AIIM Study Finds 71% of Employees Lack IT Support for External Collaboration

ORLANDO, Fla. - April 1, 2014 - PRLog -- Internal and external collaboration is required for business success, yet current collaboration and Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solutions lack necessary cloud and mobile support, according to a new report released today from The Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM). The report, sponsored by enterprise collaboration application provider Workshare, polled more than 80,000 AIIM community members and reveals a strong market need for cloud-based enterprise solutions that extend on-premise ECM systems for more synchronized and secure collaboration.

Cloud-based file-share and sync services are accelerating collaboration both within and beyond the firewall, but only 23 percent of organizations provide enterprise-class solutions. This is driving users to use unsanctioned applications, which results in unsecured content leaking from the business. While collaborating outside the firewall is a key driver for success for the majority of organizations (60%), respondents confirm that existing ECM solutions do not extend into the cloud or mobile to enable collaboration beyond the office.

In order to improve productivity and business agility, businesses must extend legacy solutions such as Document Management Systems (DMS) and ECM systems into enterprise-class online file sharing tools, as the survey reveals:

§  50% of respondents believe their organization has shortfalls in technical support for internal collaboration, rising to 71% for external. In particular, 39% feel quite strongly that external collaboration is badly supported;

§  Fewer than 25% of respondents have any document creation, editing or workflow capability on mobile, although 85% would like to have it;

§  Nearly half (47%) of those surveyed are looking for a hybrid collaboration support solution and 9% for a fully cloud option;

§  89% of the respondents agree that a formal collaboration system is a vitalpiece of infrastructure, but 54% are finding the rapid convergence of collaboration andsocial tools to be very confusing.

To meet demand for secure mobile and cloud-based document collaboration, Workshare integrates into the leading ECM and DMS vendors and mobilizes content securely within and outside of the organization. Workshare offers a hybrid cloud deployment model as an extension of on-premise ECM and DMS solutions, enabling users to synchronize workflows across cloud and mobile access, while optimizing IT’s legacy investments.

“The AIIM study underscores the need for agile, enterprise-class collaboration solutions that keep businesses productive and secure,” said Ali Moinuddin, Workshare CMO and chair of AIIM’s European Executive Leadership Council (ELC). “Workshare extends secure collaboration beyond the firewall, giving users a simple way to access and collaborate on content, while also enabling IT to enforce control for document management by retaining an audit trial.”

To learn more about the benefits of extending legacy DMS and ECM systems into cloud-based file sharing solutions and what the considerations are for enterprises, visit the Workshare team at the AIIM Conference from April 1– 4 at the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress, Orlando, FL, booth #26.