Document Management System (DMS) is a system or process used to capture, track, and store electronic documents such as PDFs, word processing files, and digital images of paper-based content. To prevent your personal data from being compromised, you can choose to keep your data and personal information safe at Filesdna.com, which includes a plethora of different features designed to secure files, prevent fraud, and speed up your business processes. This tool allows for increasing the efficiency of information flow and accelerating the company’s work
Document Management System and its most important tasks
The main task of electronic document management systems consists in the improvement of information flow in the company. Tasks of each solution of this type include, among others: registering, scanning, ordering, classifying, sharing, archiving and monitoring files included in the company’s database. The system allows collecting all documents held by the company in one place, their proper systematisation and offering swift and convenient access thereto by authorised persons.
The Document Management System is an especially useful tool, if it is integrated with the workflow system enabling business process automation. In fact, it allows obtaining access to particular documents by employees having relevant competences and handing them over efficiently to particular co-workers, in compliance with the defined configuration of scenarios, authorisations and business rules. It facilitates performance of tasks and accelerates execution thereof, which has a positive impact on virtually every aspect of the company’s work by increasing its productivity and accelerating achievement of business objectives.
The most important advantages of Document Management Systems
Implementation of the electronic Document Management System brings numerous benefits to each company. First of all, it should be mentioned that the system registers all outgoing and incoming documents on an ongoing basis, which facilitates maintaining order in the company documents and ensures that all documents are immediately available, if needed. Furthermore, the system has a functionality allowing it to register all changes made to documents. These changes can be tracked on an ongoing basis and, if needed, previous versions of documents can be accessed.
The electronic document management workflow has a positive impact on the safety of data stored by the company. The possibility of giving particular users specific rights of access allows, in fact, viewing and modifying only specific groups of files, which ensures better protection of confidential information and prevention of access thereto by unauthorised persons.
The contemporary Document Management Systems are very developed and functional programmes, which give a lot of useful possibilities to professional users. The most popular functions willingly used by contemporary companies include, among others, survey creators, reports, leave requests, notifications and many others. Their presence allows decreasing the quantity of paper documentation generated and stored by companies and improves the information flow inside the enterprise.
Novelties and trends in document management
In the time of the ubiquitous digitalisation, it becomes the natural course for larger companies to implement more advanced document and business process management systems (so-called BPMS, that is, Business Process Management System) based on digitalisation, automation and workflow. They allow efficient and effective implementation of the enterprise’s digital transformation strategy.
It used to be assumed that the role of DMS primarily consists in the digitalisation of documents in terms of registration, scanning, categorisation, storing and sharing their digital versions with everyone who needs them and is authorised thereto. Whereas, BPMS is a layer responsible for assigning tasks, servicing approval processes, data and information routing between persons, departments and IT systems. In practice, these two layers more and more often intertwine and become co-dependent.
What is more, the so-called case files are more and more often discussed and documents naturally become elements thereof. They can either activate approval flows (e.g. incoming invoices) or they result from collecting information and approvals executed at the process layer (e.g. negotiating and concluding an agreement).
The case file-oriented approach, where the main elements of the process include scans of documents, conversation threads, exchanging e-mails etc., seems a natural consequence of the tools’ evolution to the electronic document workflow and process management. Tasks related to the flow are managed in the context of a file. Therefore, solutions that not only inform of the necessity of e.g. approval, but provide the user with access to all case-related documents, data collected from users participating in the process via form, as well as context data and reports from external sources, at one place, become more and more popular. All of the above is aimed at searching for effectiveness – so that a decision could be taken efficiently, without the need to reach for third tools in search of key information.
Digital transformation entails one more important trend in developing DMS, related to the pace of business processes’ changes: assumption that the implemented solutions will be subject to frequent changes. In response to the above, the majority of task and document management workflow software producers drastically facilitated the process of developing process applications. Eliminating script languages or the necessity to code resulted in current, easier use of low-to-no-code platforms. Therefore, a necessary application will be developed faster and it will be much easier to understand and modify it when necessary to introduce change thereto.
