DOCUMENT Strategy Spring 2016

DOCUMENTmedia.com | spring.16

DSF

FEATURING

PREVIEW 2 016

DOCUMENT WORKFLOWS ARE AN UNTAPPED OPPORTUNITY

DATA ANALYTICS CLOSE THE LOOP HOW DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION WILL FUNDAMENTALLY CHANGE THE CUSTOMER COMMUNICATIONS FUNCTION PLUS

WHAT DOES CULTURE HAVE TO DO WITH INFORMATION MANAGEMENT?

THE DIGITAL STRATEGY Q&A WITH MARIA BOOS, SIEGEL+GALE D O C U M E N T S T R AT E G Y FORUM ISSUE

volume 23 issue 1

Spring.16

DOCUMENTmedia.com

Features

Competitive Marker 24 The Document workflows are an untapped opportunity

By Holly Muscolino

Digital Strategy: 20 The Do You Know Where You’re Going?

Q&A with Maria Boos, Siegel+Gale

Analytics Close 26 Data the Loop Aligning customer communications around the customer journey

By David Stabel

Departments

Columns

05 What’s New 06 Masthead 08 Editor’s View 10 Contributors 12 Think About It

the Paper Out: 14 Drive How Are We Doing?

SPECIAL PREVIEW Don’t miss our annual event on May 10-12 in Chicago! Register as our VIP guest and save up to $400!

Visit documentstrategyforum.com

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By Bob Larrivee

Up Business: 16 Speeding Are You Making the E-Delivery and E-Billing Experience Better than the Rest?

By Richard Rosen

Digital 18 InTransformation, Trust What You Already Know

Digital Transformation 28 How Will Fundamentally Change the Customer Communications Function

By Kaspar Roos

Strategy Forum 30 DOCUMENT Presents the Advisory Board Are you ready to meet your peers?

By Matt Mullen

Does Culture Have 32 What to Do with Information

Management? Everything

By Russell Stalters

Spring 2016

Features

What’s New

Optimize Document-Intensive Workflows to Increase Profits

By Ken Bechard http://documentmedia.com/article-2377Optimize-Document-Intensive-Workflows-toIncrease-Profits.html

Why Are Insurers So Focused on Customer Experience?

By Andrew Hellard http://documentmedia.com/article-2379-Why-AreInsurers-So-Focused-on-Customer-Experience.html

The Problem with OverClassification and Email

Digital Transformation Means Change: Creating Digital Agility

By Jamaal Davis http://documentmedia.com/article-2368The-Problem-with-Over-Classification-andEmail.html

By Allison Lloyd http://documentmedia.com/article-2376-DigitalTransformation-Means-Change-Creating-DigitalAgility.html

Are Simple Patterns Your Answer to a Better Customer Experience?

By Steve Biancaniello http://documentmedia.com/article-2366Are-Simple-Patterns-Your-Answer-to-aBetter-Customer-Experience.html

A Data-Driven Customer Communications Strategy: Think Incremental Improvements

By Francis Dion http://documentmedia.com/article2369-A-Data-Driven-CustomerCommunications-Strategy-ThinkIncremental-Improvements.html

The Digitization Project: Just Scan Everything?

By Paula Lederman http://documentmedia.com/article-2380The-Digitization-Project-Just-ScanEverything.html

Winning Customers: It’s About You

By Joao Penha-Lopes http://documentmedia.com/article-2374-WinningCustomers-Its-About-You.html

The Xerox Split, Disruption in the Imaging Industry and What It All Means

By Mario Diaz http://documentmedia.com/article-2363-The-XeroxSplit-Disruption-in-the-Imaging-Industry-and-What-ItAll-Means.html

Meeting Today’s Evolving Compliance Regulations

By Andy Jones http://documentmedia.com/article2364-Meeting-Todays-EvolvingCompliance-Regulations.html

DOCUMENTmedia.com spring.2016

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president

Chad Griepentrog

publisher

Ken Waddell

editor contributing editor contributors

advertising

audience development manager marketing creative director

Allison Lloyd

[ allison.l@rbpub.com ]

Amanda Armendariz Maria Boos Bob Larrivee Matt Mullen Holly Muscolino Kaspar Roos Richard Rosen David Stabel Russell Stalters Ken Waddell

[ ken.w@rbpub.com ] [ 608.442.5064 ]

DOCUMENT Strategy Media (ISSN 1081-4078) is published on a daily basis via its online portal and produces special print editions by RB Publishing Inc., 2901 International Lane, Madison, WI 53704-3128. All material in this magazine is copyrighted © 2016 by RB Publishing Inc. All rights reserved. Nothing may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher. Any correspondence sent to DOCUMENT Strategy Media, RB Publishing Inc. or its staff becomes the property of RB Publishing Inc. The articles in this magazine represent the views of the authors and not those of RB Publishing Inc. or DOCUMENT Strategy Media. RB Publishing Inc. and/or DOCUMENT Strategy Media expressly disclaim any liability for the products or services sold or otherwise endorsed by advertisers or authors included in this magazine.

SUBSCRIPTIONS: DOCUMENT Strategy Media is the essential publication for executives, directors and managers involved in the core areas of Communications, Enterprise Content Management and Information Management strategies. Free to qualified recipients; subscribe at documentmedia.com/subscribe.

REPRINTS: For high-quality reprints, please contact our exclusive reprint provider, ReprintPros, 949-702-5390, www.ReprintPros.com.

Rachel Chapman [ rachel@rbpub.com ]

Cierra Bauer Kelli Cooke

2901 International Drive Madison WI 53704-3128 p: 608-241-8777 f: 608-241-8666 email: rbpub@rbpub.com

APPLICATION ARTICLE

Are You Ready for the Future of Communication?

In her first annual address on the State of Mail at the recent National Postal Forum, Postmaster General Megan Brennan declared her mission to establish the Postal Service as a datadriven marketing channel fully in sync with an increasingly digital world, laying out a three-point plan: 1. bridge the gap between physical and digital methods and empower mail to begin the interactive experience for consumers; 2. increase the transparency of mail through enhanced tracking and real-time reaction capabilities; and 3. “hyper-personalize” mail, using customer data and the Intelligent Mail barcode (IMb) to make mailings more targeted and real-time.

Are you ready? Because we’ve been talking about this for a while now and we’re encouraged that others—including the German and Swiss posts, as well as the USPS—are taking up the mission. And of course the posts are not alone.

In a recent research note, Michael Maoz of Gartner discussed how, from the perspective of the customer, the lack of consistent treatment across communication channels is frustrating.

Customer satisfaction has not improved in the past decade, as we have seen in CapGemini’s World Insurance Reports and elsewhere. Mr. Maoz supports the idea of “Customer Engagement Hubs” that elevate customer service and support from simply a department within the organization to an organizing principle for the enterprise. He recommends that organizations take these steps in order to begin: • Analyze existing customer processes to determine where they fall short.

• Recognize that enterprise-wide customer service means that technology and processes won’t reside in a single system, but will be part of an ecosystem.

• Acknowledge that APIs are the connective tissue of that ecosystem.

Taking Mr. Maoz’s comments one step further would be to acknowledge the centrality of the customer transactional communication process in this endeavour. The most common communication between a business and a customer--an order confirmation, an invoice, a reminder, an advertisement, a response to a complaint—is the way to begin this mission.

The transactional document is omni-channel in execution and of central importance. It is also, along with those open APIs, where Compart can help you the most.

Think of an API this way: it connects the world you can’t control with the world that you can control. You can link ECM systems, CRM databases, legacy data, ERP, and much more.

Although so many organizations still struggle with disparate platforms and disconnected applications, the answer is not all that challenging once you set your mind to it. Companies all around the world have discovered the benefits of centralization by using Compart DocBridge solutions. With one central document and content hub and one system, output is created and delivered to meet the highest standards with the greatest cost-effectiveness. The result is a stream-lined process that allows for greater control, consistency and reliability.

We encourage you to contact us at www.compart.com and we will use our precision German software and experienced US ingenuity to work with you on a plan to extend your customer focused content into a customer engagement hub.

info@compart.com

EDITOR’S VIEW

I

@DOCUMENTmedia

TRANSFORMING WITH PURPOSE: PEOPLE, PROCESS AND THE CULTURE OF CHANGE

by Allison Lloyd

recently wrote an article titled “Digital Transformation Means Change.” Perhaps this is a simplistic distillation of the obvious, but for many of you, how you define what this change means to your individual organization and your commitment to aligning the processes and resources required will dictate your level of success.

As you will read in this issue, we define digital transformation as the application of digital technology to fundamentally change how you do business. The pivotal question is: What business are you in?

According to a Gartner study last year “Digital Marketers Will Monetize Disruptive Forces,” 89% of respondents believed that this would be the year where competitive advantage would rest on the customer experience.

Furthermore, Kaspar Roos, founder of Aspire Customer Communications Services and a former InfoTrends analyst, asserts on page 28, “Digital transformation aims to place the customer front and center and to rethink how to best serve and interact with the customer by digitizing and realigning business processes. Customer experience is an essential component of this that cannot be seen in isolation from the broader digital transformation program.”

The truth is transformation efforts need to be deployed in support of a real purpose. As business models become increasingly customer-centric, the pursuit of superior customer experience is cutting across the organization in unprecedented ways. However, our ability to respond to these changes and existing operational structures doesn’t always translate to this new world order. In that same Gartner study, “less than half of the respondents saw their capabilities in customer experience as superior to their peers.” Additionally, nearly one in five enterprises report they cannot honor a customer’s channel preferences due to information technology (IT)/data issues, according to InfoTrends’ report “Customer Engagement Technologies State of the Market 2015.”

Not surprisingly, for those companies who want to emerge from the pack, it will require dedication to your people, processes and the culture of change, not just the new tools for transformation. Holly Muscolino, vice president of document solutions at IDC, underscores this very point on page 24 by saying, “Above all, be sure to look beyond simply converting paper-based

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processes to digital equivalents. Replacing technology without changing processes or being able to do new things is not transformational.”

The reality is this: The majority of us are laggards when we begin to move past the act of just digitizing and push through to transforming our business models, the way we do business and how we engage our customers. Moving the needle in our strategic journey is filled with complexity, competing priorities, redundancy and rework and disjointed processes. When we say that fundamental changes are sweeping across the industry, this is not merely lip service.

Good or bad, we are all on the same journey. This is one of the main precepts of our conference, the DOCUMENT Strategy Forum. When people ask me what makes the Forum different than other education venues, I’m always proud to reply, “peer sharing.” Why is this so important or different than the rest? I believe the heart of peer sharing asks us to not only learn from our peers but challenges us to contribute in a meaningful way to advance the conversation. I hope you will begin to advance the conversation this May 10-12 in Chicago.

Until next time,

APPLICATION ARTICLE

Ensuring Technology is Enabling Continuous Improvement As an organization becomes more mature, the policies and procedures that support the core business practices strengthen.

To an external party, these can be seen as cumbersome, tedious and possibly even pointless; however, internally these procedures are developed with value, purpose and need. As these policies expand they may carry inefficiencies with them.

Flexibility

Configurability

Visibility

Interoperability

Enter technology.

Technology is an efficiency builder. It can be used to regain the losses in efficiency caused by policy, regulation or human interaction. It can be implemented to solve a single, small, repeatable task; or it can replace countless man hours of manual tedious, mundane labor that doesn’t contribute to the bottom line. Technology is an asset. Rather, technology is a requirement.

If it is established that technology is a requirement, what ensures our technology selection is the most optimal? Consider this example: A photocopier is used to duplicate pages of each contract that is received by an organization. What if the requirement changes to also copy the cover letter that accompanies the contract? It would be considered absurd if the photocopier couldn’t handle this simple requirement change, yet how does the enterprise software you use handle changes in requirements? This is known as flexibility.

Flexibility in a technology solution ensures that the business requirement is solved today, but the ability to solve the problems of tomorrow exists. Rarely do requirements in business remain static. Using software that merely meets the needs of today is a short-sighted mistake. It will leave you stranded in a world of “square peg meet round hole” for far too long.

Consider the same example with the photocopier, but the requirement is to scale the copied pages down to ¼ of the size.

Configurability. Consider the need to check how many copies were printed in the last month. Visibility. Lastly, consider the need for the copies to be immediately shredded (Wasteful? Yes, but it is just an example). The ability to remove all the manual processes between the output of the photocopier and the input of the shredder is called Interoperability.

These are the components that provide exponential returns on investment relative to a one-dimensional solution. When technology is able to solve the business requirements, yet allow additional improvements to be made at any point in the future, an ideal solution has been found.

BlueRelay is such a solution.

Initially designed to meet the increasingly demanding requirements of tight document approval timelines in the Healthcare industry, BlueRelay provides these fundamental necessities within its enterprise document and process management platform in addition to solving the business requirements through its document routing, compare and annotation abilities.

Ultimately, the decision is yours. You can choose to be a “square peg meet round hole” decision maker; or you can choose software that continuously gives you increased value.

info@bluerelay.com

CONTRIBUTORS

Maria Boos Ms. Boos is the group director of simplification at global branding firm Siegel+Gale.

She has 25 years of experience helping companies streamline and simplify complex communications and interactions to enhance customer experience, reinforce the brand and achieve operational efficiencies. She holds both an MA in professional writing and a BS in industrial management from Carnegie Mellon University.

Russell Stalters Mr. Stalters is the founder of Clear Path Solutions Inc. and author of gettinginformationdone.com. He is a recognized information and data management expert. Over the years, he has established a reputation as a subject matter expert for information and data management, SharePoint and Office 365-based solutions. Most recently, as director of information and data management and chief architect for BP’s Gulf Coast Restoration Organization, he created the strategy and applications to manage over a petabyte of information.

DON’T MISS THESE SPEAKERS AT

Holly Muscolino Ms. Muscolino is the research vice president of document solutions at IDC. She is responsible for all written research related to document services and the solutions that enable them, including managed print services, related software solutions, the scanning ecosystem and document outsourcing.

She brings to IDC more than 25 years of experience in product management, strategy development and market research within the document solutions industry. Previously, she led the document outsourcing and production workflow solutions practice areas for InfoTrends. Ms. Muscolino attended the University of Connecticut and Boston University where she earned an MS in computer systems engineering.

Kaspar Roos Mr. Roos is the founder and CEO of Aspire Customer Communications Services, an international technology advisory firm specializing in customer communications transformation and customer engagement optimization. Before starting Aspire, he ran InfoTrends’ global production workflow and customer communications advisory service. At his tenure at InfoTrends, he helped leading technology vendors and service providers understand the shifts in the customer communications and workflow markets by providing market research, insights and strategic consulting services.

David Stabel Kahtan Aizouki • Randy Beals • John Biske • Max Boedder • Damien Brunet • Alison Brunsdon Jon Carlson • Kemal Carr • Joe Carroll • Brett Collins Roger Cope • Scott Draeger • Daniele Farinaccia Brad Felske • Gina Ferrara • Ron Glaz • Avi Greenfield Jeroen Huinink • Kristen Jacobsen • Carl Jaekel Sheri Jammallo • Derick Jenkins • Matt McClelland Rich Medina • Declan Moss • Neha Parekh Kamal Patel • Stephanie Pieruccini • Hassan Qureshi Lane Severson • Joe Shepley • Steve Shimek Courtney Stone • Dave Venance • Sharon Waters James Watson • Lisa Weese • John Zimmerer • Mike Zink

Mr. Stabel is an associate director for InfoTrends’ production workflow & customized communications services. His primary focus area is on the graphic communications industry, data processing and customer communications management markets. Before joining InfoTrends, Mr. Stabel worked as a director of software strategy and market analysis at Canon (former Océ).

Earlier in his career, Mr. Stabel held various other positions within Océ, ranging from business development, strategy consultancy and project management.

APPLICATION ARTICLE

Insurance Platform Powers Multichannel Communications with Adaptive Process Mobiliar holds the leading position in the Swiss insurance market, providing a full range of products and services ranging from property, liability and vehicle to life insurance.

ensuring consistent corporate identity and design. Multilingual business staff work in their language of choice regardless of the preferred customer correspondence language.

In 2015, Mobiliar received the WfMC Global Award for its new “Mobiliar Korrespondenz System” or MKS because of its innovative use of business process technology in revamping its customer communications.

Clerks access the correspondence system independently from their office locations and create customer-specific documents by simply answering prompted questions.

The associated document processes dynamically provide required data, note the clerk’s decisions and perform any required work, automatically assembling the insurance document to match the customer’s situation, including all relevant regulations and inclusions. Completed documents can be edited and locally printed, exported as PDF or delivered to customers per selected delivery channels - or even exchanged with other Mobiliar business applications.

Mobiliar saw an opportunity to communicate and build strong relationships with customers in different languages and countries. With annual business user correspondence volumes exceeding 6.3 million envelopes, Mobiliar recognized the importance of an effective system capable of producing and delivering highvolume, high-quality, multichannel customer communications in a short time.

The existing system based on Microsoft Word left document administrators struggling to maintain hundreds of templates in multiple language variants across the distributed system used by more than 4,000 clerks. Creating thousands of documents daily from local document templates had resulted in uncontrollable growth of template versions and deviations from the corporate style. Manual data exchange, document delivery and attachments to the insurance cases managed by other business applications also caused time delays and high administrative costs for customer communication.

The new centralized MKS based on the Papyrus Platform helped introduce a new workstyle that empowers players to focus on their strengths and promotes collaboration along clearly defined lines of responsibilities. Business users flexibly design and maintain content and processes without IT through a specialized, role-based workplace that integrates all tools and permissions. IT supports more complex and technical tasks like integration to external systems and services.

To ensure consistency and maximize resources, the MKS allows large-scale re-usability of document components and streamlines processes so the front-office staff can focus on customer needs. All templates and resources are managed by the system and stored in a versioned central repository,

Using the Papyrus ACM and BPM capabilities and solution frameworks, MKS manages the complete document lifecycle from design through execution to delivery according to specific Mobiliar policy. Process control for business users enables updates as new business requirements demand, allowing Mobiliar to respond to change and seize new opportunities.

The MKS exceeded Mobiliar’s expectations, providing results in efficiency, production and service across the organization, including reduced document templates and improved document quality, 20x increase in daily production, synchronous data integration, reduced time to market for new services and enhanced focus on customer experience.

Visit isis-papyrus.com/solutionscatalog to review the Mobiliar case study with full details.

info@isis-papyrus.com 817.416.2345

Think About It “We see an increased focus on an emerging, but key, role in CCM to do with communications analytics, which analyze the effectiveness of all communications sent out and then measures customer response to messaging.”

— ALLISON LLOYD

“Asking ‘Where do we need to go?’ is quite different from ‘Where do we want to go?’”

“One out of three MPS users indicate intentions to switch providers or exit managed print services altogether.”

— JOAO PENHA-LOPES

— MARIO DIAZ

— SCOTT DRAEGER

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— DAVE SMITH “JUST AS ENTERPRISES DEPLOY ACCESS AND SECURITY MEASURES FOR COMPUTER SYSTEMS AND BUILDINGS, THE SAME ATTENTION IS NEEDED FOR DOCUMENT HANDLING.” — MARTIN DE MARTINI

SYSTEMS.”

“There’s no difference between poor internal and external document management practices—they’re all connected, and they all impact the health of the organization.”

“Mobile, cloud, data analytics and social business are key enablers driving digital transformation and impacting how businesses work with information.”

— MICHAEL LAURIE

— THOMAS SCHNECK

— ROBERT PALMER

“ALMOST ALL BUSINESSES WILL NEED TO INTEGRATE THE E-SIGNATURE TECHNOLOGY WITH THEIR BUSINESS

“According to Gartner, 25% of enterprises will have a chief data officer (CDO) in place. Some companies might have a chief experience officer (CXO) instead.”

“In developing collaboration strategies, it should go without saying that people and how they work has to be the focus.”

“An effective IG program provides an additional level of value: an enterprisewide framework for managing information throughout the entire document life cycle to support an organization's objectives and legal requirements.”

— KEN BECHARD

DRIVE THE

PAPER OUT

By Bob Larrivee

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How are we doing?

T

he mantra of our industry has long been one of “being paper-free.” This is not new; we have been chanting this since the early days of document imaging. Overcoming the differences between acceptance of the idea, improved technologies and the realization that this reality can be achieved, though, is no small task. Making progress toward paper-free processes needs to be understood and accepted by the organization as a whole—as a continuous improvement campaign. Every process should be reviewed for the potential to drive out paper.

As reported in the AIIM research study “Paper-Free Progress: measuring outcomes,” 16% of our responding organizations approach being paper-free as an ongoing campaign, though only three percent report that they have nearly reached the limit of suitable paper-free candidates. While it may seem a monumental task, removing paper from various processes is possible.

The reality is that it will not happen overnight, and there is even the probability that not all processes can be paper-free at this time due to regulatory, legal or industry constraints. My point is that there are possibilities, and you have to make a conscious effort to find them and work at it.

The first step is to create a vision depicting a paper-free environment—one that operates completely on digital information.

What would it look like in your business world? What processes could be enhanced through the elimination of paper, and what impact will it have on the stakeholders? Is there risk in moving to a paper-free process, and what level of risk is there?

Identify a process and walk through it, pinpointing all of the information related to that process. Document who creates it and how it is created. Learn where and how it enters the information ecosystem and your business processes. Assess if there is a way to capture this information closer to the first touchpoint. If it is paper-based information coming from the outside, look for ways to scan it earlier in the process or find a way to capture it digitally from the beginning. As an example, if the document you are dealing with is an application form, investigate the possibility of using digital forms and online completion.

We are closer to becoming a paper-free society than ever before. We can complete application forms, place orders for various products and even acquire products—books, music, videos and more—all online and without the need for paper.

It may not be possible for you to get rid of all of the paper from your business processes in the immediate future, but it is possible for you to start. Go ahead. Take the first step. You will be surprised at the difference it makes. O

BOB LARRIVEE is vice president of market intelligence at AIIM and an internationally recognized subject matter expert and thought leader with over 30 years of experience in the fields of information and process management. Follow him on Twitter @BobLarrivee.

DOCUMENTmedia.com spring.2016

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SPEEDING UP BUSINESS Are you making the e-delivery and e-billing experience better than the rest?

By Richard Rosen

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recently read a provocative article by Tom Monahan in Fortune magazine called “Revving Up Your Corporate RPMs.” What struck me was his conclusion that rather than speeding up, business is slowing down. Decision-making is taking longer, and project completion times are extending. Some of it is bureaucracy; some is risk aversion and regulation; and in some cases, it is due to cost cutting. Even too much collaboration (too many people involved on a project) can be counterproductive. Monahan states that between 2010 and 2015, the average time to hire a new employee went from 42 to 63 days; the average time to complete an office information technology (IT) project increased by more than a month to over 10 months (from start to delivery); and sales cycles are taking 22% longer, partly because two buyers have turned into five buyers.

Of course, we can’t help but notice the impact that increased regulation and financial reporting is having on business profitability. In addition, who can’t help but note the increasing number of people who are copied on an email or invited to a meeting, just so they can be informed and kept in the loop? Closer to home is the general slowdown in mail delivery. As the United States Postal Service (USPS) works aggressively to control costs in light of declining volumes, the percentage of mail delivered on time has decreased. In order to improve performance against standards, the standards are lowered. In contrast, electronic delivery and e-billing run counter to these trends. By its very nature, e-delivery allows businesses to deliver mail more efficiently and quickly than through the Postal Service and overnight services, like FedEx. Most large businesses have offered and promoted electronic delivery and e-billing for a decade or more, and the results have been mixed. Some have achieved adoption rates approaching

50%, for at least some documents, while others are stuck in the mid-teens.

It often depends on the relationship a business has with its customers (e.g., arm’s length like utilities or more intimate, such as some insurance companies). Maybe even more important is a company’s focus on programs, contests and incentives. My insurance company offers a two percent discount for e-delivery, a costly but effective incentive.

The trick, of course, is to make the customer experience for e-delivery and electronic payments better than the paper experience. We’re all about, “What’s in it for me? Who cares if e-billing saves the biller money if it’s more work for me?” The rapid growth of and use of smart mobile devices and enhancements to mobile wallets (e.g., Apple Wallet and Android Pay) make the user experience and convenience much more compelling for customers to make the switch and finally give up their paper.

With mobile devices, you can see your bill anywhere, anytime and, just as importantly, pay it right away and forget about it. FiServe stated in their recently released report “Mobile Billing and Payment: Consumer Preferences and Billers’ Strategic Response” that in 2015, 33% of households paid at least one bill on their mobile device, up from 27% in 2014. Why? It was easy to do (47%), convenient (44%), not near a computer (42%), saves time (41%) and anytime access (40%).

So, let’s do our part and speed up business communications through customer-friendly, mobile-enabled e-delivery and e-billing. It is a win-win for business and their customers. Nothing in business is better than that. O

RICHARD ROSEN is the chief executive officer of The RH Rosen Group. The RH Rosen Group works with clients to reduce costs and improve cash flow through paper reduction and process improvements. Contact him at RichR@RHRosenGroup.com.

DOCUMENTmedia.com spring.2016

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By Matt Mullen

IN DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION,

TRUST WHAT YOU ALREADY KNOW

IN

a sweeping generalization, which I will subsequently withdraw from the table, I’ll state that there are only two types of people: those who walk into a room confident they are the cleverest person there and those who do the same but assume they are the stupidest. Ok, it’s more complicated than that, but I’m guessing most of you are probably pumped to be in the second category, right? I know I think that way. I like to think that this attitude is helpful in what I do, as it makes me far more inclined to listen than to talk and to learn something that I didn’t previously know.

Of course, that’s where this system is a little stuck. For it to really work, it means that the cleverest people must outnumber the stupidest by such a colossal margin so that we can be constantly taught new things during each interaction. The fact that we pretty much all said we identify with the latter in the last paragraph suggests that the balance is out of whack.

So, let’s strike out that generalization and suggest another one, which might work better: We listen more closely to those who believe they are the cleverest person in the room than we do our own voices. When you’re reading about digital transformation, in general, the same thing is happening (and I guess the fact that I regularly write here on this subject automatically disqualifies me from my previous assertion of belonging in the stupidest group). However, aside from the ramblings about public transport, plumbing and cookies/biscuits, much of what I talk about here are generally accepted truisms: Work should be easier; technology should deliver something tangible for customers and employees alike; and that if everyone codes

full time, then professional sports as we know it would cease to exist.

Now, I’m not going to pretend to know your business. I might understand how it works at a high level but not the real machinations of how your organization functions. What I have come to tell you—free of charge— is that you probably know 95% of what you need to know about how your organization should face the challenges presented by digital transformation. Now that doesn’t make things easy or pain-free. It doesn’t mean that there are not people to whom you’re going to want to refer to for help along the way for guidance, reassurance or review, but right now, you can all envision what the end result should look like, feel like and work like.

Instead, what we tend to do is listen to the clever people who tell us that drones, robots, virtual reality and self-driving vehicles are all coming for us, and because we over listen to those voices, all of the sudden, the future sounds unfamiliar and unmanageable. I’m going to go out on a ledge here and suggest that, in fact, none of those things are going to feature significantly in your working future if you’re in the world of work already, if ever.

Instead, all those incremental changes that you know will fundamentally shift your organization toward what it can become are what you should be addressing. Now, all you’ve got to do is start listening to what you know to be true. O

MATT MULLEN is a senior analyst of social business for 451 Research, where some of his primary areas of focus are digital marketing and social media technology. Follow him on Twitter @MattMullenUK. DOCUMENTmedia.com spring.2016

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THE DIGITAL STRATEGY: DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOU’RE GOING?

&

with Maria Boos, Siegel+Gale DOCUMENTmedia.com spring.2016

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Q:

While the notion of “digital transformation” is not new, it is still misunderstood. Why do you think that is the case?

A:

Part of the problem is that there’s no universal definition. When you hear the phrase, it could be about social strategy, developing an app, customer relationship management (CRM)—or any number of digital tools, depending on the source, but the bigger problem is the phrase itself. It seems to put the focus on transformation for its own sake, separate from any real purpose.

I think it’s much more instructive to talk about digital in service of transforming the customer experience.

Q: A:

What is the biggest obstacle facing companies trying to bring about digital transformation?

The biggest obstacle can be ambiguity—or even worse, disagreement—about the company’s digital strategy and its role in the overarching customer experience strategy. If you say you’re committed to creating simple, personalized customer experiences but don’t invest in the technology architecture to achieve it, you’ve got a disconnect. Likewise, if your leadership is divided on the purpose of driving customers to digital channels (i.e., is it intended to create a personalized experience, or is it primarily about cost savings?), it’s hard to succeed. Additional risks include underestimating resources required for true transformation—particularly in terms of data availability—and simply taking on too much at one time, so efforts become diluted or lose momentum.

Q:

Digital transformation requires a renewed focus on the entire customer experience, but where should companies typically start?

A:

For any aspect of the customer experience, digital or otherwise, start with customers’ needs. What do they want to do? What motivates them to act? What makes them hesitate, and with unflinching honesty, what’s their preferred channel for any particular step along their customer journey? If a digital experience meets their needs but also does so with simplicity and surprise, many customers will be fully satisfied with that interaction, but if they need help or have a problem and don’t find it easy to connect in their preferred channel, you can lose a lot of ground.

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Q: A:

What role does customer journey mapping play when it comes to creating digital experiences?

Customer journey mapping is hugely valuable, as long as it’s a means, not an end. Companies should practice it to determine what, when and how they should shape the customer experience to drive engagement and satisfaction. The “how” will often be through digital touchpoints that make a genuine personal connection with customers and integrate seamlessly with their entire experience of a brand, product or service.

There’s an important implication here that customer journey mapping is valuable as a tool to help craft the ideal customer experience, not just to document what the current experience is. Some companies get stuck in the documentation mode—“We understand our customers because we have painstakingly documented the current experience.” However, that’s only useful if you take the next steps to invest in research to identify genuine customer needs and preferences and then use those insights to refine and evolve the customer journey, of course, optimizing the use of digital touchpoints when they’re the best fit for delivering against those needs and preferences.

Q: A:

What are some of the common pitfalls that companies make when creating a digital strategy?

Putting the cart before the horse—either choosing technology before defining requirements or choosing functionality (as in, “We MUST have an app”) before defining what customers truly need. Sometimes, the organizational structure exacerbates this. If “digital” is owned by a separate functional group on the org chart, it can operate in a vacuum, pretty far removed from the folks who understand customer needs and develop the products and services that drive engagement.

Quality assurance that makes sense.

Q:

In recent years, an increasing number of organizations have established “Digital Center of Excellence” teams. Is that a preferred approach?

A:

That depends. Having real digital experts in user experience design, content strategy and web and mobile technologies is essential, of course, but where you position them in the organization can significantly affect their impact. It can be most effective to think of digital expertise as a horizontal, not a vertical. In a horizontal approach, the digital competency is embedded across functional teams to create integrated working groups. With the digital experts working alongside marketing, product owners and information technology (IT), the team is best positioned to think about digital solutions in the context of the whole customer experience, not as isolated whiz-bang technology.

Q:

In your opinion, what are the critical characteristics of an organization to promote a change culture for the digital strategy?

A:

First, a shared vision about the role digital plays in transforming and supporting the customer experience. Second, a commitment to customer-centric design, including the investment in research to uncover real insights about what customers want. Third, the right infrastructure with executive support and digital capabilities embedded in integrated working teams. O

Don’t miss Maria Boos’ Opening Keynote, “Digital Transformation Along the Customer Journey: How to Transform and Operationalize Your Customer Experience” at the DOCUMENT Strategy Forum on May 10, 2016 at 9:00am - 9:50am on key trends in digital transformation that are forging new best practices for simple, relevant and engaging customer experiences.

Dollars and cents, that is.

Eliminate manual document testing. Paloma’s Print Perfect solution automates your entire document QA process, ensuring you don’t throw money (and time) out the window.

While we can’t print money, Paloma can ensure that your document QA process saves dollars and makes sense.

To learn how Print Perfect can save you money and time while reducing document errors, log on to palomaprintproducts.com or call us at 262-618-4125.

Visit us at Document Strategy Forum in Chicago – booth 417.

© 2016 Paloma Print Products

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THE COMPETITIVE MARKER

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Document workflows are an untapped opportunity

By Holly Muscolino

The unrelenting requirement to increase revenues, reduce costs, secure corporate assets and innovate is prompting organizations across all industries to identify areas that are ripe for digital transformation. IDC defines digital transformation as the application of “3rd Platform” technologies—cloud, mobility, big data analytics and social media—to fundamentally change the way something is done. As organizations seek to optimize business processes across the customer, product and service life cycles, the document workflows that support a company’s operations are an often overlooked opportunity to further drive business transformation.

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However, cloud-based applications, mobile devices and the increasing socialization of business are creating new pain points, as well as new opportunities, related to document and information management. Your stakeholders—both internal and external— expect access to the content that they need, when they need it and via their desired medium, and that medium is increasingly shifting from paper to electronic versions. Although electronic formats are enabling new ways of doing business, in some industries, they are also driving regulatory changes. At the same time, the number of content types and channels are increasing, and organizations must manage both structured and unstructured content arriving through a myriad of media channels.

Paper continues to play a role in businesses of all sizes, and in all industries, and contributes to document workflow pain points. According to recent IDC research of knowledge workers in the United States, 28% of all documents used each week are in paper format, and this is only expected to decrease to 20% in the coming two years. We all know that searching for information within paper documents is time-consuming and frustrating. Knowledge workers spend an average of two and a half hours per week searching for documents. Integrating this information into any type of enterprise application or back-office system requires manual intervention. Many organizations have a number of disparate systems that generate, consume and store content, contributing further to document inefficiencies. Knowledge workers in our study used an average of five different content repositories to find documents (paper or digital) on a weekly basis.

Document compliance and security suffer as well. In an earlier IDC study, sponsored by Adobe, more than a third of business leaders indicated problems with agreements missing signatures, initials or dates—or that have been signed by the wrong person; nearly half (46%) aren’t sure they have copies of all signed agreements. Just over half (51%) say they have problems with documents that are misfiled or lost.

It appears obvious that the automation and optimization—and ultimate transformation—of document workflows should be on the organizational radar. Document workflow is an untapped opportunity for further cost reduction, and this doesn’t just mean eliminating print-related costs.

Additional examples are decreasing transaction times or reducing the fees and penalties paid for lateness or non-compliance. There is also the opportunity to increase employee productivity, including minimizing rework and errors. Digital workflows are more easily tracked, leading to improved auditability, greater accountability and increased security. All of this adds up to competitive advantage for an organization.

So why aren’t organizations focused on document workflows already? A large part of the reason is that document workflows in general, and print specifically, are an often overlooked expense because its oversight is distributed across the organization. Since they are so fragmented, inefficient and retain outdated processes, though painful, they may not be top of mind for decision makers. These decision makers may not be aware that there are opportunities for transformation within these processes—and if they are

aware, document workflows may not be a priority versus other “3rd Platform” and digital transformation initiatives.

So, how do you go about making these changes within your own organization? First, you should evaluate your existing document workflow infrastructure and process maturity to gain a good understanding of your starting point and your organization’s readiness for transforming document workflows. Use this evaluation to identify use cases with the most significant pain points and the greatest potential for return on investment. Develop a strategy to address those pain points.

Consider a pilot initiative for one specific workflow. This can be used as a proof of concept and a way to demonstrate potential benefits.

Of course, it may be important to educate key stakeholders and decision makers in both information technology (IT) and line of business. As we noted previously, document workflows and the opportunity for process improvement is frequently under the radar of decision makers. Above all, be sure to look beyond simply converting paper-based processes to digital equivalents—think about how “3rd Platform” technologies could be used to drive entirely new business models.

Replacing technology without changing processes or being able to do new things is not transformational. O

Don’t miss IDC’s General Session, “Transformation of Document Workflows LIVE Benchmarking” at the DOCUMENT Strategy Forum on May 11, 2016 at 4:10pm - 5:00pm. All attendees will receive a personalized recommendation sheet on how to progress to higher levels of document workflow maturity.

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By David Stabel

Aligning customer communications around the customer journey

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I

n his famous management book first published in 1954, The Practice of Management, Peter F. Drucker stated, “The goal of a business is to create and keep customers.” Today, more than 60 years later, businesses are focusing on the customer again as they are pursuing a customer-centric business model, with customer experience as the new “holy grail.” Yet, there are significant differences between 1954 and today when it comes to creating and keeping customers. Today, there is a better understanding of the concept of customer experience in literature as well as in practice.

Furthermore, businesses have a multitude of options at hand for managing the customer experience. Approaching it from a customer communications management (CCM) point of view will make it an easier process.

In managing customer experience, the customer journey is an increasingly popular management tool. Similar to Drucker, who talks about creating and keeping customers, the customer journey, as defined by InfoTrends, describes a customer acquisition phase and a customer retention phase. Business functions are typically designed to support individual engagements between the business and the customer across the customer journey. CCM is a crucial element of customer journey management as it facilitates the communications in each of these engagements—whether that is an onboarding process, providing a bill or statement or servicing a customer call.

The customer acquisition phase should be supported by personalized, datadriven communications that are appropriate for where the customer is in the journey. Data capture and customer analytics provide the starting point for this process in each point of engagement, driving relevant and personalized content suitable for delivery via the customer’s preferred communication channels.

The customer’s responses are captured, tracked and fed back into the business’s

customer databases to inform subsequent cycles of communication and to support the next stage in the customer’s journey.

Each engagement involves the rundown of a complete CCM cycle (data capture and customer analytics, content composition, omni-channel distribution and response management). Doing this in (nearly) realtime is important, because it allows the business and the customer to instantly switch between channels while continuing the conversation. This is the essence of an omni-channel approach.

One of the key challenges in managing customer communications across the customer journey is dealing with multiple departments, with increasing input from marketing and sales as well as customer support and service. Many of these internal divisions are mirrored and sometimes further entrenched by legacy information technology (IT) systems that cannot communicate with each other, resulting in siloed data and a fragmented view of the customer. For example, according to InfoTrends’ “Customer Engagement Technologies State of the Market 2015” research, nearly one in five enterprises cannot honor a customer’s channel preferences due to IT/data issues.

In addition to an often frustrating experience for customers who may have to deal with multiple and apparently unconnected departments over time, siloed data means missed opportunities for the business to identify developing customer needs or to detect/predict receptiveness to new offers. Ideally, there should be complete transparency within the business so that each person or group involved in any aspect of customer communications can see what the others have done—whether it is mailing regular transactional statements; running a multi-channel, personalized marketing campaign; or handling customer service calls in the call center.

To address these issues, businesses need to “close the loop” in their customer communications, allowing the feedback

and insights gained from one engagement to be used by another across customer journeys. This directs and refines customer communications as well as allows for synchronization across multiple communication channels. The key underlying technology for closing the loop is data analytics.

Synchronizing the communication experience across multiple engagements, providing customer-facing staff with real-time customer communication history, as well as offering better data-driven personalization and relevant communications are among the key initiatives enterprises are currently considering, according to InfoTrends’ research in key CCM industries. Data analytics applied within a CCM context is enabling this. In our research, enterprises expressed interest in increasing their IT spend in data analytics technology or have it on their short list of IT investments. Other enterprises indicated that they turn to service providers for help with data analytics and customer segmentation.

Having skills and expertise in data analytics is becoming, if it has not already, a competitive differentiator for businesses.

The ability to master this discipline will be a deciding factor for whether or not businesses are successful in improving the customer experience by aligning their customer communications around the customer journey. O

Don’t miss David Stabel’s session, “Smart Customer Engagement: Achieving a 360 Digital View” at the DOCUMENT Strategy Forum on May 11, 2016 at 9:30am - 10:20am on how to close the loop in your customer experiences.

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How Digital

Transformation Will Fundamentally Change the Customer Communications Function

DSF SPEAKER 2 016

By Kaspar Roos

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any enterprises, particularly those operating in regulated industries, have long-established customer communications teams and well-defined processes in place to ensure smooth delivery of critical communications. In order to protect against risk and to minimize cost, most have invested heavily in automated

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customer communications systems that are backed by rigorous governance and control processes.

In large organizations, however, the scale of the document inventory and the complexities of legacy infrastructure can mean that large teams are required to manage those communications. As a result, the typical customer communications function is rigid rather than agile, reactive instead of proactive and is driven by risk reduction or compliance concerns rather than being focused on innovation and business enablement.

While this may have worked in the past, it is not going to work in the future. Customer communications

executives that do not evolve their customer communications function risk becoming marginalized and being seen as barriers rather than enablers of business growth. There are two key business drivers at work that will necessitate a fundamental rethink of how customer communications are managed: digital transformation and customer experience.

Digital transformation is about the application of digital technology to fundamentally change a company’s business model, operations and ways of engaging with its customers. A great example is Quicken Loans with its Rocket Mortgage offering. Quicken Loans, a US-based loan provider, has completely digitized and redeveloped its mortgage application offering, including back-office processes such as underwriting, building an easy-to-

use website and mobile app that applicants can use to upload or link to all their details. As a result, accepted customers can now take out a fully underwritten mortgage in less than 10 minutes, compared to the weeks or even months it could take to complete a conventional process.

We are seeing similar innovative developments in other financial services areas and in other industries.

Driven by digitization, big data, the Internet of Things and other emerging trends, the number of companies engaged in digital transformation can be expected to rise dramatically. Digital transformation enables businesses to fundamentally rethink their offerings and position themselves for growth in increasingly competitive markets.

Communications play a key role in this process. Digital transformation happens across the entire business, and the distinction between transactional and promotional communications is rapidly blurring and losing its significance. It is no surprise, therefore, that marketers, digital officers and customer experience officers are taking more and more ownership of critical communications. For them, any customer touchpoint is an opportunity to add value, and they are very much aware that it is four to five times more cost-effective to keep an existing customer than to acquire a new one.

Creating a customer experience that is consistent throughout the customer journey is an overriding objective for today’s enterprise marketer.

Customer experience is the perception that customers have of all their interactions with a brand. If a company sends relevant, authentic, easy-to-understand messages that are delivered through the customer’s channel of choice, it is much more likely to be seen as a business that delivers a good customer experience. From research, we know that customer experience leaders significantly outperform customer experience laggards in terms of business growth and stock return. Customer experience leaders have significantly more engaged customers, better retention rates, higher wallet share (via upselling or cross-selling) and less expensive service requirements than their peers.

Good customer experience involves engaging and simple-to-understand messaging, which is fully personalized in terms of channel, message, timing and location. It is also almost certain to be truly omni-channel, meaning that customers can start a conversation in one channel—responding to a printed communication, for example—and continue it seamlessly in another, by phone, email or online as they prefer. For this, a modern communications platform with centralized tracking is essential.

Digital transformation aims to place the customer front and center and to rethink how to best serve and interact with the customer by digitizing and realigning business processes. Customer experience is an essential component of this that cannot be seen in isolation from the broader digital transformation program; enterprises with an outdated customer communications approach will struggle to be seen as relevant.

This means that customer experience or digital transformation teams are going to develop various new propositions, including how to communicate

with customers. Customer experience professionals require proactive support and certainly cannot afford to wait three months (a real market average) for a message template to be developed.

The risk is that to meet their goals, they will migrate customer communications to digital teams, creating redundancy in processes and adding extra cost in maintenance and development. Often missed, but equally important, are the implications from the risk/compliance and governance/organizational perspectives, areas where customer communications teams typically have strong expertise and can make a difference.

For customer communications professionals, it is essential to get ready for the changes that are coming. There are three main steps: First, get educated on the changes that are happening in the marketplace. Attend tradeshows, customer events or vendor technology briefings as these are excellent ways to get—and stay—up to date. The next five years will likely see more changes in customer communications management than we have seen in the last 10. Second, review your customer communications function and ask yourself to what extent it can really help drive the organization forward: Do customer experience professionals see you as a trusted advisor that can help them realize their communication goals, or do they see you as an obstacle to work around?

Third, check that you have a communications technology platform in place that enables omni-channel communications with centralized tracking that empowers business users to own their communications and which is backed by the right level of governance. If you don’t, it may make sense to carry out an audit or bring in outside expertise to help you transform your own functional area before you can help other parts of the organization with their digital transformation goals. O

Don’t miss Kaspar Roos’ session “The Customer Experience Journey: Building 3D Personalization” at the DOCUMENT Strategy Forum on May 11, 2016 at 9:30am - 10:20am.

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PRESENTS THE ADVISORY BOARD

ARE YOU READY

EDITOR’S NOTE

TO MEET YOUR PEERS? We are amidst a time of extraordinary change and faced with very real challenges as “customer-centricity” and disruptive digital technologies rewrite the rules as we know them. Time and time again, executives tell me that the most valuable lessons they learn are through their peers. In this spirit, we’ve assembled a team of 13 leaders to spearhead the only Peer-Driven, Peer-Reviewed and Peer-Produced conference to tackle the strategies that are upending our traditional business models. I encourage you to meet each of these individuals in Chicago on May 10-12, share your story and collaborate together on what the future really looks like. The heart of peer sharing asks us to not only learn from our peers but challenges us to contribute in a meaningful way to advance the conversation. Through each individual, we all learn.

Senior Vice President, Business Architecture Services, Wealth Management Wells Fargo Jackson serves as leader of business architecture services at Wells Fargo’s Wealth Management Group.

In this role, he is responsible for multiple business technology functions, including wealth management help desk and application entitlements, imaging, information services, business process consulting and business systems consulting planning.

MICHAEL COFFMAN

CHRIS COTTELEER

DEANNA DORSEY

Director, Operations, Print and Distribution Unum

Chief Information Officer Schumacher Group

Manager, Document Automation Grange Insurance

Michael is a director in the Document Management Operations (DMO) team at Unum Insurance.

He has 14 years experience contributing to the strategy and leading print and mail operations across multiple sites for the company, as well as strengthening current and future DMO capabilities.

Chris is a seasoned and successful healthcare information technology professional. He has over two decades of experience making highimpact business decisions through the use of pragmatic and innovative systems and solutions in the information technology sector.

Deanna is the manager of the document automation team at Grange Insurance. She has over 20 years of experience leading information technology (IT) teams in the area of customer communications. Deanna has worked in the utility, financial and the insurance industries.

GERALD EDWARDS

NANCY GREEN

JESSICA HARMAN, CRM

Director, IT, Content Management EmblemHealth Gerald is director of information technology and manages electronic data interchange (EDI), content and document management teams. He has over 30 years of experience as a consultant and employee across numerous industries.

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Assistant Vice President, Simplify Customer Communication MetLife Nancy is AVP of US Customer Communications at MetLife responsible for transforming correspondence which includes setting standards and guidelines, writing simple, easy-to-understand content and improving the customer experience. She has an extensive background in financial services.

Supervisor, Records & Information Management Phillips 66 Jessica is currently serving as the supervisor for the records and information management team at Phillips 66. She is a Certified Records manager, Certified Information Professional and actively participates in both ARMA Tulsa and Houston chapters.

FRED KAM Director, SPM for Client and Tax Reporting UBS Financial Services Inc. Fred is the information technology (IT) director of client and tax reporting with UBS Financial Services, Inc. He has been with the firm for 20 years. Previously, Fred was part of the management team supporting the mutual fund business in a prior role.

JAMES KENNEDY, CRM, IGP Manager, Records & Information Management Tallgrass Energy James is the corporate records manager at Tallgrass Energy and has been in the records and information management field for many years in various different positions, giving him a cross-functional ability that is unique in records.

MIKE KRAMER Assistant Vice President, Enterprise Document Services (EDS) USAA Mike currently oversees the Enterprise Document Services (EDS) organization at USAA. He joined USAA in 1995 and has held a variety of leadership roles within document management, business continuation, data/application security and physical security.

DUPREE W. POTTER SR.

CONNIE SCHUMACHER

LYNNETTE SORENSEN

Managing Director, Regulatory Participant Communications TIAA

Senior Specialist, Records Management Purdue Pharma LP

Business Manager, Integrated Solutions State Farm

Constance is an experienced practitioner in the field of information governance, enterprise content management, records and information management and archival administration. She has assisted organizations to identify, implement and manage appropriate, state-of-the-art, enterprise-wide information management programs.

Lynnette has worked at State Farm for 28 years.

She has over 15 years of experience from both the information technology (IT) and business side of several practices: form development and management, content management, business process management and customer communication strategies.

DuPree is responsible for production management of all transactional and regulatory communications to more than 3.2 million TIAA participants, His key focus areas include managing vendor and business partner relations, strategic planning and process improvement.

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WHAT DOES CULTURE HAVE TO DO WITH INFORMATION MANAGEMENT?

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e have all heard the information technology (IT) project failure statistics.

When we think of rolling out information management solutions, what is the single biggest risk factor for success of the project? The answer is the adoption of the new solution by the people. Why is this? In most cases, we are asking people to change their behavior. We are asking them to use a new application or change the way they create, save and find information because of this new solution. We are asking them to change their relationship with information. For some, this is a big change.

John C. Maxwell, an internationally recognized leadership expert, speaker, coach and author, believes culture is the most powerful factor in any organization— more powerful than vision. He often says, “Culture eats vision for lunch.” John’s definition of culture is behavior, symbols and systems. Behavior is the personality of an organization’s culture, and systems are the practices of the culture. For instance, the way each employee manages their information and how everyone supports each other as they embrace a new information management solution are both behaviors and systems. How do we expect to successfully implement an information management solution and not address behaviors and systems intentionally? No wonder so many projects fail.

There is hope. I recommend that organizations embarking on deploying or updating/upgrading an information management solution use a formal and tested change management methodology as well as investing in a change management professional as a part of the project team. One of my favorite resources for managing the people side of change, which I recommend, is the book Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard by Chip Heath and Dan Heath. In their book, they present a three-part framework that can guide you in any situation where you need to change behavior: First, direct the rider.

What looks like resistance is often a lack of clarity. Provide them with crystal-dear direction. Second, motivate the elephant. What looks like laziness is often exhaustion. It’s critical to engage people’s emotional side—get their “elephants” on the path and cooperative. Third, shape the path. What looks like a people problem is often a situation problem. The situation is the “path.” When you shape the

By Russell Stalters

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MANAGING CHANGE

ADKAR A

AWARENESS of the need for change (e.g., communication from senior leaders and the project sponsor)

D

DESIRE to participate and support the change (this maps to “Motivate the Elephant”)

K

KNOWLEDGE on how to change (e.g., training and effective communication)

A

ABILITY to implement required skills and behaviors (e.g., training and the use of a change agent network)

R

REINFORCEMENT to sustain the change (more communication, recognition, rewards, incentives and highlighting successes)

path, you make change more likely, no matter what’s happening with the rider and elephant.

There is also a widely accepted methodology for managing change, and specifically the people side of change, created by Prosci called ADKAR. ADKAR is a research-based change model that represents the five milestones an individual must achieve in order to change successfully. I effectively used this model with the help of an excellent change management professional, Karen Ball, while leading the strategy to manage the information and data from the BP Gulf oil spill.

The team we assembled came from many different contracting companies with varying levels of experience in managing information. We had to quickly enroll them in the processes and behaviors needed to effectively manage this vast amount of information. Additionally, they were creating more and more information every day,

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and I needed to make sure that we were in full compliance with the legal hold and preservation order that was in place at the onset of the Deepwater Horizon incident.

One of the main reasons our change management program succeeded was that we had a strong sponsorship coalition. The head of the Gulf Coast Restoration Organization, along with the organization’s chief counsel, participated in a video about the changes needed and why they were so important. Also, each member of the leadership team reinforced the need for the change within his or her departments. Support for the change was regular and very visible.

Another book I would recommend, especially for the senior leadership team and project sponsor, is Boundaries for Leaders by Dr. Henry Cloud. What are boundaries?

They are made up of two essential things: what you create and what you allow. In the end, as a leader, you are always going to get a combination of these two things. This is especially true when you talk about making changes to the culture (remember, culture is behavior, symbols and systems) of the organization to accommodate a new or revised information management solution, along with the associated policies and processes. The leadership of the organization needs to set the tone for the change and for the necessary culture needed.

Finally, there are three key activities needed from the top-level leadership of the organization to support the people side of change: First, communicate directly with employees; share why the change is happening, the risks of not changing and align the change with the overall direction of the business. Second, build a sponsorship coalition that reinforces the awareness message at all levels. Enable peers, direct reports and managers to communicate the reasons for change to their employees so that a consistent message is finding its way throughout the organization. Third, those senior leaders need to participate actively and visibly throughout the entire change process and to stay engaged with the project team.

Information management initiatives can be successful when organizations fully address the culture change needed to make sure their employees embrace and adopt the new behaviors and begin using the practices necessary to effectively manage information. O

Don’t miss Russell Stalters’ panel on “Big Data: Real-World Challenges, Insight and Business Value” at the DOCUMENT Strategy Forum on May 10, 2016 at 11:00am - 11:50am on how three organizations are leveraging Big Data for real-world applications and are realizing real-world gains.

THEY DON’T CALL IT SWEET HOME CHICAGO FOR NOTHING! DOCUMENT Strategy Forum ’16 is going back to where it all began at the Hyatt Regency O’Hare, May 10-12. Mark your calendars and start planning now!

2015 BUZZ AT TENDEE...

EXHIBITOR...

Wow, what a conference! I wish I could have come for the whole thing—lots of great sessions.”

Thank you for everything Joel, it was an amazing event for us.”

DAN GUINAN — INFORMATION ENGINEER TRAVELERS INSURANCE

The show is great. Instead of these folks being spread out across various shows, it’s great to have them in one place!”

VERA IORDANOVA — DIRECTOR OF MARKETING ITEXT SOFTWARE

Great event! Great environment, and well planned agenda.”

MICHAEL GAUDINO — PRESIDENT PROCONVERSIONS CORPORATION

ANDY KELLER — IT TECHNICAL ARCHITECT USAA

INTERESTED IN PARTICIPATING? The collaboration and networking acquired at DSF is stellar!”

RYAN M. ZILM NEWFIELD EXPLORATION COMPANY

DOCUMENTstrategyForum.com

Interested in Sponsoring or Exhibiting at the industry’s first and only Peer-Driven, Peer-Reviewed and Peer-Produced conference dedicated to the professionals charged with delivering superior customer experiences, please email jdunkel@eventevolution.com or call 203.378.4991 x201.