at the moment.)

Well, as you can imagine, with such a crowd, the discussion of was lively and full of opinion (sometimes agreeing and sometimes differing.) The purpose of this post is to provide my recollection of the key points that came for the discussion.

Despite the variety of topics (SaaS & cloud computing, SOA & BPM, Social Computing & ECM, and Text Analytics), discussion almost always came back to a basic value proposition for ECM, striking a balance between increased access/collaboration, and content governance and security. (See the AIIM Market IQ on Content Security for more on this idea, and a post by summit participant Ron Miller.) Terms frequently uttered in discussion included mobility, social networks, collaboration, agility, flexibility, e-discovery, compliance and risk. Collectively these seem to represent the potential benefits associated with ECM.

ECM was frequently discussed not as a technology, or a single implementation, but as a platform, a competency that should be available across the entire enterprise. In this regard, the group often reiterated that solution providers and pundits of ECM all too often talk in terms of unstructured content, and that this is wrong.  ECM is about all forms of content – and therefore should provide a single integrated interface to the unstructured content (e.g. documents), as well as structured content (e.g. databases associated with ERP and payroll systems.)  Too much focus has been paid to the unstructured content separately and distinctly from the structured.

This single interface was extended to the concept of enterprise search.  We discussed that enterprise search has erroneously been discussed in the market far too often as a product.  The often touted single enterprise master taxonomy and search tool is not most effective.  In reality effective search across the enterprise will likely involve multiple search tools, taxonomies, relevancy rankings, etc., each finely tailored and tuned to specific content and use cases, but presented and managed as a single interface to the user.  The group agreed that this requires great complexity on the part of IT, but that complexity can and needs to be hidden for the user.   

We all acknowledged that the rules of publishing have changed.  On the positive side this has allowed faster and more wide scale dissemination of knowledge and experience.  On the other, this has created a demand for new approaches to demonstrate reliability and trust in “discovered” content.

Similarly, the long tail of electronic content (compared to the much shorter tail of paper content), necessitates more powerful approaches to management, retention, and findability.  Without it enterprise content can quickly become chaotic and/or grossly under utilized.

In this regard, Matt Coblentz of EMC proposed that “Content is Stupid”.  The group agreed, (or at least some did), with the addition that Content Management is intelligent.

We thought that overall culture was ahead of technology with regards to collaboration, but behind technology with regards to security and compliance.   

Some of us saw ECM in a state of evolution, progressively increasing functionality and ease of use over time.  Others argued that the advent of functionality such as SaaS and Enterprise 2.0 represents a hockey stick inflection point for the industry, that will be viewed as a revolutionary point in the market in time to come.

I for one walked away with a sense that ECM is once again a very exciting marketplace.  Ron Miller reminded us, that in his review of the AIIM 2008 show, he had indicated that the show was buzzing with excitement.

With that, the realm of ECM has become increasingly complex.  ECM is not just about technology, nor just about content.  The ECM practitioner MUST be concerned and involved in people, process and content (EMC’s words), or content, community and context (my words.) This is what keeps this market place alive and vibrant.  This is what affords careers and debates that go far beyond technology alone.

On a final note, I will share a light moment. To a large degree there was much reaffirming among this  group, as opposed to learning. There were some exceptions. Two new technologies were introduced:  “blockies and wigs.”  These terms were coined by one of the speakers in a slip of the tongue in his excitement over the power of “wikis and blogs”.  We all got a good laugh out of it. OK – maybe you had to be there, or maybe you just aren’t ECM-geeky enough.

aiimALERT: HP climbs Tower to ECM; Stops Short of Top Floor

Yesterday HP and Tower Software announced a pre-bid agreement for HP to acquire Tower. (See press release.)

The independent/standalone ECM solution market got 1 vendor less with this acquisition, leaving this segment of the market extremely lean.  Are Interwoven and Open Text the only two top tier players left alone (belles of the ball or wall flowers?).

OK, that aside, what does this mean specifically for HP and Tower?  According to the press release, " The acquisition of Tower will add electronic records management to HP Software’s existing e-discovery and compliance capabilities in information collection and retention."  No argument there, nothing very new there either.  Under an pre-existing agreement, Tower TRIM Context was already integrated with the HP Integrated Archive Platform, providing records management within the compliance archiving platform. 

Although Tower has consistently touted its records management capabilities, it did so within a full ECM suite, that includes functionality such as workflow, document management, e-mail management, document assembly, web content management and, to a certain degree, collaboration (i.e. a small step into the Enterprise 2.0 arena). 

There is more potential to this acquisition than HP is touting in the release. Are they being near-sighted based on the previous partner relationship?  It would behoove HP to re-assess the value of this acquisition and perhaps position these new capabilities beyond records management, e-discovery and compliance, into the realm of a full fledged ECM platform offering from a systems and hardware provider, putting them head-to-head with the likes of IBM and EMC.

aiimALERT: Open Source Players Join to Close Functional Gap

Yesterday Intalio, Inc. an Open Source BPMS company, announced a partnership with Alfresco Software, an Open Source  Enterprise Content Management (ECM) company. The integrated offering allows users to manage  document-centric workflow processes and support the collaborative development of business processes. (See details.)

Despite its age the ECM market is ripe with new beginnings.  As readers of the blog know, I am wrapping up the Market IQ on Enterprise 2.0 (register for 3/27 webinar).  Major themes of this topic include collaboration, low-barrier application development and open business models.  Part of the report looks at the intersection of Enterprise 2.0 and ECM.   Although with a slightly different perspective, this announcement by Inatlio and Alfresco does the same thing.

Alfreso provides an Open Source approach to ECM.  With the integration of Intalio, an Open Source workflow offering the ECM platform is far more complete.   But, even more fascinating to me is the fact that the integration effort was undertaken by  the Demand Driven Development (D3) model introduced by Intalio in 2006, an Enterprise 2.0 approach to development in and of itself.

There is great synergy in this simple announcement on many plateaus.  Open Source and SaaS represent new models to implementing ECM in an enterprise.  Enterprise 2.0 offers new ways to support and facilitate collaboration in an enterprise, as part of an ECM strategy.  And here the twain doth meet.  These are all industry trends that AIIM must, and will continue to monitor. 

The ECM market is anything but dull.

Targeting ECM On Ramps & BPM, Yeah I Guess We Should

Its that time of the year when we, AIIM Market Intelligence, finalize our editorial calendar for 2008.  Key among this is selection of topics for the Market IQs.  We have targeted Enterprise 2.0, Findability, BPM - Process Efficiency and Outsourcing, and On Ramps and Off Ramps to ECM (i.e. authoring, capturing, and distribution).  Today, we began to double-guess ourselves, especially concerning BPM - Process Efficiency & Outsourcing, and On Ramps and Off Ramps (capture authoring/distribution). Have these topics been covered enough already?  Has enough changed in related technologies and best practices to warrant another look?  Is there still a need to enlighten users?

Once again serendipity came to the rescue and provided the answer.  Both Dan Keldsen and I were also under deadline today to provide  speaker verification and AV requirements for a trade show (that shall remain nameless to protect the innocent - but it should be noted that the show is highly ECM-focused) we are both speaking at next year.

The degree to which the process and the document creation/capture were flawed was unbelievable.  First, we noticed that they required us to print out the form and sign it and then fax it back.  A simple speaker verification form - and yet there was still a reluctance for anything other than ink-on-paper signature to show agreement, and of course, not an original signature, because we were instructed to fax the form back. (BTW, has anyone seen my fax machine? I seem to have misplaced it 5 years ago.)

But OK, maybe there is some good reason why they need a signature in this format.  The confirmation form required that I complete my name, address, etc..  No problem, except for the fact that they already had all this information - when I submitted my proposal - electronically.  Heck, all the required information was in the e-mail message used to transmit the form to me.  Yet, I was asked to handwrite it onto this form. (Do any of you see the lunacy and gross inefficiency of this?  I can only imagine the end result - someone keying this information again.)  Couldn't these forms have been dynamically personalized for me?

It gets worse.  I had to fill out 2 more sheets - 1 for each presentation I am making.  Yup, I had to supply name, company name, etc. - yet again, along with the title of my presentation, date and time (which THEY ASSIGNED TO ME), and again, all of this information was in the e-mail message used to transmit the form to me. Couldn't these forms have been automatically personalized for me?  Couldn't the process have been more automated?

Forget the personal inconvenience to me.  Think of the increased time spent re-keying (forget trying to OCR my handwriting) all of this data. Think of the multiple points of potential error.  OK - now think of the inconvenience to me - not as a speaker - but as a customer.  Is this scenario much different from situations we find ourselves in when completing medical claims, accident reports, mortgage applications ...

If a tradeshow company that prides itself on being technology savvy can continue to "function" this way, chances are there is still a need for Market Intelligence on the state-of-the-industry with regards to On Ramps and Off Ramps, and BPM - Process Efficiency.  So, the topics remain on our editorial calendar for the coming year.  We promise to address the issues raised in this ranting, and go far beyond, to some very cutting edge techniques and best practices.

Stay tuned ... (and thanks for letting me get that off my chest.)

aiimALERT: Autonomy Becoming More Autonomous

Autonomy announced an agreement to acquire record and document management vendor, Meridio.  (See announcement)

The ECM industry continues to consolidate through acquisition.  With this instance, Autonomy, whose roots are in enterprise search, strengthens its offering as a platform play in ECM, more in league with OpenText, IBM/FileNet and Documentum, distancing themselves from search/navigation pure plays from vendors such as FAST, Google, Endeca and Vivisimo. 

This acquisition builds on an earlier acquisition of Zantaz, which provided Autonomy with e-mail archiving and management.  In my aiimAlert on the Zantaz acquisition, I noted that Forrester was quoted as stating the Zantaz acquisition made Autonomy more attractive as an acquisition target for the likes of EMC, Oracle and IBM.  I did not agree with that observation then and still do not.  It would appear that Autonomy is more focused on direct competition than possible acquisition.  With its recent acquisitions, Autonomy is building a content management platform.  Its strategy is markedly different from  competitors such as Oracle and EMC who built their platform from the ground up.  Whereas these companies began as a storage/infrastructure, and acquired content management functionality leading to interface and search, Autonomy started as an interface and search company, and is working its way down the functionality chain, so to speak, to include fundamental management and archival.

With the acquisition of Merdio, Autonomy positions itself as an Enterprise 2.0 platform provider.  Merdio brings tight integration into Sharepoint (including collaboration and content management).  With the anticipated integration of the rest of the Autonomy technology, including a host of search functions, workflow, SNA, tagging, and archival, a multifaceted Enterprise 2.0 platform is emerging. 

It will be interesting to see how Autonomy handles the issue of search in its solution implementations.  As stated, Autonomy began as a search tool, and added to this functionality with its past acquisition of search rival, former search leader, Verity.  But, as it morphs into a Enterprise 2.0 platform play, will Autonomy be wise to make its search functionality optional, allowing customers to plug “best of breed” search tools, search engines that are not application specific?

This news came on the heels of Autonomy stock falling after Q3 numbers were released.  (See related article)

aiimALERT: SpringCM Gets SaaSy About Workflow

SpringCM announced the availability of workflow/BPM and capture capabilities in its SaaS Document Management system.

On one level this is not news – document management systems such as Documentum, OpenText and FileNet have provided integrated workflow and capture functionality for several years.  Indeed, until now, for organizations looking at document management with a compelling need for workflow, the SaaS alternative offered by SpringCM would probably fall off the short list.  With the addition of these new capabilities, document management with integrated capture and workflow, as a service has become a viable alternative.  As I stated in a previous post focused on Alfresco, the SaaS and Open Source models are quickly becoming strong competitors in the ECM marketplace, with full functionality.

It is interesting to note that this post is being made at about the same time that Gartner released a “Magic Quadrant” on ECM vendors.  (I posted regarding this quadrant earlier this month, questioning the placement of Microsoft versus others.)  I failed to notice at the time, but was reminded by a post by Dan Ortega on his blog, that this “Magic Quadrant” is void of any SaaS or opensource ECM providers.  Dan does a good job pointing out that while SaaS vendors may be small in comparison, today, they represent a future market direction.  Here I would have to agree, especially in light of the comments I made above.   

Distributed Capture Tightly Tied to Transactional Processes

Last week I announced the latest AIIM study on Distributed Capture (Download  study).  In that post, I  commented on the fact that the top two benefits associated with distributed capture installations were process-oriented (i.e. increased process).

On the heels of this finding, a clear trend emerged from the survey data: the identification of transaction-intensive processes as the most popular targets for distributed capture.  These included invoice processing, expense reporting, personnel actions, new hire processing, order processing and new account setup.

Processes that lend themselves more to an ad hoc and customized process, (e.g. custom quote request and customer care) were less likely to be significantly impacted by simple capture and perhaps more readily lend themselves to benefit from online collaboration and more knowledge-oriented technologies.

It logically followed  that when asked to identify the departments in which distributed capture is used, Finance and Administration were a clear front runner, with 59% of the responses.

Capture Process Efficiency

A few weeks ago I posted a blog after taking a tour of Databank IMX, in which I spoke of the criticality of the processes behind content capture.  On a powerful related note, AIIM just released its latest Industry study on distributed capture (download full report). 

The most interesting finding to me in the entire report was the identification of the top two benefits associated with distributed capture installations. Savings resulting from reducing shipping and copying costs are often cited when justifying distributed capture investments.  But among the 400+ experienced users of distributed capture in organizations, the top two benefits identified were: 1.  Improved efficiency (faster access to content), and  2. Automated processes (streamlined processes).  Capture is often typecast as  commodity technology.  Perhaps a better way to think about it is as a mainstream technology that nonetheless still provides serious differentiating benefit to core business issues.  In fact, the third most popular answer – a virtual tie with “reduced shipping and copying costs”, was “increased content security”, which also points to a far more strategic positioning of benefits. 

From Leisure - Learning: Content Security and Corporate DNA

Yesterday was one of those days where the events of the day converge and there is an epiphany.  I spent most of the working day planning the upcoming AIIM Market IQ on Content Security with Dan Keldsen (blog).  We grappled with defining the various facets of content security, how to define them and their respective value propositions and what this topic should be called.  Is Content Security indicative of everything we mean when we talk about the subject?

In the evening I treated myself to pure mindless leisure – yes, I watched television.  The first show I watched was an extension to The Antiques Roadshow (not sure if it had its own name), and the second was the live coverage of the 50 year commemoration of the Truman Presidential Library. 

On the "roadshow" program two individuals each had a document, a photo from the post Civil War era and a handwritten parchment purported to have been signed by President Thomas Jefferson.  The photo was puzzling because it showed two African American soldiers along with several white soldiers at what appeared to be a commemoration of some sort.  Historians using documents (ranging from chronicles in the Library of Congress, personal family histories and records in local government offices) unraveled the mystery of the photo and educated its owner (and me) regarding a group called the GAR (Grand Army of the Republic) and how it was integrated from the outset, despite the then popular separate but equal attitudes of the nation.  What was fascinating was how they tracked down the identity of the two gentleman in the photo, an din one case contact a living relative and bring them to the grave of their heroic ancestor.  (The GAR is now defunct.)

Former President Bill Clinton spoke at the Truman Library commemoration, in what was, in my opinion the most eloquent speech I ever saw him give.  Within this speech, Clinton commented that one way we know about President Truman is through his library, his collection of documents.  (Until Truman, there was no Presidential Libraries Act, formally establishing and funding the presidential libraries.)  Aside from the official records captured from the oval office, there is much to be learned from the informal and formal writings of the president, as well as taped conversations.

This is when the epiphany happened.  Many talk about content security as a way to protect content from leakage, from the compliance and regulation perspective.  Surety, a security software and services company maintains a "Wall of Shame".  I am a big fan of the site, but unfortunately it too drives home the message of the need for content security from the "gotcha" perspective.  What about content security from the knowledge management perspective?  This is an aspect of content security we will cover in the upcoming  Market IQ.  Systematic and governed capture of organizational content, that is properly tagged, maintained and capable of being easily searched, builds an online corporate memory with, if done properly, near perfect recall.  Herein lies a great benefit from content security, the capture of corporate memory, or the elimination of corporate amnesia.  Virtually every corporate executive today whines about the loss of know how with the aging of the work force and the rapid turnover in staff.  Perhaps content security is an answer to that problem.  A systematic, governed and automated approach to properly capturing, authenticating, maintaining and making available "all" corporate know how. 

Many years ago I gave a keynote address at the first Documentum user group, Momentum.  The address was entitled "Documents: The DNA of an Organization".  I proposed that if properly leveraged workflow and document management tools would create an organization DNA, a trace to who, what, when, where and why of the organization.  Since then, ECM tools have only gotten more powerful, augmented with associated technologies such as portals, blogs, etc., and yet we have not reached perfect corporate DNA.  Why?  Unlike human DNA, corporate DNA , is not automatically intrinsic.  It must be manually built in.  Unlike human DNA, corporate DNA does not automatically have a long shelf life.  It must be carefully maintained and protected.  Unlike human DNA, corporate DNA is not impervious to tampering.  It must be protected and authenticated. 

But if we do create corporate DNA, we are killing two birds with one stone.  The objectives of content security can be met, while simultaneously creating near perfect corporate memory.