The race to success in today’s business world starts and ends on a budget. For companies of all sizes, the goal is to remain competitive while spending less. This challenge is especially great for small and mid-sized businesses that need to invest in order to grow.
It can be a struggle for SMBs to find the technology they need to succeed, without breaking the bank. However, companies such as Xerox recognize the unique business requirements of SMBs and have developed an extensive portfolio of technology that gives these businesses an array of options to enhance the ways they work.
For example, Xerox’s latest version of DocuShare, it's enterprise content management platform, is specifically tailored to the SMB crowd. DocuShare Express is affordably priced for smaller businesses and comes equipped with an easy, quick install process suited to business users – dispelling any notion that extensive IT knowledge is needed to get a content management solution up and running. To allow more direct integration with the multifunction display panel than ever before, Xerox has also made a DocuShare EIP Connector available at no cost.
It is important to realize that content management is no longer a necessity for only the largest of companies. It needs to be top of mind for smaller companies too. A key reason many SMBs fail within their first few years is that they’re unable to manage company information and processes, especially when the company begins to grow. Many smaller business owners are just focused on trying to get their businesses off the ground - instead of thinking about how vital keeping, storing and maintaining information, records and documents will be to the success of their business.
In an age of information overload, being able to obtain useful information and collaborate effectively is critical for organizations of any size, so it is important that smaller businesses have access to advanced, affordable content management solutions.
Jay Ganesh
Director, Channel Marketing and Launch
Xerox DocuShare Business Unit
I had a chance last week to moderate a lively and informative panel on enterprise content management at the CIO Forum and Executive IT Summit in Cleveland. The one key message that panelists drove home was that effective enterprise content management has to be about more than just installing software on a server and putting together a technology workflow.
There has to be organizational change and a commitment to optimizing the productivity of the assets of the enterprise in order to accomplish key objectives such as speeding time to revenue and rapidly managing costly corporate issues such as litigation risk. Effective ECM solutions start with understanding the needs of the business and how ECM technologies can enable or improve critical business processes. EMC solutions can help health insurance providers improve membership enrollment, can help financial institutions process and fund mortgages more quickly, can help companies manage and adhere to employment laws, or can help global manufacturing companies bring products to market more quickly. Today’s collaborative business environments are also requiring ECM solutions to extend out beyond our own firewalls to include our customers, suppliers and business or trading partners.
For example, one Xerox customer was able to change its culture from relying on snail mail to using Xerox Distributed Capture Service to submit account-related documents. Now more than 90 percent of its volume it submitted through devices with XDCS, improving time to revenue by taking a 3-5 day process down to just a couple of hours. The solution also significantly reduced expenses related to overnight shipping and long-term archival storage costs.
A second discussed example was how a large, global manufacturing company leverages document and content management technologies to better enable and support their legal discovery and litigation management requirements. This solution has created a more efficient process for their legal staff and outside counsel and has significantly reduced their costs.
So when your organization starts to think about ECM, think beyond a single hardware and software decision, and think about starting the journey with a single business application that has high-payback rather than trying to change the entire infrastructure, which for most companies is very difficult to do. Today’s solutions often include multiple technologies and integrate with the line-of-business applications. The key messages from the session were that successful solutions involve joint ownership and leadership from a business and I/T perspectives and that engaging outside partners can bring some of the best practices from the industry.
For open commentary and industry perspectives, visit http://www.xerox.com/blogs, http://www.xerox.com/podcasts or http://www.consulting.xerox.com/flash/thoughtleaders/index.html.
Rich Baily
Vice President, Business Process Services, Xerox Global Services
In the last few months, mortgage lenders’ interest in electronic mortgages (“e-mortgage”), especially the ability to electronically sign via an e-signature process, has been rising significantly. Mortgage lenders are keenly aware that they must become leaner and more efficient in their processes. In fact, a recent blog by Mortgage Technology Magazine describes this rapid rise.
The current state of the mortgage industry has contributed to the uptick in interest. Paper has always been considered a limiting factor. Over time, the industry has moved towards paperless with imaged-based documents. The issue with paper to imaged documents is that the data was separate from the document. Validation required a person to “stare and compare” the image with the data in a data system, like a loan origination system. The promise of e-mortgage documents is to bring data and documents together making documents machine readable and enabling “lights out” processing.
Now, as has been promised for many years, the industry is beginning to implement e-mortgage initiatives. An e-mortgage is where loan documentation is created electronically, executed electronically, transferred electronically and stored electronically. At a minimum, an e-mortgage is an e-note that is created, signed and delivered to the secondary market electronically. However, an e-mortgage can also span into origination with e-signed disclosure documents
With today’s announcement of e-signature capabilities, Xerox Mortgage Services has entered the e-mortgage arena. This solution builds upon the award-winning BlitzDocs® solution for mortgage document collaboration and extends the BlitzDocs network of lending institutions and service providers. Even though we are rapidly moving to an “e” world, lenders are still dealing with paper, paper to images and existing electronic documents. Using our document expertise, Xerox is uniquely positioned to help support mortgage lenders with the dual processes they must support.
Interested in further commentary on industry trends and technology? Click here to listen to a podcast featuring my colleague Greg Smith, vice president, Xerox Mortgage Services.
Judson Phillips
Vice President, Marketing
Xerox Mortgage Services
Even with new laws requiring the timely turn around of documents that could be used as evidence in a trial, studies regarding e-discovery preparedness continue to show that legal professionals are struggling with the demands of the process. Xerox Litigation Services recently sponsored a survey that polled more than 200 legal professionals to understand if the buzz around litigation had companies ready to produce a year’s worth of e-mails and other documents with little notice. Here are just some of the results:
Among the 81 percent of legal professionals involved in reviewing documents for litigation purposes, the survey uncovered concerns about current in-house review systems. Some of the issues noted were:
• slow turnaround (42 percent of respondents)
• inadequate system support (41 percent) from sources like software licensing companies
• lack of important features (41 percent), which may include expanded search options and software updates
• IT department could not support the in-house document review system (38 percent)
These findings spoke volumes to me – e-discovery readiness is not something that is easily achieved nor should it be taken lightly. When in doubt, outsourcing these requirements to experienced and skilled consultants makes good business sense. It’s tough to handle the full range of e-discovery requirements in-house -- from assessing and collecting the relevant data, to processing and extracting the metadata, to reviewing and coding the information, to producing documents quickly and accurately – done incorrectly or incompletely, your company’s brand value and corporate financial standing could be compromised.
I welcome your thoughts on these findings and how you think businesses are stacking up to the e-discovery process.
Ken Reiff
Manager, Business Development
Xerox Litigation Services
The office environment is constantly in flux and evolving as new accessories help make work flow easier and more efficient. Recently this became even more evident to me based on a conversation with a client. This gentleman informed me that he not only helped dramatically reduce his companies overall expenditure on promotional literature, but also increased their sales revenue by over 20% by altering how this literature was produced.
He informed me that his company use to prepare these huge elaborate informational binders which they sent to prospective clients. Each binder cost approx. $50 to produce and was quite heavy and expensive to ship. Looking to upgrade the presentation while reducing the cost, the company created a fluid digital presentation which they used their Xerox Duplicator to copy on to CD’s. This minor switch not only reduced the overall cost of each presentation from over $50 to less than $1 each, but increased their client retention and sales success rate.
How can such a simple change bring about such a major transformation? To me this shows the transition of today's office to a more digital workspace and how digital technology such as CD duplicators can not only be an integral office accessory, but also a financial asset. When you dissect the facts in this case, even though the original binder presentation was most likely very attractive and eye catching, and has the advantage that the reader does not need a separate device to read it, there were numerous drawbacks;
1) A binder is too heavy and cumbersome to travel with whereas an optical disc such as a CD or DVD (“Disc”) is light and easily fits in a briefcase or even a pocket for convenient travel.
2) Plus the shipping cost of a thick heavy binder is far more expensive than a small light Disc.
3) A binder is flat with two dimensional images, charts, and text whereas digital content on a Disc can offer eye catching graphics with fluid action and text that comes alive.
4) A binder can become dated and stale if it sits for too long whereas a Disc can have a link that directly connects to the companies website for the most up to date and relevant information.
5) A binder is susceptible to the elements and can become ruined if it comes in contact with rain or snow where a Disc is more tolerant to extreme conditions.
6) The lifespan of a Disc is far longer than that of content printed on paper.
This is not to say that Discs will wholly displace paper or other printed material, but rather to show the emergence of Discs and other digital content in the general office environment. When people ask me what markets are appropriate for an optical disc duplicator, I inform them any market that has content they want to store, distribute, or duplicate. So the next time you have a presentation or similar matter that you need to disseminate to any number of people or entities, look at the opportunity to take your company digital.
Ryan Swerdloff
VINPOWER DIGITAL INC.
"The Future of Optical Storage"
Click here to see more about Xerox Duplicators
As Earth Day-Week came to a close, it made me realize how fortunate I am to be able to lead a Xerox business where we really have the potential to impact the environmental footprint. Obviously, I share a biased position, but from the results I have seen driven for our clients and the response we continue to receive from them, the Xerox Office Services team ranks as the world's experts at creating an optimal office. Inside the optimal office is a tremendous opportunity to impact our environment for generations to come.
Simply put, every large enterprise operates with thousands (often, tens of thousands) of output devices. In many cases, a large business enterprise will generate over one billion impressions annually. Those who have taken control and effectively manage output today have far fewer devices, consume far less power, have reduced their carbon footprint and have significantly reduced their green house gas emissions. Not to mention the fact that they have eliminated literally tons of landfill waste that comes from packaging, repair materials and paper on an annual basis. And, if they have effectively managed their entire supply chain for output, they have also reduced the amount of trees used to produce their paper, the amount of fresh water used in the production of the paper, and the amount of waste water that comes from that process. Surprisingly, they more than likely have saved millions of dollars at the same time, and they know where every impression is being made, who is making them and how they are being used. These are just some of the elements and benefits of today's optimal office. Many of our clients today also take advantage of technological advantages that have come from Xerox innovation, including ink products that are bio-degradable.
When our consultants have the opportunity to work with committed environmental organizations, we can drive a host of environmental benefits our clients can measure. And whether you think about establishing optimal offices on a small or enterprise-wide level---the positive impact to the environment is astounding. After Earth Day 2008, it certainly feels great to know that the work one does on a daily basis is making a difference.
Jim Joyce
Senior Vice President
Xerox Office Services
There are profitable approaches that save money and reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, 60-70% of emissions are energy related i.e. fuel for transportation, heating and power generation.
Most companies are focused in several areas:
1) Improving their infrastructure (buildings, data centers, factories, plants, offices)
2) Improving their supply chains (raw materials, product design, suppliers, transportation)
3) Optimizing finished goods and appliances they use (machinery, auto's, TV's, PC's, Printers).
There is opportunity in the office. Many enterprises have work from home employee programs, carpool programs, and encourage fuel efficient vehicles. In some industries, 30-50% of their employees work from home which reduces office space, requiring less energy for heating, cooling, lighting.
IT continues to adopt green principals and look to technologies within the data center and across the enterprise to reduce cost, reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions. Forrester states that the number of enterprises adopting green IT practiced jumped from 25% to 38% in 2007. Forrester's article, "Green IT Nudges Tech Adoption," March 10, 2008, provides some great examples and insight. Collaboration software & services, web conferencing, thin client technology, server virtualization, data center outsourcing, and document/print services outsourcing are the leading strategies that reduce carbon footprint. Outsourcing requires service providers to implement cost reduction as well as provide energy efficient solutions. For more details on Outsourcing and Services review the High tech and Communications blog.
Susy Mark
Industry Marketing Manager
High-Tech, Telecom and Media
Xerox Corporation
|
