Management Best Practices: 9 Important Tips
Some of the document management best practices featured below may seem obvious. Thankfully, that means they’re easy to understand and implement; you need only ensure you remain consistent with them to have a continuously robust document management system in place. Let’s go through them.
1. Choose the Best Document Management Software for Your Business
The first step your business needs to take is identifying which document management system is right for you. While many of the options are similar, they’re not the same, and choosing one that doesn’t meet your needs can be a waste of time and money.
Choosing the right DMS is an integral part of effective document management.
If your business creates a lot of new documents that you need to collaborate on, then something like Microsoft SharePoint or Egnyte are good options, as both offer Office 365 integration. Alternatively, if you simply need a space to store and manage contracts, DocuWare is a terrific option that also allows you to digitally sign your documents.
2. Use Clear Indexing
To ensure your documents are easily accessible, it’s vital that you index each new document and folder accurately, thus creating a consistent file structure. Prior to creating your DMS, we recommend that you make clear folder structures and create a list of categories for each document type.
Clear indexing makes it much easier to find documents when searching, and far easier for different departments to manage documents within their section of the business. When using a document management solution like M-Files, you can also label documents with tags and other forms of metadata, ensuring each document is in its proper place within your DMS.
3. Scan Your Paper Documents
If you’re migrating from physical documents to electronic documents, it’s good practice to make digital copies of your paper documents. It may be a daunting task, but scanning documents and transferring them to an electronic digital management system ensures that sensitive documents remain safe and accessible.
Your paperless process should include scanning and moving physical documents to electronic.
Paper documents are much easier to lose, and a physical filing cabinet doesn’t have the same level of security that the best document management software provides. So moving everything over not only makes filing more efficient, it also gives far more robust protection for each document.
4. Select Access Rights
Not every person in your business needs to have access to every document that lives in your document management system. There will be sensitive documents — like employee contracts and performance records — that must remain confidential. Thankfully, with today’s document management software you can grant access permissions to users of your choice.
When setting up your document management system, take time to identify which senior members of staff and departments need to access specific documents. They’ll also be able to control access for their own team members, and choose which of them can access, edit and share documents.
5. Set Up Automations
Automations are something every business should add to their document management workflow. They make business life easier and also help you remain consistent in managing your documents and business processes.
Automation plays a key role in managing documents throughout your organization.
Depending on the document management software you’re using, you can send automated notifications when a document is created or edited. You can also set automated document approval workflows for certain documents, as well as set up automated invoicing if your business works with external clients.
If you’re using an efficient document management system, you can expect to have more automation options available, and it’s a good idea to make use of them.
6. Use Cloud Storage
Assuming you want to move away from physical documents and filing cabinets, you have two options when it comes to using a document management system: on-premise and cloud storage.
On-premise document management software allows you to control your documents from a server within your business. Cloud storage means your documents exist on third-party servers — which some users don’t like.
Keeping your documents in the cloud means you can access them even if your hardware becomes corrupt.
However, cloud storage gives you an added layer of protection should your hardware get damaged or stolen, as you’re still able to access your documents in the cloud. Cloud-based software also makes it much easier to collaborate with different users, especially within remote teams, improving overall business efficiency.
If you’re looking for a space to manage documents as well as other file types, check out our top online cloud storage providers for documents.
7. Have Consistent Version Control
File versioning allows you to access older versions of edited documents.
If your business constantly updates documents, having effective version control in place is a must. File versioning means you can access previous versions of documents, and restore them if needed.
It also lets you give some users only the ability to view documents and other users the ability to view, comment and change the edited versions. Doing this means you can effectively collaborate on a document and ensure a document isn’t changed without the proper authorization.
8. Complete Document Audits
Although it’s much easier to manage business documents with an electronic document management system, it’s still good practice to do regular audits of your documents to mitigate against potential process failures or breaches.
You can do audits internally and externally. For the former, it’s good to do audits every three to six months, while an external audit can be conducted annually.
Completing regular audits allows you to keep on top of document management compliance.
Not only does auditing allow you to learn what documents you have in place, it also means you can understand if your business is being compliant with sector regulations. Many professional sectors will enforce an external audit, so it’s good to keep on top of everything, rather than panic when the time comes for your business to be put under the microscope.
9. Know Your Local Regulations
It’s a good idea to learn what types of documents you need to keep in the document management system for a certain period of time. For example, in the financial industry, regulatory requirements state that certain documents must remain on record for a period of seven years. Before deleting a document, double-check to see if it’s against regulations to do so.