How an efficient document management solution eliminates information silos

If you're running a business, then you need to manage documents of all kinds. From contracts and business plans to policies and documentation around daily work, keeping track of the paperwork associated with your business is crucial for good governance and strong business performance. This means effective document management is a key part of operating a business; however, it's easy for employees to fall into bad habits and forget to share information with others. 

A lack of communication within your organization can damage operations, particularly if you need to act swiftly or when having clear, specific instructions to follow are vital to a project's success.

If communication is stalled or information isn't shared freely, it can create information silos that hinder tasks, create frustrated employees, contribute to missed deadlines, and, in the worst-case scenario, can even initiate some legal issues.

Streamlining communication with a document management solution can overcome these challenges as well as improve the business across a number of key performance indicators (KPIs). Effective communication is essential in facilitating and sustaining company growth, as well as achieving business goals. It can also improve staff morale and engagement.

A secure central source of information

A cloud-based program, such as Microsoft Office 365 and SharePoint, can give you a secure, central source for storing, accessing and sharing information. Using metadata (information about the information) means you can classify the content, making it easier for employees to find the right documents and the right information when they need it.

Using SharePoint means you can store emails and their attachments together, so information doesn't get locked in someone's email inbox. Instead, emails can be shared easily among all staff members who need to see them.

Four benefits of an efficient document management solution

1. Budget and deadline visibility

During a project, tracking the budget can be frustrating or difficult without clear visibility of all relevant information. A central location where all information is accessible and stored will let employees find the most recent budget updates themselves, rather than having to follow up with project managers or accounts or dig through previous emails.

Ensuring that tasks are underway to achieve project deadlines is also crucial to a campaign's success; however, this can only happen if employees are kept updated on deadlines and changes.

2. Knowledge of changes and updates on projects, clients, or key documents

Businesses update documents regularly, whether it's updating client information, invoice or payment details, or even making adjustments to standard business documents to maintain industry best practice and compliance. Ensuring your business is compliant with legal obligations may be as simple as using a new version of a previous document; however, if employees don't have this document or know about it, then it creates holes in the company's procedures.

It is also important that employees, accounts payable teams, executives, and managers have visibility across projects. A document management system can let authorized staff members easily access these documents and information, giving them a tool to oversee project updates efficiently, while keeping teams on the project informed of progress.

3. Improved employee productivity

Having a solution that streamlines information management improves employee productivity through shared access to files and easy collaboration across documents. Using SharePoint, employees can edit a document simultaneously, making changes collaboratively while still maintaining a record of previous versions.

This means employees won't need to keep requesting the latest version of a document from co-workers or manually combine two versions of the same document.

4. Improved business reputation and increased growth

Delivering projects on time and within budget can help improve the company's reputation. Streamlined processes and easy access to information can help employees to engage more deeply in their positions, align to the company's goals, and deliver exceptional customer experiences, all of which can also contribute to reputation improvement.

A document management solution helps to ensure that employees have the right information to do their jobs efficiently, while also improving communication within the business to eliminate information silos.

To find out more about how a document management system can help your business eliminate information siloes and improve internal communication, contact OnePlace Solutions today.