Written by Glenn Boylan
The August PMI Atlanta Technology Forum was held on Tuesday, August 26th, at the Hewlett-Packard office in Alpharetta. The Forum welcomed Tina Teree Baker to speak about enterprise content management solutions.
The meeting started with some chapter business. Venkata Patt reviewed some of the changes to the new chapter web site, Steve Kruger discussed the opportunities available for volunteers, especially with regard to helping with registration and getting (or being) speakers for upcoming meetings. Perhaps most important, the members in attendance unanimously agreed the pizza from the new supplier was delicious.
Nancy Berlin introduced Ms. Baker, who is President and CEO of the Cadence Group. Her presentation was titled “Considering an Enterprise Content Management Solution (CMS)?" and provided an excellent overview of what companies should look at when implementing a CMS solution.
Ms. Baker’s presentation covered various aspects of a CMS implementation, including: early decisions companies must make; project management; identifying vendors; evaluating products; and mitigating risks. A content management solution is a complex system that has at its center document management, records management, and web content management. With studies showing that companies spend 20% - 30% of their time searching for this information, the value of an effective CMS is obvious.
Ms. Baker pointed out how important corporate sponsorship and governance are to achieving success. An enterprise-wide CMS implementation can be a big change for a company, and top-level support is critical. Ms. Baker also talked about how a change management plan and a small scale proof of concept trial can help smooth the road toward that change. The goal is the get buy-in at all levels of the organization before the implementation of the CMS.
There was an excellent Q&A session after Ms. Baker’s presentation, which wrapped up a very interesting and informative evening.
Please note the September Technology Forum will be on held on Tuesday September 30th. This is the fifth Tuesday of the month, not the usual fourth Tuesday. The September presentation will be "Why Big Data ... How We Got Here" by Rich Wise, of the Software Group.