Summary:

Doormen in buildings provide a vital role in managing the flow of people in and out of the front door of a building. Similarly, Artificial Intelligence (AI) creates a “Digital Doorman” that can manage the flow of information in and out of a “Single Front Door” of an organization. This single front door consolidates the many streams of paper, fax and PDF into an organization while the digital doorman “reads” and “learns” documents that come in. This model turns documents into data in a time where organizations desperately need to reduce costs, transform processes and improve the quality of data.

The New Cost Reduction Imperative

It is hard to argue that in less than three months, the world has radically shifted. The word Pandemic, which was barely in the public consciousness six months ago is now taking lives and affecting the lives of virtually everyone on the planet. the only story that seems to matter. Additionally, the economic fallout from COVID-19 has been swift and overwhelming. Out of necessity, businesses are looking for ways to transform processes, reallocate personnel and reduce costs quickly. Old ways of doing business seem to be evaporating overnight. With this in mind, I offer some thoughts on proven methods for changing some expensive, slow and low-quality methods for sharing data and interacting with customers, vendors, employees and other stakeholders.  It is time to change or be changed.

Paper Stops at the Door

One of the most common problems we encounter is the challenge of dealing with paper, fax and other documents that come into organizations from multiple sources and via many channels. We have worked with customers to create a “Single Front Door” policy for these documents.  In other words, everything that is not structured data (paper, fax, PDF…) goes through a single-entry point for an organization and is turned into data immediately before moving further into the company. No exceptions. The same goes with paper and fax on the way out. You need a single back door as well. No paper in. No paper out. To paraphrase a common expression, paper begets paper. It needs to stop. We need data.

Why is stemming the flow of paper key to reducing costs?  I started my career in accounting, so here is my quick explanation. If I share a spreadsheet with you as a file via email, it is frictionless and almost free. In this scenario, I create data, I share it digitally and you can use the data without the friction or cost of having to key any information. It’s not free, but it is pretty close. 

However, if I share a PDF version of that same spreadsheet, it is typically not data. It is like sharing a photo of the spreadsheet. I can still email it, but the receiver must re-enter any/all of the data if it is to be useful for other purposes.  This creates both friction and cost as does paper and fax.  A single front door can bring all documents through a single door so that it can be turned into data, reducing process friction and cost. A Single Front Door is more policy than technology. It is a decision to change the way we do business.

Artificial Intelligence and the Digital Doorman

Doormen in apartment buildings provide a vital role in managing the flow of people in and out of the front door of a building. Similarly, Artificial Intelligence (AI) can create a “Digital Doorman” that can manage the flow of information in and out of the “Single Front Door” of an organization. At BRYJ, we help our customers leverage Artificial Intelligence (AI) as their digital doorman. Here’s what that digital doorman can do at your front door.

• AI will “read” each document that comes in, regardless of whether it is a scanned image, fax or other document, like an email or PDF.
• It then identifies each document type that comes in. In this process, called classification, our digital doorman identifies each page. It notes that one document is an invoice from ABC Enterprises, while another is a health claim and another a resume. Know what a document is can help direct it to the right department and process.
• Once classified, the doorman “reads” the contents in a process called data extraction. AI can look for structured data or fields, read handwriting or machine printed text and convert the images of the documents into usable data. By reading the document in this way, we understand the contents and context of the data within it.  We know what customer, member, patient or vendor this applies to.  With this information we can introduce automation.
• Some fraction of the documents cannot be confidently read.  The AI doorman sends these off to a person to verify the information before it moves along.
• Finally, the doorman hands off the data (and document) to a workflow to route the data to a person, system or both.

That is a frictionless process where human intervention is minimized, documents don’t get lost and our doorman works happily 24 x 7 making sure only data leaves the lobby. Most importantly, in these days where every dollar matters, a Single Front Door combined with a Digital Doorman can radically reduce costs, improve process speed, data quality and automation opportunities.

Getting Serious about going Paperless

If you are looking for ideas to reduce costs in 2020 by leveraging AI to eliminate paper and create frictionless processes, please let us know.  We are wildly passionate about building bridges to the future with our customers.  That’s why we named our company BRYJ. You can check us out here.

Please check out our upcoming webinar on reducing the costs of health claims entry using AI. It is on Wednesday, May 20 at noon CST. You can learn more and register here.