How to Plan a Successful Document Imaging Project – Part 4

Over the past three weeks we have showed you how to create a plan for your document imaging project.
In a step-by-step approach, we have showed you how to complete each section that should appear in your plan. So far, we have covered the following sections:

1. Overview and Objectives ✔
2. Current Situation ✔
3. Resource Plan ✔
4. Project Design ✔
5. Scanning Design ✔
6. Post-scan Document Processing ✔
7. Change Management
8. Project Review
9. Budget

In our final post in this series, we share tips for completing the sections on change management, project reviews and budget.

Change Management

Change management encompasses many related activities – and it is one of the biggest challenges of every imaging project. You might even say that the entire project is one big change management exercise!

In our experience, you must focus on several areas to manage the change and ensure a successful outcome.

• Articulate the value of the project to all stakeholders
• Win support from the front-line staff who will be most affected by the change
• Clearly communicate the project plan to all involved
• Provide thorough training
• Maintain continuity of business processes during the scan

Project Review

Unless your project is a one-time exercise, you must be prepared to manage an ongoing imaging program. Like any program, document imaging programs require regular monitoring and adjustments in order to continue to deliver value.

In this section you should therefore outline the steps you will take to ensure the ongoing success of your program. These steps can include:

• progress reviews with business leads, project management and IT
• team meetings with advocates and users
• interviews with end users
• surveys of users and stakeholders
• review of project metrics.

These steps will help you make the necessary adjustments to keep the program as efficient and effective as possible.

Budget

Every plan needs a budget, so that brings us to our final section in the template.

Because of their complexity, document imaging budgets are hard to budget for accurately. However, in the course of completing this template, you will already have gathered a lot of useful information to help you prepare your budget.

In fact, your budgetary line-items should very closely match the items outlined in the project design that you mapped out in section four. These will include fees or costs for:

• your imaging provider, if you have outsourced the project
• temporary staffing, if you have brought in helpers to handle it yourself
• scanning equipment
• scanning software
• peripheral equipment such as barcode scanners storage and staging equipment
• filing and labeling supplies

The key to getting the numbers right is to be very thorough in mapping out your overall project and the scanning process. Budget overruns are often caused by a poor understanding of what should be involved in a scanning project.

We hope this walkthrough of the planning process has been helpful. The one additional thing you can do to plan for success is to bring in the help of an experienced partner. TAB has planned and executed countless document imaging projects. Our experience and scanning expertise will save you time and ensure a successful outcome.

Next Steps

• Want all of these tips in an easy-to-read PDF? Download our best practices template here.

• Learn more about preparing for a document imaging project.

• Get help with your scanning project.