BCT Guiding Documents, the supplier of the document management system Corsa, is one of the first providers to present a complete operational SharePoint integration. BCT Guiding Documents, which recently also became a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, has developed a link between SharePoint and Corsa. As a result of this, users of SharePoint are granted access to the extensive functionality for document management, workflow, filing and folder development in Corsa.

For organizations, the new version of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) is mainly interesting as a portal or collaboration environment. Because this solution also includes functionality for content management and enterprise search, organizations and their employees are able to share information. SharePoint supports all intranet, extranet and web applications in an organization, within one single integrated platform. The intranet and internet functionality provides, among other things, portals for teams and project groups, between which documents can be exchanged. Through Outlook, SharePoint has – limited – facilities for workflow and document management. SharePoint is especially suitable for collaboration, by which a group of people on ad hoc bases – for example in the scope of a project – create, jointly modify and save documents and files.

Corsa, mainly used by the Dutch Government, contains extensive and professional functionality for document management, workflow, filing and folder development. The main strength of the application is the digitalization of processes, the archive ready information and the availability of this information. Corsa covers the whole process of automatic document registration and saving and making documents accessible, within specific work processes and folders.

Corsa and the other BCT products all meet the standards and requirements of the Dutch Government, such as the Public Records Act and the software specifications for Records Management Applications for the Dutch Government (ReMaNo). 

The integration of Corsa with SharePoint resulted in a solution that incorporates the best of these two systems. SharePoint is focused on the individual work environment, while Corsa is more focused on the organisation and emphasizes the structured documents and processes. Integrating Microsoft SharePoint with Corsa resulted in a complete package incorporating functionality for document management and workflow, which is interesting for the government, non-profit organizations and business enterprises. In ‘daily’ use, SharePoint can be applied as the normal platform, which grants access to all official documents that are saved in Corsa. The user will not need to worry about version management or authorization. Documents that are created in SharePoint can be transferred to Corsa in the archive phase. For professionals working with documents as part of working processes and with folders, and who have to deal with legal validity terms and task-focused workflow, Corsa with its own interface will remain leading. 

The advantages of the integration are clear. Users benefit from the possibilities of SharePoint with respect to collaboration, the portal function and implementing the workflow within only one user group. Corsa meets the needs for a safe filing system in conformity with ReMaNo, a coordinated workflow, state-of-the-art capturing tools and integration with vertical applications.