It is a sad fact of life that many workflow applications turn out like this picture. Unfortunately, there is nothing funny about the results for all the people involved.

What surprises everybody when these projects go wrong is that in most cases all parties do their utmost to carry out an excellent job. So how can it go so wrong when professionals undertake, what to users seem, simple tasks. The easiest way to understand this is first to look at workflows that go right.

One of the basic workflows in records management is data input. To the end user, this appears not to be a workflow, but simple mundane data entry. There is however a great deal of workflow sitting behind this simple process. Documents are scanned by an operator and R/KYV passes these into a queue for data entry and validation. This can be a one or two stage entry and verification process. Documents failing the validation process are passed back for correction. Validated documents are moved forward into an automatic OCR process, which again uses extensive workflow and bit map algorithms to obtain the best textual results. Completed text is dynamically merged with the existing databases and connected to the relevant images. If the system has tagging, new tags are produced and updated. If tag alerts are present, relevant documents are sent to a user’s desktop. If the documents pertain to an existing file they are liked electronically to that file. At the same time the database dynamically reorganises itself to maintain high speed retrieval.

Every R/KYV client uses this workflow and it has been near perfect from the first day of installation. It was conceived, designed, programmed and debugged nearly 20 years ago, long before shipping to any client site. Obviously there have been major upgrades over the years, but the basic workflow is the same. The key to the development success - we were not trying to emulate an existing system - electronic records management did not exist. So all design communication was internal and communication is the key to success or failure in all workflow applications.

No supplier will ever know as much about the client’s business as the client and no client will ever know as much about the system as the supplier. The key to success is bringing these two knowledge bases as close together as possible. A few fundamentals will help close this gap.

• Project managers need to be appointed on both sides who will be able to see the project to fruition.

• On the client side, grass roots users need to be involved at the earliest stages of discussions. This is often bypassed because users are normally under pressure with existing (manual) systems and their needs are interpreted by department heads.

• On the supplier side, trainers should attend initial meetings with users alongside analysts. This allows trainers to retain focus of what the user actually wants to see from the system. The trainer can then test these requirements before anything is shipped to the client.

• Technical discussions need to take place with IT at an early stage to consider any potential stresses to the technical infrastructure by the new workflow system. Adequate back up facilities need to be in place at an early stage.

• Management need to ensure that adequate time is made available for staff to be properly trained on any new system. Train the trainer is often considered the most cost effective approach to training. Experience has often shown this not to be the case, with information being watered down as it passes through the training layers, necessitating follow up fire fighting. The classroom approach with structured training times between the original trainer(s) and users, appears to work better.

• The supplier needs to understand that a “small technical problem” can be a mission critical system failure to a client and a user needs to understand that some things must change with any new system.

On both sides, proper communication means that information is passed as directly as possible between the parties, giving a greater chance of success.

Tags: project management, tree swing, Workflow