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 | | http://www.contentmanager.net/magazine/article_394_enterprise_content_management.html |
DMS, Document Management Systems was the designation in the nineties of the last millennium, with which the industrial sector identified itself in Germany. DMS and later DMS EXPO where also the names of the leading exhibition, at which the industrial sector presented itself. However, during the last two years a movement of removal could be recognized. The organiser Advanstar changed the meaning of the acronym DMS first of all in "Documents - Messaging - Security" in order to redefine the abbreviation in "Digital Management Solutions" for the event of this year from 16 to 18 September in Essen. Furthermore DMS was only an almost exclusively German matter. Here the acronym was used as designation for the whole industrial sector, and thus included groupware, archiving, workflow and other areas. In the original country of document management the term stood for a group of systems, the document management in a closer sense. These were interpreted to support the dynamic part of the life cycle of documents: checkin/ checkout, version management, electronic file and collaboration on the basis of documents were typical features. Nowadays the term seems to be a little bit out-of-date. For some time marketing managers have been trying to introduce new slogans, which are to attract more attention of the products: KM Knowledge Management, CLM Content Life Cycle Management and other terms the creative people could think of.
ECM Enterprise Content Management
Now a new acronym comes from the USA: ECM for Enterprise Content Management. The first who used it were the colleagues from IBM around the year 1999/2000. Shortly after that the AIIM, Association for Information and Image Management International, took over this term and made it the new central theme of the umbrella organization. ECM was also a reaction of the traditional suppliers, who got under pressure through modern web-based technologies. Thus, today ECM is a universal, company-wide solution, which leads together conventional document and internet technologies. The AIIM has tried in several attempts to coin the picture of this new acronym. Today ECM includes the areas of capture (entry, indication, classification), manage (with components like records management, workflow, collaboration, traditional document management and web content management), deliver (edition, output management), store (dynamic storage with the necessary services, databases and storage systems) and preserve (archiving with the corresponding storage technologies). An essential approach is the creation of a middleware, through which the individual functions are made available to the leading applications and portals.
However, ECM does not sound very sexy
The acronym ECM does not solve the problem of the industrial sector: it is little catchy, not really sexy and needs a lot of explanations. No message by which potential purchasers are attracted automatically. First of all, ECM is an empty cover with an overblown demand, it is no product, perhaps only a vision. If you take the whole portfolio, which AIIM assigns to the acronym ECM, it becomes clear that today no supplier can deliver this from one hand as an integrated, company-wide solution. ECM can also be equated with a "wool milk sow which lays eggs". All suppliers have to make an effort to be able to meet the demand which is connected with ECM. However, this does not prevent anybody from printing this abbreviation in his brochures. There are on the one hand traditional suppliers from the old DMS-world like IBM, Filenet, Documentum, Gauss Interprise or IXOS which have already won their spurs in document management solutions. However, on the other hand suppliers like Interwoven or Reddot, which come from the arena of web content management, now climb into the ring under the banner of ECM. It will be shown very quickly to which extent demand and reality split up. The demand of ECM, to be used on a company-wide level, to have the same rights like other leading applications like ERP or office communication solutions, will be the biggest problem for the suppliers.
Alternative: document-technologies
Another approach for the new orientation of the industrial sector is DRT Document Related Technologies. This conceals the same components like at ECM - and some more. However, the demand is different. DRT-components integrate themselves as services into existing IT-landscapes. This is also a benefit for the suppliers, which have only specialised in individual components of the ECM-portfolio and do not run after the demand of a global solution. The advantages of the DRT-approach are, that where ever there is a demand, the functionality is integrated in existing applications and document technologies are used as infrastructure. You can also bundle DRT-components under an independent user surface, however, the integration in commercial or specialist applications, in office communication solutions and other big standard software applications is more promising than an independent, company-wide ECM-solution. Furthermore DRT is more open for new technological developments and will also include all technologies in the future, which deal with the handling of weak and unstructured information, the documents. Whether the suppliers succeed in establishing the acronym ECM in Germany through common marketing activities? Or if one rather tries to connect the German translation "document technologies" for DRT Document Related Technologies with the document term, which is anchored in the brain of German decision-makers? Or use another acronym? Finally it does not matter - first of all, the suppliers have to take care that their systems work and fulfil the increased demands of the users. A new acronym like ECM alone does not help much here.
Published: 03/2004
Author: Dr. Ulrich Kampffmeyer
  | | Dr. Ulrich Kampffmeyer is managing director of PROJECT CONSULT Unternehmensberatung GmbH, Hamburg, and director of the DLM Network EEIG, Worcester. Project Consult |
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