Email overload and data loss are major problems impacting businesses. Mail Manager, the email management solution by Arup, discusses how to modernise your document management
Email overload, information visibility and data loss are major problems afflicting businesses of all sizes all over the world. And all of these issues are largely born out of organisations still struggling to effectively handle their document management.
Sending and receiving email is a vital and unavoidable part of daily life for near enough everyone that runs or manages projects of any size. This is proven by our recent project management research report of people in senior leadership roles at AEC organisations. The research found that more than half of respondents (55%) use email for more than 80% of their project correspondence. A further quarter (25%) revealed that between 71% and 80% of their project communication is via email.
Furthermore, 88% of respondents told us that they remain concerned that project information won’t be readily available and isn’t visible enough. And, when you consider that 99% of respondents have had to retrieve emails from a previous project, that becomes a major concern.
Why email communication remains vital
Email is widely used to share information that is central to the success of projects both while they are in progress and upon their completion. For example, our research found that nearly one in five respondents (18%) had needed to reproduce information from completed project communication trails when chasing payments. Furthermore, 60% revealed that they regularly have to retrieve email messages from past projects.
These findings are indicative of people across the organisation requiring access to project information as and when they require it. So they cannot afford for it to be locked in one email inbox that only the owner of the account can access. Further down the line, that person could be on holiday, be off sick, or could have left the company, which risks seeing the information being lost forever.
To avoid this possibility, businesses need to look to software that brings down the barriers of document management and ensures information isn’t locked away in individual inboxes.
How to modernise document management
Our research discovered that only one in ten respondents felt confident and comfortable with how to find project information. It’s, therefore, no surprise that information visibility and data loss, in particular, continue to blight businesses. To address this, businesses need to modernise their document management systems and processes.
Instead of emails being stored within individuals’ inboxes, Mail Manager organises it into folders within shared locations. Emails are securely stored in a centralised folder, reducing inbox storage space and increasing collaboration between teams.
The Outlook add-in helps users to find the information they are looking for in seconds with its advanced search criteria. This helps them find information based on who it was sent by, who the recipient was, the date it was sent and whether the message includes attachments.
Mail Manager also helps businesses become more organised, using an AI-powered solution that learns peoples’ filing habits to suggest the most appropriate location for a specific email to be stored in. The plug-in also works on all devices, enabling businesses to take control of their document management anywhere and at any time.
Information discovery in practice
Mail Manager ensures that people working on a project can always the information they need, be it to check an agreed deliverable or to settle a dispute.
For example, one of our customers uses the solution to keep track of past email communication. This includes going back so far in time that people can’t remember the emails they sent, discovering which version of a file was sent to a client and whether certain people were included in email correspondence. Project managers also use it to go back and discover all emails sent by former employees when they’ve left the business or teams have changed.
The solution is also crucial to boosting productivity. Australian firm Enspire Solutions’ team members use Mail Manager’s search capability to ensure that critical emails have been sent even if they weren’t copied in on the message, which is crucial for people working on different timezones.
Enspire has teams across different offices & time zones, who are able to see every email across the project they need to…
Enspire also uses it to minimise the effects of email overload. The business estimates that a single employee would spend one hour per day trying to manage a full inbox, which equates to around $1,500 – and could be doubled for a director. Mail Manager removes this risk by ensuring emails are immediately filed to the appropriate location, meaning employees no longer have to waste time managing their inboxes.
Modernise your document management
There is now no excuse for anyone working on projects to feel uncomfortable or lack confidence in their ability to find information as and when they need it. Mail Manager makes the process simple and helps anyone find any information pertaining to a project they’ve worked on in seconds.
It’s time to avoid your usual email headaches. To find out how you can reduce risk and increase collaboration on projects, download our guide ‘Transform your project information management by embracing Sharepoint‘.
