Enterprise content management (ECM) implementation in South Africa

Purpose - This article aims to assess how enterprise content management (ECM) has been implemented in South Africa. Design/methodology/approach - The article is a five-part analysis of the concept of ECM. The first part outlines a perspective to ECM based on predecessor and related terms such as EDMS and ERMS. The second part reviews literature generated in South Africa on electronic records and document management over the last decade as well as a discussion on value added resellers in the country. The third part provides the results of the survey of ten South African institutions. This section includes an outline on the research methodology used as well as analysis of the data and a brief discussion of the research implications. The fourth part provides concluding remarks and the fifth part is a list of references. Findings - A literature review conducted by the author reveals that there have been few published sources on institutional experiences related to implementing electronic document and records management in South Africa. However, the survey published in this article reveals that South African institutions have as much as eight years of ECM implementation experience, a majority using ECM applications from one company and the most common ECM applications modules installed within the organizations being records management, document management and imaging. These survey results suggest additional research is needed to assess proprietary vs non-proprietary applications as well as the impact of value-added resellers to ECM implementation. Originality/value - As the literature review has shown, ECM implementation in South Africa has received minimal attention beyond graduate level research. This article provides an analysis of empirical data on ECM implementation in South Africa and serves as a baseline for more comprehensive studies in the future.