How to implement an enterprise content management system

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One of the most important best practices for enterprise content management is taking the time to properly implement your solution. The following 10 steps help ensure organisations choose the right ECM, communicate the change to employees and other stakeholders and actually address business needs with the software.

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1. Review ECM software options and decide on a solution

Leverage free demos and  product trials to learn more about the contenders. Use the data you've collected to make a checklist defining your needs and must-haves. Assign members of the project team to evaluate solutions on the market and present those that  best meet your needs. 

Decide whether you want to implement a cloud or on-premises solution. Your decision will be based on many factors including your organisation’s IT infrastructure, the potential cost of upgrading your hardware, and the bandwidth and expertise of your IT team.

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Approach your top choices and ask for pricing information and ask for anything else you need to make a final decision. Then making the right choice should be clear.

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2. Get buy-in from critical stakeholders

Bring your analysis to critical stakeholders, such as an executive board. The goal of this step is to demonstrate the need for the ECM system with actual projections and numbers, illustrating potential ROI, as well as to confirm the suitability of your chosen solution.

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Once your solution is given the go ahead, you can begin to draft and deliver communication about the upcoming change to others. The goal isn't to overwhelm people with details about a change that hasn't yet arrived but to prepare them with logical reasons that the change is necessary. Proactively communicating about any type of tech implementation helps generate future buy-in at every level, which is important to success.

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3 Form a project team

Start by pulling together a team of stakeholders and subject matter experts who can help you implement an enterprise content management solution. Some people you choose for the team might include:

• Tech leadership and experts from the IT department, especially if you need to integrate the ECM with existing systems

• Managers and employees from various departments who will play a role in implementing the ECM software or benefit from it, including human resources, training, sales, customer service and accounting

• At least one stakeholder who can champion the project; typically, this would be someone from executive leadership

• Experts from areas that may need to have oversight of how the tool is implemented and used, such as your compliance or legal teams

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4. Use your solution provider as a resource

Once you choose a vendor, take advantage of the expertise they’ve gained by working on many other implementations. The best solution providers are knowledgeable, highly responsive and provide ongoing support.

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5. Define your current position and develop future goals

Work together as a team to produce two deliverables in the early stage of the project:

• A current state process map that details how work is done now

• A future state process map that details how you want work to be done

 

Taking time to understand your business processes and planning ahead helps you create an implementation process that supports minimal business interruption.

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6.  Create a roadmap to get from your current to future state

Spend time determining what changes need to be made to get from the current state to the future state. Create a list of those changes ranked by priority. Then you can develop a step-by-step roadmap for your project.

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7. Create policies and procedures

While the technical work is being done to integrate the ECM system into your operation, ensure someone is creating policies and procedures for the use of the software. Documents you may want to create include:

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• Access policies that define who has access to what in the ECM system

• Security protocols that define how you plan to protect data in the system and what you expect of employees in this regard

• Workflow procedures that define how documents enter the system, what is done with the information in the system and who is responsible for various tasks

• Knowledge management and training documents that will help teams roll out the new software as seamlessly as possible

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8. Train your administrators and power users

Armed with this documentation in hand, begin training your administrators and power users. These users can put the system through all its paces during testing time. During that time, glitches and concerns can be addressed quickly and without upsetting overall productivity.

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9. Test and fine-tune

If you're implementing ECM software one department at a time, you might have a small team of testers from the department you're currently implementing in. If you plan to implement the solution across the enterprise, recruit testers from every functional unit you can. They'll all be concerned about different aspects of the system. It's tempting to choose the best and brightest to test your system. And while your top employees may certainly be likely to spot important issues and communicate them to the team, it's also a good idea to include other employees to ensure the system works well for everyone.

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10. Implement the ECM system across your department or enterprise

Once any issues identified by software testers have been corrected, begin rolling the ECM system out across the department or company. Make sure to include plenty of time for training to ensure the highest levels of buy-in.