AIS Proves Key Partner in City of Charlotte Document Management Initiatives

March 18, 2010
Written By Dennis Drury
Dennis works for the City of Charlotte in North Carolina as a Business Process Consultant and Account Manager. In this role he manages Electronic Content Management and Document Management initiatives across the enterprise.

The Partnership:
Advanced Imaging Systems (AIS) has been a business partner with the City of Charlotte since 2001. The partnership began when the City of Charlotte recognized the need to add an electronic document management system. The major goal of this project was to begin converting paper documents into digital documents and store them in a central location. In 2004 AIS and the City implemented Digitech Systems ImageSilo solution. ImageSilo is a web based tool that stores documents in a central repository and supports users across wide areas to access the stored documents. This was a solution with a solid foundation for the City’s early document management needs.

The City quickly realized there are many great benefits to hosting a document management system in house. The City of Charlotte Human Resources division was engaging in a project with AIS to scan the personnel files of the City Employees stored in large file rooms. The City partnered with AIS to scan the all the paper files to digital .tiff or .pdf images. Those images scanned by AIS were returned to the City and loaded into the new in-house document management system.

The City of Charlotte and AIS continue to grow together and expand their partnership. In 2007 the City of Charlotte introduced Microsoft Office SharePoint Services (MOSS) 2007 across its multiple divisions. The City quickly adopted MOSS as its main content, document, and records management repository. The legacy system housing the Human Resource digital images was to be retired. AIS was once again contracted to assist the City in converting the files from the legacy system to files that would be uploaded to MOSS 2007 sites and libraries. This project was successfully completed fourth quarter of 2009.

The City of Charlotte and AIS partnership is constantly expanding. AIS continue to provide the City’s divisions with professional, high quality, affordable scanning services and storage solutions. The following text examines the City of Charlotte Human Resources Electronic Document Management Project with Advanced Imaging Systems.

The Problem:
The City of Charlotte employs hundreds of individuals. Each individual employee has an employee file adding up to thousands of pieces of paper. As with many private and government entities the paper must be stored until the maximum retention date is reached. In the case of the City of Charlotte, the paper finds its way into large file rooms where it is kept accessible to employees. Each division of the City of Charlotte has Human Resources (HR) Representatives dispersed around the city. Each division produces employee paperwork. However, the City of Charlotte has a central HR division that is the owner of the documents. The majority of this paperwork is stored in a central location file room. When paperwork is needed within a particular division that divisions HR Representative calls the central office and asks for it. HR employees located at the central office will manually go to the file room and pull the employee file. The paper or requested information from the file must then be securely delivered to the division HR representative.

The City identified many risks associated with paper file storage. For the purposes of this text we will examine a few of them. First, the exposure to natural disasters such as fire or flood could easily wipe-out all the employee files. Second, the paper must be maintained in a secure location allowing access to few individuals. Third, paper files are easily miss-filed or lost. If a file is lost there is no backup copy to replace it with. Finally, the amount of storage needed is astronomical and the destruction of files that have reached their retention period is laborious. Teaming with AIS the City decided to launch an electronic document management initiative.

The Solution:
AIS is an integral part of the City of Charlotte’s Electronic Document Management Solutions through three iterations. The first iteration being Digitech’s offsite storage solution ImageSilo in which AIS scanned and hosted the City’s documents, the next was a third party vendor solution in which AIS provided the scanning services, and finally the City and AIS has taken on the current MOSS solution.

The City of Charlotte’s MOSS environment hosts its intranet, document and records management systems. The City began a conversion project to move all City electronic documents to MOSS in 2008. The project is ongoing. The City’s first challenge was to convert and import the Human Resources documents originally scanned by AIS hosted in the City’s third party document management system.

The role of AIS for this project was to format the images to a MOSS compatible image format and then add them to cds with associated index files. AIS also transitioned the City’s current scanning procedures quickly to incorporate the needs of the new MOSS system. The cd’s were returned to the City and uploaded to MOSS. With a successful HR document transition the City is continuing to work on this project with AIS moving to the next divisions documents.

The Benefits:
The City of Charlotte is continuing to experience key benefits from Electronic Document Management and their partnership with AIS. With these types of initiatives it is often difficult to calculate Return on Investment (ROI) due to the abstract nature of Electronic Document Management.

For this reason the City of Charlotte prefers to consider their benefits of Electronic Document Management in terms of a cost savings model. The City’s benefits experienced in a cost savings model include several hundred feet of office space previously used to store documents converted into new working areas. The City has lowered its disaster recovery costs because secure electronic backup storage is more cost effective than off site bulk paper storage. Permanently deleting a digital file cost less than shredding the document. Digital documents have a lower carbon footprint than paper documents. The City is also experiencing a direct savings in manpower. Having documents stored digitally in a central location increases productivity by allowing the HR staff to retrieve documents in a fraction of the time it took when they had to find them manually. Security is increased as the document management system allows for easy and effective document lock down. The electronic security model adopted by the City includes network security, single sign-on, and document level security.

There are many technical benefits as well. Audit trails provide maximum tracking of documents. Audit trails give the ability to see where documents are in various stages of the document life-cycle and allow users to easily view document changes. It is easier to redact information from electronic documents. Simply highlight and remove the text or delete the pages not needed. Delivery of documents is more efficient via emailing document attachments outside of the City or giving access to central repositories via the City intranet. There are also several advantages to electronic file searching. It is simple to build a search or use search software to search on document indexes and metadata to retrieve documents. Another key benefit is improved document process efficiency through internal document processing and workflow. These technical benefits truly put the electronic documents at the fingertips of the users that have access to them increasing productivity and lowering cost of ownership.

In conclusion, it has been imperative for the City of Charlotte to have AIS as a partner participating in their electronic document management initiatives. The partnership is vital to the ongoing success of the City’s challenges as the initiatives go citywide.

Written By Dennis Drury

Dennis works for the City of Charlotte in North Carolina as a Business Process Consultant and Account Manager. In this role he manages Electronic Content Management and Document Management initiatives across the enterprise.