Dalhousie Student Union Relies on Laserfiche for Continuity
May 23rd, 2007 Comment on this article
Q and A with Karen Kwan, Policy Analyst, Dalhousie Student Union
User News: What were the challenges you faced that led you to choose Laserfiche?
Kwan: We have an extremely fast-paced organization with high turnover in leadership. Five student executives and close to thirty councilors command the organization’s direction and, typically, serve one-year terms. The majority of business that the Dalhousie Student Union (DSU) conducts, however, has a life span exceeding the terms of both executives and councilors. Currently, the retention of institutional memory and the responsibility for the yearly carry-over of the DSU’s business lies with its 11 full-time staff members.
User News: What was the process that led to your installation?
Kwan: We actually went through two years of planning and research with council, executives and staff. Beginning with “best practices” research and continuing with conversations with the Dalhousie University Medical School’s IT Department, which was already an avid Laserfiche user, the University and public archives of Nova Scotia and the Dalhousie School of Library Science, the DSU was ready to discuss implementation. IKON, our reseller, was instrumental in helping us choose the right system for our needs and budget and within a couple of months we were up and running with Laserfiche. That made the DSU one of the first student organizations in North America to implement a digital archiving system.
User News: How has Laserfiche helped you meet the challenges you faced?
Kwan: Laserfiche helps us to bring new executives and councilors up to speed on the issues of the DSU by enabling them to access DSU files. By delivering the ability to quickly and individually access files, Laserfiche empowers new leaders to learn the background of current issues and initiatives and make informed decisions. It empowers individuals to do their own research, on the vast records of the organization. As a lobbyist organization, we need quick access to information and quick briefing on the background to an issue quickly. The digital system gives new executives the ability to quickly access information about initiatives and issues from previous years.
Since installing Laserfiche, we’ve been able to electronically store and fully search decades of DSU archive material. In addition to enhancing the research capabilities of the DSU through improved filing and quicker retrieval of information, we’ve used the system to better preserve the organization’s institutional memory. The DSU plans to expand this system to other departments and staff.
We rely on Laserfiche for speedy document retrieval. The DSU has over 30 internal committees and 220 student societies as well as a very extensive relationship with media, all levels of government and the university. The DSU also has revenue-generating contracts and services, so it’s an absolute necessity for us to know past precedence on all legal and financial matters. Laserfiche helps us keep historical records of these relationships.
We also use Laserfiche as a tool to achieve more financial and operational accountability as an organization. With Laserfiche, we have streamlined our archives and made retained documents available in a more rapid and systematic way. This access is especially useful during reviews of certain policies, services, financial audits, legal and regulatory matters, governance and the like. Access to DSU financial and operational information can act as a preventative measure against potentially unreasonable decisions.
User News: Was space for paper storage an issue?
Kwan: Yes, and Laserfiche helped us to both save paper and become more organized. The DSU is housed in a fairly small office for an organization of its size. It’s unlikely that we will be expanding into a larger physical space in the near future, but the DSU continues to produce and collect many files. Laserfiche helped minimize paper by accommodating systematic file sharing. We’ve been able to make people conscious that sometimes there is no need to print a document stored on the system. We’ve begun to ask, “Do we want to keep the file? What value does this file have on our organization?” The tendency in the past was to keep everything, and to keep multiple copies with no unified filing structure. Multiply that by eight offices, and you begin to see a need for a digital document retrieval system.
We are the first established student union organization in Canada with documents dating back to 1844, and are part of a school that is one of the oldest universities in Canada. Our student newspaper The Gazette is the oldest in Canada, which speaks to the significant weight we place on our records and archival material. We are still in the planning stages of determining retention periods for our records as well as determining what will be archived, and/or transferred to the University Library Archives (where all of our vital, historical records and artifacts end up).
User News: Are there any practices you’ve developed that might be useful to others setting up a Laserfiche repository?
Kwan: For the DSU, keeping things centralized is the key to maintaining a successful file system. Because of the high transition rate in our organization, we need to organize our files centrally and locate them easily. Within the Laserfiche repository, we have a “dump and run/holding” folder where people can temporarily put documents in the system before they’re categorized. This encourages people to be active participants in the system, without worrying about misplacing files. We then have a separate person follow up by OCRing documents, creating templates and placing the files in the right folder. All our organizational filing mirrors the Laserfiche repository structure, including the file structure on each computer desktop. We encourage everyone in the organization to file using the same file folder names.
The Research Department, which keeps track of all of the original hard copy files, makes all the repository composition decisions and relays the changes to everyone else. At every chance, those involved with Laserfiche champion the system by reminding people to file frequently and correctly by doing “spot checks,” having informal conversations or playing “search games,” where the first person who retrieves a certain document gets a prize! These practices are useful in reminding people that the system is active and is fulfilling an educational component by actively engaging them in learning how to search for documents.
User News: What other concrete benefits of Laserfiche can you share with us?
Kwan: As a result of installing Laserfiche, all DSU staff members have cleaner offices and cleaner hard drives. And we’ve added a more professional image to our organization and are gaining a reputation as an innovative leader among student organizations across Canada. Gaining the capability to scan and share documents and retrieve them quickly has boosted our efficiency, helped the organization keep up with leadership changes and given us quick, easy access to the information we need.
User News: How does Laserfiche figure into your future plans?
Kwan: As we move into the future, we anticipate rolling out the system to our service departments, such as room reservations or the DSU bar. And as we expand, we also anticipate increased success in expanding our lobbying efforts, internal document management and the operational efficiency of the DSU, based on the positive track record of the Laserfiche system.