Workflow management systems

As the Henry Stewart Digital Asset Management Symposium kicks off in London, we comment in today's press release on a few areas where DAM vendors are coming up short, based on our recent research for The Digital & Media Asset Management Report 2008.In our interviews with customers, many lamented their investments in DAM systems failed to meet their needs for workflow and rights management. My fellow analyst Kas Thomas and I were often surprised to find that what many vendors call a workflow application is no more than a thread of e-mails. You can read more details in the release, and of course, our DAM Report.

In order to maintain their reputation for developing superior solutions for their customers, Perseco wished to reduce costs, create efficiency, provide disaster recovery, and establish a higher level of customer service. To accomplish these goals they turned to IDT to help them introduce a content and workflow management system with enterprise-wide capability to the organization. Submitted by Integrated Docuement Technologies, Inc.

The Claims department is able to upload hundreds of photographs into the system as email attachments. This has been a huge time-saver; our printing turnaround time went from 12-18 hours to just 5 minutes. By integrating our email management tool with digital workflow, information can be picked up and processed within 30 seconds. We can provide immediate response, and trim our processing time by 33%. Submitted by Optical Image Technology

The second of our 2-parter on the usability of web content management systems is available on EContent magazine. To quote:Here in Part II, I'll examine usability through the lens of system functionality. What does it mean to have a usable workflow? Can a "Help" subsystem make up for the inevitable gaps in user training and understanding? How can authors find what they need? To the extent that you can answer questions like these for your CMS project, you are well on your way to developing a more usable -- and therefore, by definition, a more effective -- content management system...

Thanks to a heightened regulatory environment and fierce competition, enterprise-wide workflow, content management and resource management systems are no longer found exclusively among the high brow Fortune 500 companies. According to a recent study published by the Aberdeen Group, 40 percent of mid-market companies are reporting moves to core business applications and ERP suites. Submitted by AnyDoc

While getting product from one place to another is the nitty-gritty job of supply chain management systems, a whole lot of knowledge management goes on behind the scenes to make things happen. Supply chain management (SCM) entails orchestrating a number of disparate tasks--often involving the coordination of information within your own organization as well as communicating with suppliers. To furnish all partners in the supply chain with the most accurate information and cohesive reports, knowledge management systems are being used to define workflow and gather data from a number of different sources.As supply chain management (SCM) becomes more crucial to the success of an organization, knowledge management systems are being deployed among departments and small work groups as well as at the executive level and enterprisewide. The lack of efficiency in the supply chain can be extremely costly to any organization, so SCM is getting attention from the top down.

Digital asset management (DAM) systems are heavily used in industries where creative content is the primary output—advertising, broadcasting and entertainment. Use of DAM products by organizations in other businesses is also growing. As the media types have multiplied (witness the boom in podcasts), companies are realizing that they must manage their digital assets more consistently.Gartner predicts that publishing companies lacking a DAM system are likely to lose market share within just a few years. The DAM software serves a vital role by keeping track of master image files and various renderings derived from them, managing workflow and supporting records management functions such as digital rights. In addition, they facilitate delivery of images to multiple distribution channels.Managing artwork

QuickCapture Pro connects your PC scanner to your business workflow and document management systems. View, index, enhance and manage scanned content with just a few clicks.

One of Interwoven's slicker differentiators is the cool annotation tool it bundles with TeamSite, offering the ability for reviewers to post "stickies" that travel with content through the workflow. Now Documentum -- never noted for its advanced editorial interfaces -- plays a good game of catch-up by partnering with tool vendor iMarkup, whose Review Server product enables editors to apply post-it notes, highlighting, paintbrush strokes, etc. to content. We think this kind of meta-communication is essential to any content management system where online approval processes need to approximate the richness of offline workflows. Note, however, that iMarkup carries a per-client license of $30-$40 a pop. BTW, Interwoven and Microsoft obtained these capabilities by buying two of iMarkup's failing competitors...Read how one Documentum customer integrated iMarkup (785kb pdf)

GOVERNMENTBureau employs new imaging systemThe Ohio Bureau of Employment Services (Columbus, OH) has contracted with Dakota Imaging (Columbia, MD) for an automated forms and document processing system. Dakota Imaging will replace the bureau's existing imaging OCR with its Transform OCR/ICR imaging system. Transform will provide scanning, OCR/ICR data capture, tape/floppy input, workflow, welfare tax credit processing, Internet tax submission and optical storage management. The bureau will use Transform statewide to automate unemployment insurance reports and welfare tax credit cases. Dakota Imaging estimates that the bureau will reduce its quarterly cycle to 10 days from 45 to 90 days required by the semi-automated system.

EMC Captiva FormWare identifies, extracts, and perfects data from virtually any type of form, enabling you to deliver that data into back-end systems, including your databases, workflow, and document or content management systems.

User Stories from the knowledge frontWith one recent project attracting 100,000 participants worldwide, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology at Cornell University wanted an Internet-based system that would allow bird watchers to easily submit sighting information. Among other digital assets, the lab boasts the world's largest collection of bird sounds.The lab chose a solution that consists of using Fatwire’s UpdateEngine6 and UE Studio to build and manage its Web site and several Web-based projects. According to FatWire, the system will provide automated workflow and a consistent, easy-to-use interface to pull information from multiple sources, including the lab's digital asset management (DAM) solution.