The benefits of going digital

Studies estimate more than 95 percent of data created today is digitally born, which is a pretty remarkable statistic. It wasn’t long ago when most documents were in paper form. While there’s been a noticeable shift from physical to digital origination, paper documents remain essential to business operations, compliance and governance as well as to records management. Organizations must know that in addition to securely storing and managing paper-based documents, they need to digitize them as well. Just as cloud backup for digitally born documents is a nonnegotiable enterprise must, so too is digitization of paper documents.

Many organizations, especially newer ones, view physical digitization as less-critical because fewer paper documents are created. However, if a business generates 500,000 documents per year, 25,000 original documents are still paper-based and need to be securely and properly managed. There are many benefits to converting original paper documents to digital documents, such as enhanced work flows, increased productivity and improved customer satisfaction. Additionally, the conversion ensures business continuity should paper documents become lost or damaged. This is especially true for industries—such as finance, insurance and health care—that rely heavily on paper-based original documents.

Digitizing physical records is a key component to an effective information management posture. Digital and physical records provide an array of benefits and help to strengthen an organization’s information governance program.
 

Traditional benefits

For most organizations, return on investment (ROI) is one of the greatest indicators of success, and without question, digital imaging impacts the bottom line direct and indirectly, including:

Business continuity. Natural disasters—from tornados to floods—occur quickly without warning. Even the most secure and well-managed facility can be affected. Digitizing physical records is one of the best ways organizations can combat the possibility of lost or destroyed paper files. During times of emergency, companies are trying to stem the tide of confusion and disruption on a number of fronts, and the information contained in critical records is often the key to keeping “business as usual” or, at the very least, functionality. Being able to reproduce the essential physical files can help ensure businesses can pick up where needed after a disaster.

Efficiency. The time associated with locating non-RFID (radio frequency identification) tagged records can cost a U.S. business tens of thousands of dollars in lost productivity each year. Quite often, a document is only needed for a minute or two to extract a small number of data points. It’s easy to see the inefficiencies that exist when an employee has to spend more time trying to pinpoint the document’s location than actually using the file. Having a centralized portal where cataloged digitized files exist can drastically increase production time and deliver information quickly and easily.

Compliance. Whether enforced at the national, local or industry level, data compliance is a fact of life for most businesses. The last 20 years have seen a drastic increase in regulations, such as HIPAA/HITECH (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act/Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health), Sarbanes-Oxley, the Patriot Act, the European Union’s Data Protection Directive and Australia’s Privacy Act, among others, affecting how organizations protect data. Digitizing physical records adds a layer of protection against permanent loss of data should the original physical documents become compromised and subsequently prevents fines for noncompliance.
 

An emerging benefit: information governance

The management of physical and digital data is a key skill set for organizations to remain compliant and see return on their information management investment. Information governance (IG) policies that address physical and digital data allow organizations to have greater control over their data, and digitization continues to play a key role in maintaining proper IG strategy.

But what is IG? The analyst firm Gartner says, “The goal of information governance is to ensure compliance with laws and regulations, mitigate risks and protect the confidentiality of sensitive company and customer data.” Information governance aims to support an organization’s regulatory, legal, risk, environmental and operational requirements.

How does digitization of physical records support information governance? If an organization decides to store its physical records off site and access information through an online portal of digitized copies, IG strategies are supported in a number of ways, such as:

Informational control. Physical records can be moved and returned to the wrong location, not returned at all or simply lost. When critical physical documents are taken out of the day-to-day mix, their whereabouts are no longer a concern. Digitized records are easy to find and can be tracked to ensure proper usage.

Increased visibility. A proper IG program should provide visibility over multiple repositories and the relevance of the data contained in those repositories should increase with enforcement of policies and procedures. Having digitized versions of physical records allows quicker access and visibility, which can increase the overall value of organizational data.

Risk mitigation. Risk reduction is driven by laws and regulations as well as by litigation, audit requests and other related factors. Almost annually, more laws are passed around the globe to regulate data. The control that digitization offers allows organizations to access information quickly and to keep it secured. And, in the event a physical record is missing, a digitized record can be reprinted.

Increased data efficiency. Digitization makes the task of retention easier because documents are easily and quickly located and disposed of. Subsequently, retention of the physical originals will be top of mind. Space is more efficiently utilized, and the possibility of falling out of compliance for holding on to documents too long is greatly reduced.

Greater data quality. “Poor” data are caused by a number of issues: redundant and obsolete documents, lack of structure, lack of visibility and other elements. According to a 2011 study by Artemis Ventures (www-new.insightsquared.com/2012/01/7-facts-about-data-quality-infographic), poor data costs U.S. organizations $3.1 trillion per year and is cited as the No. 1 reason for project cost overrun. While not the sole cure for poor data, digitization can help to increase the value through greater visibility.
 

Implementing the process

Digitizing physical records requires more than just a scanner and a file on a network. It should be addressed with the same level of security a company would employ with any critical data.

Limit mobility. While digitization of physical records is still a critical part of a healthy information management plan, the process isn’t without its challenges. Digital documents, easily located within a network, can be copied into less secure areas of the network, shared (either accidentally or intentionally) and fall into the hands of the wrong people. The regulatory and business-sensitive drawbacks of portability are plentiful, so it is important digitized records are secure and have appropriate policies in place to reduce risks.

Create a strict retention policy. As discussed earlier, organizations have to know when it is time to securely dispose of data. Holding on to documents beyond the date a company is required to retain them offers absolutely no benefits. The drawbacks, such as inefficient use of space and falling out of compliance, are serious. Having an information breach is bad enough, but losing data that should have been eliminated is worse.

Administer security levels. Some documents are more important than others. A client must understand who has visibility and create strict access restrictions based on how critical they are to the business at hand.

Understand privacy laws. This is perhaps one of the biggest challenges, especially for global organizations. Privacy laws are regularly amended and new ones created. Compliance today could mean noncompliance tomorrow. Staying on top of the seemingly ever-changing stream of rules and regulations in every country a company operates will help organizations assure digitized documents are properly managed.

Vet the vendor. If an organization decides to have its documents digitized by a third party, a critical inspection of the vendor’s credentials in terms of process and security is nonnegotiable. Potential clients will be looking to ensure vendors’ reputations are impeccable before handing over their data.
 

Compliance reigns supreme

There is no doubt the world is becoming more digital in terms of how information is created, shared and secured. However, compliance and regulations reign supreme, and physical records remain essential to businesses. As a result, digitization has emerged as a complementary best practice to physical document records management to ensure greater efficiency and prevent drawbacks, such as data loss and regulatory fines.

The author is global vice president, digital market leader, for Recall, Norcross, Georgia.