While document management has great value in archiving business data, both electronic and scanned paper, it gains in value exponentially when coupled with the ability to workflow those documents. A workflow component in a document management system simply places a document in the hands of the person who needs to act on that document and inform them of the action to be taken using status labels, attached memos and annotations. This allows workers to be more effective by preventing loss of important documents and providing the ability to have documents that require an action from being overlooked.
Many document management systems offer some type of workflow, some are complex additional cost options that require consulting services to set up and some are included and are easy to set up and use. DocuXplorer is an example of a system with an included workflow process that is easy to set up and use.
Workflow in DocuXplorer employs some of the basic functionality of the system; index fields, Saved Search Documents and the ability to export a document to a Windows folder or Desktop. Users create workflows using two index fields; "Assigned To" to define the user that needs to act on the document, and a "Document Status", with the "Document Status" being the action that needs to be taken. For example, all documents for "John" (the Assigned To) where the status is "Needs Approval"
(the status tells the assigned user the action to be taken on the document). This simple and easy method allows an administrator to create a series of workflow objects for each assignee that tells them the action to take on a document.
Once the fields have been created, a search can be performed to bring up a list of documents with a specific status for an assigned user. Using DocuXplorer's Saved Search Document functionality, the workflow search can be saved and labeled, ready to be rerun and refreshed each time the Saved Search Document is run.
Saved Searches in DocuXplorer have an additional benefit in that they act like documents and can be exported and used outside of the DocuXplorer Library. A user can then save the workflow Saved Search Document to their Windows Desktop. It appears as an icon on their Desktop and when clicked will automatically open DocuXplorer and present the user with results of the workflow search.
The increased value of workflow tools in document management dramatically improves the productivity of every employee. It results in increased ROI on a document management system's cost, and reduced day to day expenses by effectively managing employees execution of tasks relating to company documents.