Electrify Your Digital Transformation with the Cloud

By Tori Ballantine, Product Marketing, Hyland

Taking your organization on a digital transformation journey isn’t just a whimsical idea; or something fun to daydream about; or an initiative that “other” companies probably have time to implement. It’s something that every organization needs to seriously consider. If your business isn’t digital, it needs to be in order to remain competitive.

So if you take it as a given that you need to embrace digital transformation to survive and thrive in the current landscape, the next logical step is to look at how the cloud fits into your strategy. Because sure, it’s possible to digitally transform without availing yourself of the massive benefits of the cloud. But why would you?

Why would you intentionally leave on the table what could be one of the strongest tools in your arsenal? Why would you take a pass on the opportunity to transform – and vastly improve – the processes at the crux of how your business works?

Lightning strikes

In the case of content services, including capabilities like content management, process management and case management, cloud adoption is rising by the day. Companies with existing on-premises solutions are considering the cloud as the hosting location for their critical information, and companies seeking new solutions are looking at cloud deployments to provide them with the functionality they require.

If your company was born in the digital age, it’s likely that you inherently operate digitally. If your company was founded in the time before, perhaps you’re playing catch up.

Both of these types of companies can find major benefits in the cloud. Data is created digitally, natively — but there is still paper that needs to be brought into the digital fold. The digitizing of information is just a small part of digital transformation. To truly take information management to the next level, the cloud offers transformative options that just aren’t available in a premises-bound solution.

People are overwhelmingly using the cloud in their personal lives, according to AIIM’s State of Information Management: Are Businesses Digitally Transforming or Stuck in Neutral? Of those polled, 75 percent use the cloud in their personal life and 68 percent report that they use the cloud for business. That’s nearly three-quarters of respondents!

When we look at the usage of cloud-based solutions in areas like enterprise content management (ECM) and related applications, 35 percent of respondents leverage the cloud as their primary content management solutions; for collaboration and secure file sharing; or for a combination of primary content management and file sharing. These respondents are deploying these solutions either exclusively in the cloud or as part of on-prem/cloud hybrid solutions.

Another 46 percent are migrating all their content to the cloud over time; planning to leverage the cloud but haven’t yet deployed; or are still experimenting with different options. They are in the process of discerning exactly how best to leverage the power of the cloud for their organizations.

And only 11 percent have no plans for the cloud. Eleven percent! Can your business afford to be in that minority?

More and more, the cloud is becoming table stakes in information management. Organizations are growing to understand that a secure cloud solution not only can save them time and money, but also provide them with stronger security features, better functionality and larger storage capacity.

The bright ideas

So, what are some of the ways that leveraging the cloud for your content services can digitally transform your business?

• Disaster recovery. When your information is stored on-premises and calamity strikes — a fire, a robbery, a flood — you’re out of luck. When your information is in the cloud, it’s up and ready to keep your critical operations running.
• Remote access. Today’s workforce wants to be mobile, and they need to access their critical information wherever they are. A cloud solution empowers your workers by granting them the ability to securely access critical information from remote locations.
• Enhanced security. Enterprise-level cloud security has come a long way and offers sophisticated protection that is out of reach for many companies to manage internally.

Here are other highly appealing advantages of cloud-based enterprise solutions, based on a survey conducted by IDG Enterprise:

• Increased uptime
• 24/7 data availability
• Operational cost savings
• Improved incident response
• Shared/aggregated security expertise of vendor
• Access to industry experts on security threats

Whether you’re optimizing your current practices or rethinking them from the ground up, these elements can help you digitally transform your business by looking to the cloud.

Can you afford not to?