Folders, are they really important?

I have read an article in AIIM that is titled: "Why folders are the new F word" written by Chris Riley. I have seen how the writer is against the usage of folders in ECM solutions in opposite to utilizing metadata searches where he prefers most. to have a look at this article, please see the link

http://www.aiim.org/community/blogs/expert/Why-Folders-are-the-new-F-word

in my opinion, I may disagree with Chris here, I do believe the folders are a very useful and a rich feature in any ECM solution. I have seen that Chris is a well experienced Microsoft Sharepoint professional, And knowing MS share point 2007, there was a limitation in managing folders and documents (like document reference links for example which used to depend on folder location) that I know is no longer there in 2010 version.

People may use folders to do 3 main usages: categorizing documents, grouping documents and browsing documents.

Categorizing documents forms a very simple and initial classification methdocuments. People use folders since the DOS world to categorize documents by different means. There are different scenarios that people follow while categorizing documets in folders, they may prefer to categorize documents by it's type, so a folder may be created with and named as "invoices" to contain invoices documents, another may be named as "correspondences" to contain memos, faxes and letters, same like "contracts", "certificates". other people may choose to categorize by the originating source of a document whereby a folder may be created that is named as "ministry of ....", "bank of ...." . Other folder naming styles may categorize documents based on people identities, so you may find a folder that represent your manager name, or your chairman, or your father / sun / friend...etc.

Such a categorization may form a grouping mechanism of documents that relates together to ease browsing it, so you know that all the invoices are available in one place in the invoices folder, or you know that any document that relates to your dad is in your dad's folder. You are also certain that all the documents that relates to your current employer are into the "current employer folder".

Now you may come and say this: can't I use document metadata in fulfilling all of the above scenarios of folder management and use this to get rid of folders? I would say, hmmmm, yes and no depending on the situation.

Metadata is another set of attributes that would record information that relates to the document, it may contain subject, from, to, document date, document type, keywords...etc. By utilizing metadata, you will be able to establish search queries depending on values of the metadata that you have in mind about a certain document, for example, you look for a document that has the word "commitment" in it's title, and was received 3 months ago. In the case that the values you are specifying about the document are correct, this would perform the fastest and the most accurate way to retrieve the document you are looking for (in here I agree with Chris). But let me then ask this question, what if you do not recall the exact metadata of a document, will you be able to get it? I would answer this with a No. In this case, searching for a document based on a metadata will fail to get it, and you will start digging for different option to get the document, and here is where you start browsing for it based on the available set of defined folders.

So this brings me to advantage point #1, which is "folders will offer browsing for documents based on it's business / user categorization and classification", which forms an additional option to searching, not a replacement of searching.

Let us take the discussion further, if we present to a normal user the ability to save a document based on entering the requried metadata (indexing it) in opposite to filing it into appropriate folder, so for example, an Hr clerk wants to upload an employee leave document. Using metadata indexing, the clerk will be entering the employee number (12345), then select the document type (leaves), then select a sub type (annual leave), then key the document date and end date...etc. Using this methodology will ensure faster retrieval time, since the query may go as follows: "get me the annaual leave of employee 12345 that was taken in 2011"....very neat query with exact results. So this is one of the cases that metadata filling is better than filing into folders from search perspective. But let us talk compliance and governance and enhance the abve case to use folders, what if an auditor comes and needs to have access to the whole employee file of employee number 12345? In an ECM world, this means conducting the above query again, and loop through all the documents and assign access to the auditor on all the documents. This is a costly operation, and may require some customization and coding to acheive it. Now let us say that the emloyee file is represented in folders as the following hierarchy: employee number --> document type --> document sub type, and we know that most of the ECM leading vendors suppot securiety access rights inheritance from folders, so the auditor access may be given in seconds by assigning his ACL on the top employee file folder, which is folder 12345, which would make the subfolders and it's documents to inherit the access right that is assigned to the top folder. Using folders here will give flexibility in assigning security for group of documents at the same shot and would also make it so flexible to remove this access right once the auditor work is finalized and completed. in the opposite scenario, the matadata query may not fulfil your need in getting all the required documets grouped together from the first search attempt so you will have to conduct multiple queries then group the documents manually. This brings us to advantage point #2: "folders help in assigning inheritted security access rights to a group of documents with ease"

It is also very important to address how records management world is fully dependent on folders structuring, this is simply because of file plans. A file plan is a comprehensive outline that includes the records series, file organization, active file locations, file transfer instructions, file retention and disposition instructions, and other specific instructions that provide guidance for effective management of records, including vital records. File plans specify how records are to be organized once they have been created or received, provide a "roadmap" to the records created and maintained by an organizational unit, and facilitate dispositioning the records. A file plan lists the records in your office, and describes how they are organized and maintained. file plans means heirarical data and this will never be achieved without utilizing a sofisticated folder management and classification. So this brings us to advantage point #3: "folders helps in configuring and deploying a records management solution to organizations.

So in my opinion, yes, folders are vital and essential to be used in any ECM solution, instead of getting rid of it for faster searches of documents, this rich feature needs to be always enhanced and supported to add value to searches and any ECM solution. there are more advantages than the specified in this article but i will leave it to folder lovers to talk about it :)