It’s a big ask to push knowledge workers to be more productive when most struggle to access the very thing needed to power the job at hand: knowledge. Yet that’s the current reality, with only 25 percent of organizations perceiving employees as extremely confident they have access to all the knowledge needed to perform daily tasks.[1]
 
And the biggest contributing factor: the very systems meant to improve how employees work. The same survey showed current technology tools are not fully meeting business needs, with just 34 percent[2] of companies confident in the ability to organically facilitate knowledge sharing and information.
 
What’s needed is an information foundation enabled by document management, allowing employees to stop wasting time hunting for information by breaking down the barriers between the applications they use every day to remove information silos.
 
Let’s explore four ways to elevate the knowledge worker and boost productivity with document management solutions.

1. Deepen collaboration—with control

As technology has progressed, knowledge workers have benefited from digital transformation at every turn. Thanks to the digitization of documents, gone are the days of passing around a creased, coffee-stained report to collaborate. However, this shift has also introduced some new challenges. Where is the document you need to collaborate on stored? An old email? A random file share? Yet another application? Are you sure you’re working with the most recent version of the document? Or did you miss that IM from your co-worker with their changes attached?

Document management systems establish a single source of truth—one place where knowledge workers know they can easily find the most up-to-date content. And when changes are made to those documents, they’re saved as a new version with a full audit trail of who made changes and when. Granular permissions also ensure that only the right people have access to sensitive information, so knowledge workers can share and collaborate with the confidence that proper protections are always in place.

2. Reduce painful application switching

Eight in ten (84%) organizations report information silos have a noticeable impact on employee productivity and operational efficiency.[3] Modern document management solutions reduce constant application switching among knowledge workers, leveraging out-of-the-box integrations that connect to key business applications.

By delivering content in familiar interfaces, document management systems give knowledge workers instant insights within the applications they use every day—delivering massive productivity gains. For example, Sales teams can spend more time selling and less time searching for information, responding quickly to customer needs, uncovering buying trends, and identifying new opportunities.

OpenText continues to expand document management integration capabilities, leading the way with support for:

• SAP®
• SAP® SuccessFactors®
• Salesforce®
• Microsoft®365 Teams and Office
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales and Service
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations
• Microsoft Power Platform
• ServiceNow
• Oracle EBS
• Guidewire
• IBM Maximo
• AutoCAD
• Google Workspace

3. Remove blind spots

Document management solutions create a single source of trusted information, allowing knowledge workers to work smarter and faster. With a complete picture of all information in one place, users can make informed decisions with the most up-to-date content at their fingertips—able to start and complete key activities with ease.
 
OpenText takes this advantage one step further with dedicated business workspaces that bring together all relevant content, data, team members, and workflows to create a comprehensive view of a customer, asset, project, opportunity, or any business object.

4. Provide an AI content assistant

GenAI is changing how knowledge workers engage with information, enabling users to reduce tedious tasks and gain valuable insights. With an AI content assistant, documents can be quickly summarized, compared, and translated. This frees up the knowledge worker to focus on other tasks. As a result, employees can turn 20 minutes of hunting and pecking for information into immediate answers, extracting additional value from content across the organization. Using data curated within a document management platform, content can also be used in new ways and repurposed, with workers able to easily create charts and graphs, customer correspondence, blog posts, and other key assets.
 
With GenAI capabilities integrated directly within document management platforms, OpenText is accelerating GenAI benefits through AI-to-AI integrations. For example, AI content assistant integration with Salesforce Agentforce allows Sales and Service teams to summarize customer buying trends and upsell relevant products and Customer Service teams to easily summarize and resolve claims.

Get on the AI productivity path with OpenText

Elevating knowledge worker productivity by improving collaboration, reducing application switching, creating a single source of truth, and tapping into GenAI to make better decisions is just the beginning.

[1] Foundry Research sponsored by OpenText, MarketPulse Survey: Digital Friction, September 2024
[2] Ibid
[3] Ibid

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