Electronic archives and document workflow

As a company grows and develops, its internal document workflow increases, and its archive grows exponentially as a result. This software solution provides a portal for internal archiving and document workflow. There are options for categorizing documents based on the enterprise or department in question.

Reference materials can also be stored in their own location on the portal for access at any time. Documents can be given a certain security status or access level, to protect sensitive data such as company secrets or personal information. There is a space for forum discussions, as well as multimedia support for posting images, audio and video files to the network. Furthermore, official document work such as the signing of contracts and communication with external agencies can be carried out via the portal.

To work with the module, certain parameters must be set, with information taken from three separate tables: ‘Subdivisions’, ‘Contract Parties’ and ‘Consultation types’. A new entrepreneur case can be initiated by clicking on the ‘Create’ button. Each item in the list, which corresponds to a consultation process with an entrepreneur requesting support, contains a package of documents in various file formats, including Microsoft Word, Excel and plain text files. There are four possible statuses for consultations: ‘Not assigned’, meaning that the employee may have been selected for the review process but is not yet aware of it; ‘Active’, which means that the employee at the fund is currently carrying out the consultation process; ‘Completed’, meaning that the employee has either approved or rejected the request, which is now awaiting confirmation from a reviewer; and ‘Verified’, signalling that the consultation is ready for approval or funds are available for transfer. Employees receive email notifications when a consultation task is set to begin, as do reviewers when the task is completed.

During workflow processes for the consultation itself, there are further parameters to be set in the area marked ‘Assignment’: these are ‘User’, ‘Deadline’, ‘Reviewer’, and ‘Review deadline’. There is a ‘Start’ button which can be used for cases where these terms are already designated, based on the general parameters relating to the class and type of entrepreneur under consideration. Users and reviewers can be modified over the course of the consultation period, if for example it is a collaborative project.

The consultation itself involves a list of tasks to be carried out by the employee, with the option to add attachments (the entrepreneur's documentation) to the relevant sections. All elements of the process can be deleted, altered or replaced at any stage before the deadline, when the access is passed on to the reviewer. The employee can mark a task as completed, before checking the results at a later stage. The ‘Approval’ mode allows administrators, reviewers or management to check the interim results of the consultation process.

Where an application is approved, the entire process for providing feedback and informing the entrepreneur of the approval is carried out via the module. Furthermore, employees can subscribe to notifications about the changing status of items in the list of consultations, so as to track the ongoing approval of applications. All incoming and outgoing correspondence, as well as documentation relating to prospective recipients of funding, is stored on a secure, online document library.