Enterprise Content Management
Ditch the document drama with an organized taxonomy for SharePoint.
When trying to navigate the complexities of an Enterprise Content Management (ECM) system, an effective taxonomy is vital to avoiding document drama. But what, exactly, does the term taxonomy mean for your company’s information?
Without a taxonomy, an organization cannot build nor maintain a successful information management program. Luckily, in SharePoint, it is easy to implement rules like information governance, managed metadata and a hierarchy of folders. An optimized taxonomy for SharePoint can mean impressive returns for years to come—let’s get down to the five reasons you should adopt one.
1. Stay Structured
As your SharePoint library accumulates more and more documents on a daily basis, an organizational system eventually becomes a no-brainer. A taxonomy for SharePoint provides structure for your information. Build your taxonomy so you are classifying the most critical business documents in ways that are structured, intuitive, and easy to find later on.
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2. Search Better
When your company has taken the time to develop an organized and effective taxonomy for SharePoint, you are enabling your end-users to find the documents they need faster. A taxonomy that is implemented with managed metadata shows information in a clean, user-friendly structure. End users are able to understand how to search for the documents they need, meaning speedier results.
3. Be More Productive
When your system for getting documents into SharePoint is streamlined and organized, you’re able to work with your business information better. A taxonomy for SharePoint allows you to use more of the platform. This means better decision-making, faster business processes, and happier end-users and customers. Plus, as content grows, your taxonomy allows your SharePoint to grow with it without having to worry about where to put new information.
4. Get Organized
Truly organize the data within your SharePoint sites by taking advantage of SharePoint’s ability to retain managed metadata. When you tailor your taxonomy for SharePoint, you can begin to capture the metadata you need with every document upload. And when you build a strong foundation, the system will be able to capture more than 90% of the metadata it needs to identify a document. Again: better document management, better productivity.
5. Automate Your Processes
Now that you have the structure, you can access the data within it to begin automating your business processes. This means triggering workflows, developing process automation, and even watching end users’ productivity and expertise soar as they aren’t bogged down with manual day-to-day tasks. A proper taxonomy for SharePoint is the first step to truly taking over your document management.
