Paper slows down digital transformation: what needs to happen

Doug Miles looks at digital transformation at the AIIM UK Forum 2015

If paper-based processes are still the norm as mentioned in a previous post, this isn’t exactly good news for the digital transformation challenges organisations and full industries face.

After all, digital transformation, the core theme of the earlier AIIM Conference in San Diego, goes beyond digitisation.

And didn’t SAP’s Sameer Patel say that organisations were beyond digitisation now at CeBIT 2014? Truth is that there still is quite some digitisation to do in many organisations. The good news: it can go hand in hand with digital transformation projects.

Digitisation: the clock is ticking

At the AIIM Forum UK 2015 Doug Miles reminded us of the digitisation that still needs to happen in number, when looking at the sort of progress people are making on paper-free:

• 35% have yet to adopt any paper-free process. Including a number of organisations with more than 5,000 staff.
• Only 9% are actively looking at every process to actually drive out paper.

With all the benefits – and often urgent need – regarding digitisation, it’s hard to understand why we aren’t further in our efforts to get the paper out of the process, certainly when we look at the ongoing advice virtually all analysts, big consulting firms and best-in-class organisations offer each day to realise the necessary digital transformations. The clock is ticking. As in our previous post customer service and the customer come in here as well: most digital transformation projects today de facto are about customer experience and service optimisation on one hand and cost saving on the other (with both being very connected in many ways).

The customer service impact of the digital mailroom

Digitisation and taking the paper further out of processes is not just going to happen with – great initiatives such as AIIM’s World Paper Free Day, Doug Miles reminded the audience about (next one coming on November 6th).

Then, what needs to happen on top of such initiatives and reminding organisations about all the – proven benefits – of paper-free and digitisation initiatives?

ROI of a digital mailroom can be achieved in less than 12 months for 38% of the cases (Doug Miles)

Doug Miles acknowledged it’s not always easy and shared some ways to get it done:

One way to achieve it is to head off paper at the door. With a digital mailroom indeed. And here customer service comes in a third time: using a digital mailroom, AIIM research shows, cuts down on mailroom staff, speeds up response to customers and provides real-time access to the latest customer correspondence. Customer and organisational benefits with one approach: the digital mailroom.

Again Doug shared some numbers: ROI of a digital mailroom can be achieved in less than 12 months for 38% of the cases. And in less than 18 months for 60% of initiatives. Check out our document scanners to get it done.

Digitisation – benefits of heading off paper at the door with a digital mailroom – Doug Miles at AIIM Forum UK 2015

If you don’t have an integrated policy for multi-channel inbound and automatic routing to process then you’re going to get behind in customer response management (Doug Miles)

Capturing closer to the customer and the key success factor to get rid of paper

Another – related way – we’ll tackle more in depth in a next post: capture – and digitise – closer to the customer. Doug showed data indicating it’s not done enough yet.

In customer-facing situations capturing close to the customer delivers better customer experiences as Aline Saponara explained in a previous post.

Check out our white paper on input and response management

But there is more. Doug Miles: “If you don’t have an integrated policy for multi-channel inbound and automatic routing to process then you’re going to get behind in customer response management”. And that is what Colin Labrum’s presentation at the AIIM UK Forum – and a lot of articles and papers on this website – are all about.

So, what is holding us back? Why isn’t it happening (faster)? Here is the promised key success factor as Doug shared it.

Doug Miles: “It isn’t going to happen unless you actually set the mandate to get rid of it (paper). One of my pointers for ECM directions is let’s keep up this drive to actually get rid of paper”.

Hopefully this post was a reminder to keep up that drive and boost customer service levels, drive down costs and achieve all the other benefits Doug mentioned at the AIIM Forum UK 2015.

Der Beitrag Paper slows down digital transformation: what needs to happen erschien zuerst auf KnowledgeShare by Kodak Alaris Information Management.