Document Management - White Paper (ID 5277).pdf Jul. 2014 | Page 18

Compliance and Accountability
Many companies must comply with regulatory mandates
for record keeping and transaction reporting, such as the
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
rules for health care or the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) for
financial accounting. Others choose to voluntarily comply with
standards to gain industry certification, such as ISO 9001 for
manufacturing and engineering. In either case, compliance
hurdles require a massive documentation effort in addition to
the paperwork generated in the normal course of business.
The scale and importance of these efforts often makes an
upgrade to document management solution somewhat of a
requirement in itself. Organizations still reliant on paper filing
or standard PC and server storage find it nearly impossible
to cope with formal filing requirements without hiring the
equivalent of a second staff. A document management
system, on the other hand, can often manage the additional
work associated with compliance efforts without additional
administrative staff.
An electronic document management system that supports
compliance with regulations or standards typically must
provide:

Even companies not regulated by a government agency or
outside professional association are still subject to a higher
authority from time to time. The concept of “risk management”
involves implementing record-keeping and audit strategies that
can defend a company in case of a legal dispute with vendors,
customers, or workers.
Sometimes rather than a regulating body or other third party,
the authority that needs satisfying is the organization itself. The
same goals of risk management also happen to be the essential
elements of good business, where important files are properly
maintained and employees and departments are held accountable
for their decisions.
The central question for most organizations is no longer whether
or not they should adopt a document management solution,
but rather which they should choose. Which will incorporate
all the features needed to maintain complete compliance
documentation? Which delivers the best value for its cost? How
effectively will the system mesh with the everyday tasks of staff
and integrate with existing systems?

•

Automated back-up and archiving procedures

•

A history log and audit trail of user file actions

The next two sections provide greater detail about common
features of document management solutions and guidance on
how to best assess your organization’s specific situation.
__________

•

Automated workflow features

1

•

Template forms that conform to specific submission rules

EASY DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT

IDC, Quantifying Enterprise Search May 2002.
Arik Hesseldahl, Businessweek. “The Push to Get Rid of Paper,” May 2008.
3
IDC, The High Cost of Not Finding Information April 2003.
4
Gartner Research, 2004.
5
Ponemon Institute, Security of Paper Documents in the Workplace 2008.
2

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