Indexing for the Enterprise: Retrieve Your Documents 100% of the Time

“Seek and you will find” would be great for workers if their software would consistently deliver the information they need, where and when they want it. Too often, the bridge between what’s needed and found is incomplete, especially as organizations grow, the amount of stored information increases, and more people are involved. A sea of documents, disparate legacy and line-of-business systems, and the paths each document travels during the business lifecycle makes some searches as efficient as sifting through dark file folders in a dim basement while wearing sunglasses. Service, reputations and profits can suffer irreparably when documents are demanded and can’t be located.

The challenges aren’t always the result of inferior technology. Often they arise from poorly devised indexing plans.

Ideally, employees would determine what they need and have it delivered to their cerebral desktops. Not only is this impossible, but security considerations necessitate filtering what each user is (and is not) allowed to access. Web-based enterprise content management (ECM), supported by an enterprise approach to indexing, delivers information workers need to succeed, unearthing relevant files within seconds. To ensure specific, meaningful, and consistent search results rather than extensive, irrelevant lists of files (or none at all), you should follow these basic indexing rules.

1. Understand that data—not documents—determines the success of ECM projects.

Finding, flowing, securing and distributing documents are critical for any business. All of these processes are driven by data within your organization, and they are only achieved by leveraging the data effectively across your enterprise. Since data is the axis that drives processes, knowledge, and decision making within and across your organization, the indexing plan is the single most important piece of the ECM puzzle.

2. Conduct a detailed document inventory.

Unless your company is a one-person operation, you probably don’t know the ins and outs of every document type in your company or all of the people who need to access its contents. Communication is a critical part of analyzing and understanding the documents within your organization. Talk with IT staff, managers, and end users from each department so you become aware of the business value of each document type and its touch points within your business.

3. Create meaningful groupings of information to address common search needs.

Although ECM doesn’t follow the color-coded file process used in paper-based offices, it segments information in a similar way—only much faster, and consistently following your established rules. Understand the types of questions people will ask about your files. Know what kind of routine reports are needed, and which data is drawn from specific document types. This will help you to determine what to index. A university admissions office might index by a unique student ID number, name, birth date, year admitted, area of study, campus or college, and high school name or code. An insurer might index policyholders by first name, last name, street address, document type, date insured, claim number, and more. Separating each criterion into its own indexed field is vital for quick, targeted, and easy retrieval.

4. Maintain indexing consistency across multiple departments.

In large organizations, multiple departments may use the same software independently to build indexing schemes. When someone conducts an enterprise search by a commonly used criterion, this can lead to complicated, ineffective returns if departments use different fields to capture the same data. Having a clear vision of your organization will help you create a plan that meets common needs while allowing departments the flexibility to index additional data unique to their area. Understanding proprietary information versus data that’s needed by multiple areas is critical, but it’s often less obvious than one might think.

5. Streamline electronic filing with auto-indexing wherever possible.

Document indexing can be time consuming. Although indexing data or interpreting questionable input typically involves humans, their involvement can be streamlined by using automation. OCR, bar code capture, screen scraping from other software applications, and other methods can be used to automate the indexing process. The ability to take full advantage of these technologies, however, typically is determined by the nature of the documents themselves, the degree to which you understand your data repositories, and your access to the data.

Summary

Like most successful initiatives, indexing across the enterprise requires methodical planning, meticulous analysis, collaboration, and solid communication. It’s important to involve the right people from the start to ensure buy-in to the project and acquire access to the details you will need to make the project a success. Investing time up front to prime your employees to embrace the solution and achieve maximum success is time well spent.

With solid indexing, your need for information can be fed with results rather than being nourished by countless delays. A clear vision, an eye for detail, faith in your team, and a solid solution will ensure that you seek AND find….every time.

For more information or to schedule a demonstration, please Contact DocFinity now.