Reduce, Reuse, Recycle: Not Just for Document Management

A recent article in Integrated Solutions noted that the time has come to apply reduce, reuse, and recycle thinking to electronic business information because embracing a more strategic, “green” approach to information management will deliver a number of benefits, not the least of which is a dramatic reduction in the cost of storage. These days, there are a number of technology offerings that can reduce storage demands and improve real-time access to business-critical information. For example, on-demand conversion of print-stream to PDF eliminates the unnecessary storage of large-format documents and lessens internal network congestion during the retrieval process.

To demonstrate the efficiencies achievable with smart application of modern technology, the article provided a brief case study of a financial services institution that recently upgraded its customer service technology infrastructure to provide its 2.5 Million online customers with easy access to their statements.

  • Reduce
    On demand statement generation and conversion reduced the storage footprint 97% from 12.5 TB of storage a month to 375 GB.
  • Reuse
    A smart infrastructure allows the same information to be retrieved through a portal, e-mail, or traditional mail.
  • Recycle
    The provider is “recycling” content data to personalize cross-sell offers to the right customer at the right time.

However, the mantra is particularly pertinent to Contract Management. With a good contract management solution that includes authoring and archival capabilities, you get the following:

  • Reduce
    You can collaboratively edit contracts on-line in the application, which greatly reduces the amount of paper you waste and e-copies of the contract-in-progress that float around in each contributor’s storage account.
  • Reuse
    Common clauses can be applied across contracts, saving the need for the recreation (and the associated legal [review] fees).
  • Recycle
    Contracts can be templated so that all that needs to change on the next award is the recipient, pricing, term, and conditions.

For a list of contract management solution providers, start with the resource site.

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