What is Document Management?
Depending on the business need, the implementation of a Document Management system would normally take place in a series of phases.
The foundation of a Document Management System involves, registering the existence of all existing documents and registering the creation of new documents in an area of a business. An indication of its date of destruction or archiving could be made as this contains the growth of the data to a small extent.
The next level is to enable others to retrieve and view a document, allowing it to be marked-up with any suggested changes or corrections (often called red-lining in drawings). These would then be assessed by the appropriate authority and incorporated, if accepted.
The computer system is required to ensure the integrity of documents and control access to documents to those with the required need/authority. Modern systems are delivered as a configurable package.
The Document Management System could be linked with Workflow. This facility enables an organisation to stipulate who or what job functions need to be involved and in what sequence in a business work process.
In a clerical task workflow this may be quite simple, A checks several boxes of a form, depending on the values contained, passes to B or C who action further before D approves.
In Engineering the workflows are often more complex, requiring iterative, multi-step sequences through levels of in-house engineers, external consultants, and Approval Authorities.
Engineering Standards and Corporate Standing Orders require fixed patterns of Approval, often going to the highest level of the company.
There are of course other issues, but the main one not mentioned so far in this overview is that of the document’s media. Images and hence the term Document Image Processing (DIP) is often the vehicle of advanced DM Systems as it takes account of paper-based documents of all sizes as well as other electronic, video and audio media.
Important external issues concern communications with Suppliers and of course the public, raising issues of Document Capture and Electronic Data Interchange (EDI). Modern document creation systems make this much easier than in years gone by.
My background
My early work was a simple vendor control system for an engineering contractor’s project in the late ‘70’s. Next, in the early ‘80’s, a major project was to guide BNFL to create a Drawing Registry system for 1.25 m drawings. Then in the 80s the Registry was increasing by 1,000 per week, for the THORP Project. In the mid 80’s, I pioneered sales and use of a PC based system, arguably ahead of its time, in late ‘92, I chaired the Intergraph company task force set up to re-specify their product’s direction, as a PC based, modular offering.
A major assignment, for a major transport was as Programme Manager for the provision of Document Management on 1,500 desktops, the replacement of 140 UNIX CAD seats with Windows/Intel equipment. In addition, 1,200 standalone databases were to be migrated to an Enterprise-wide ORACLE system.
A further large project was to customise and validate a system, to control drawings and documents in a regulatory compliant way for a pharmaceutical R&D facility. A key element in the project was to register and then make a raster/vector conversion of 80,000 paper drawings.
My last assignment was to audit the specification of a major defence manufacturer's development of their customised system.
And for more information in even greater depth see the leading magazine in the subject https://document-manager.com/