Millennia Group Blog

It happens every day in our professional lives, we need information to make decisions or to complete tasks.  To assist us in this effort we try to use our memory, the internet and information stored away in filing cabinets, desk drawers and computers.

Sometimes decisions or tasks are completed quickly from a single source of information.  For instance, “was customer order 12345 invoiced?” – you can easily look it up in “the system”.  This becomes more complex if the question simply expands to “and was it correct?”.  Just like that you need much more information to come to the correct decision.  It would be nice if there was only one place to get the complete picture.

The typical mobile phone these days has a 2 ¼” x 4 ¼” screen and a pop up keyboard.  Most cost something close to $500-$750 and will soon move up to $1,000 – not counting cellular service.  A very competent Windows laptop can be acquired for the same price and a powerful tablet computer can easily be obtained for a lot less.

For many of us a laptop or tablet, possibly with a supplemental monitor and keyboard, is our primary workstation.  Most of us also accomplish much of our daily tasks using some type of cloud based solution, such as a CRM, financial system, document management system or email.  So when we need to be mobile AND get work done, it’s no problem.  But, how much of that work can we actually complete using only the ultimate mobile workstation, our expensive new phone?

Some day in the future it is plausible that paper documents in the business world will disappear.  Electronic documents, however, in the form of PDF’s, Word files or Excel spreadsheets, will continue to exist.  In fact, it will be a very long time before documents, and the content of the documents, cease to be important in the business world. 

Technology has enabled simple processes or transactions to occur entirely with online forms and direct data entry.  But there are still many instances where the content in a complex document becomes the data for accounting or ERP systems or documents.  It is easy to see what was keyed in, but In Documents we trust.

How will artificial intelligence (“AI”) impact our world?  There are knowledgeable people talking up the potential positive uses of AI and there are knowledgeable people voicing concern over the potential problems.  On the positive side are articles generally oriented towards business efficiency gains, of which IBM’s Watson is a widely seen example. 

Many companies are looking for a better way to help manage the explosive growth files and documents and they are hoping that AI and Watson can benefit them.  The rate of growth is exponential and that is creating increased user search times and poor results accuracy - inefficient.  AI might help users find the information that they are looking for, but Watson is going to have to get to know each user and know each user very well first.

I don’t think I would like to be in the folder, inter-office envelope, paper clip or staple businesses.  They had a great run.  They served a very good purpose.  But it’s time to move on to new forms of workflow.  Yes, that’s right, paper clips, folders and envelopes were the first workflow tools.

Paper clips and staples separated documents into relevant parts.  Folders and envelopes kept the collection of information together as it moved through the company for decision making purposes.  Plenty of business decisions still rely on a collection of data and documents.  So where have all the folders and paper clips gone? To digital workflow packages, which are the new tools for business process.

Have you ever found a jar of mustard in the fruit drawer of your refrigerator?  How about the Penske file in the folder labeled Clients D-E?  Let’s face it, there are those of us that are very organized and there are others that aren’t.  This could be at home or at the office and it can be both frustrating and in the case of the office, costly. 

We were recently asked if there is an optimal company size that dictates when it’s time to use an electronic document management system (EDMS) rather than a file storage solution like a network drive?  I would say as soon as you find the mustard in the fruit drawer, it’s time.  However, there are several factors that should be taken into consideration when considering the need for an EDMS and two stand out, number of employees and industry the business operates in. 

There are many benefits to using electronic documents versus paper.  One of those benefits is being able to do a search to quickly locate the one document that you are looking for.  This takes only a matter of a few seconds in most any document management system.

But what if you are looking for more than one document?  What if you need a collection of documents, like all of the contracts for customers with model number 123abc?  What if you aren’t exactly sure what documents you need and only have a few pieces of information to go on?  This is where you will get your money’s worth when properly configuring your document management solution.

Millennia Group just wrapped up being a sponsor and participant in the 19^th annual Realcomm IBCON tradeshow in San Diego.  This is a show dedicated to the understanding and use of technology in the commercial real estate industry.  As one might expect for a technology show, there were some familiar topics including robotics, artificial intelligence, blockchain, virtual reality and renewable energy.

The current news touches on these topics, but from a different angle; the death of the retail industry, the reshaping of office workers and their environments and Amazon warehouses – they’re popping up everywhere.  After 19 years of participating in this industry trade show, it is still very clear, there is a long term focus in this industry, well beyond how these external forces will impact the next quarter.

The first thing that comes to mind when you hear about workflow is most likely order and process.  There is validity in that thought.  Workflow is intended to deliver efficiency and cost saving by using defined order and automated process. 

Defining what the process should be is the tricky but necessary part and it’s the fun part.  Yes, fun.  When you dig in and people realize how many time wasting tasks can be eliminated, you can feel the joy.  So how do you re-connect the dots to create an effective digital workflow and really make work flow?  Put on your technology goggles and look at the process.

Bitcoin continues to make news and inroads into the world of finance.  Two of the basic technologies that drive Bitcoin include blockchain and peer to peer computing.  These two concepts are relatively understandable.  Blockchain uses a distributed ledger, which is essentially a list that is shared across many computers (peer to peer).  Because many computers contain a time-stamped replica of the data, it is very difficult, and expensive to hack or change the data in a fraudulent way – and its encrypted.

These concepts are moving into other areas such as smart contracts.  However, these contracts are not documents as that term is generally understood.  The smart contract is essentially a perfectly known set of conditions and data, that when met, results in a payment or action.  The contract is essentially data points; house address, meter number and usage, bank account or Bitcoin account, electricity rate, dates.  All immutable data that can be kept in a ledger.