UralChem is AZOT (interaction of systems on DICS)

Subject of document flow and interaction management — today one of the most discussed in IT. And if earlier authors of publications generally spoke about corporate document flow, then the subject of interdepartmental document flow and interaction became rather new trend in 'dokumentooborotny' journalism. Two terms — interdepartmental and intercorporate document flow are in parallel used. A part of experts * adheres to such point of view: interdepartmental document flow can exist only between state bodies (G2G) and if the commercial organizations (B2B) exchange documents — such document flow is called intercorporate. At once there is a question by what term to designate document flow between state bodies and the commercial organizations. On the other hand, even between state bodies of the relation arise not only at implementation of the state functions, but also within daily business activities. Therefore in the context of this article document flow between the independent organizations, whether it be state bodies or commercial structures, will hereinafter be referred to as 'interorganizational'.

Now the majority of initiatives first of all mean exchange of electronic documents by interorganizational electronic document management and interaction. So 'same', only instead of the paper document — electronic, instead of the sign manual — the EDS, instead of traditional mail — e-mail. For example, such model interorganizational (this context — interdepartmental) electronic document management (MEDO) in federal authorities contains the Order of the Government of the Russian Federation of 9/22/2009 No. 754 'About the statement of Regulations on the system of interdepartmental electronic document management' **. System architecture of MEDO represents classical 'star': there is a head node, there are nodes of participants of interorganizational electronic document management. The head node and nodes of participants connect secure channels of communication. In spite of the fact that it is called 'interaction of federal information systems of electronic document management', in fact such scheme — classical implementation of the protected e-mail. And let as the addressee and the sender of electronic messages in the document 'information systems of electronic document management' are called, in this scheme they act as normal mailboxes.

Such 'dokumentocentrirovanny' scheme is quite efficient for periodic interaction of poorly connected subjects. But actually interaction in state and business environments has more difficult character. In language of the process approach we deal with end-to-end business processes. Process can be initiated in one organization, have contractors in others, and controllers — in the third. Formally interaction is performed in the form of exchange of documents. But it should not mislead: exchange of documents is made within end-to-end business process. Documents in this case not all knowledge of process, a considerable part of information (signatures contain, dates and so forth) contains in metadata of documents and the business process. For state bodies an example of such difficult interaction which automation would benefit from application of the process approach is interaction during rendering electronic state services.

However their departmental dissociation and often lack of the methodological center which could assess a situation in general prevents to approach process of automation of the interaction systemically to state structures where it is necessary, optimum to rebuild business processes and to automate them, but not just to organize transfer of documents from department 'And' in department of B. In it state bodies should learn from representatives of holding structures who, without exaggeration, are pioneers in the field of the organization of interorganizational interaction including electronic.

In case of electronic interorganizational interaction select two levels: methodical and technical. On the first of them issues of the organization of legal space are resolved, procedures of interaction are defined. At technological level interaction of the ECM systems of participants will be organized. Let's stop on this aspect in more detail.

The idea to integrate corporate systems in the uniform mechanism is not new. The last reincarnation of this idea is the service-oriented architecture (Service Oriented Architecture, or SOA). The central part of SOA represents the corporate service bus (Enterprise Service Bus) which integrates separate information systems. In the market there is no shortcoming of solutions. It is possible to remember Microsoft BizTalk, IBM WebSphere, Bea WebLogic — the powerful scalable industrial systems capable to organize data exchange between several information systems. The medal back — the serious cost of ESB solutions and also need of keeping of qualified specialists for maintenance and development of a system of interaction.

From this point of view the idea of creation of the specialized solution capable to integrate the ECM systems of participants is more interesting and to organize end-to-end business processes, at the reasonable cost. An example of such solution are services of interaction of the DIRECTUM systems (DIRECTUM Intersystem Cooperation Services, or DICS). DICS are intended for the organization of information exchange between systems, initially not connected among themselves in any way. It can be the DIRECTUM systems installed in the different organizations, having different versions, different development and different setup. At the same time observance of regulations of the movement of documents is provided, exchange of documents with the EDS is supported.

The basis of DICS is formed by the following elements:

• DICS controllers are the routing nodes providing data transmission from one system in another. In addition the controller accumulates at itself a part of the transmitted data for fast connection to it of the new systems;
• agents of the DIRECTUM systems — the DICS programs representatives on the party of a final system. The main objectives of the agent — accumulation of packets, sending to their controller according to the schedule, acceptance and accumulation of incoming packets and sending them according to the schedule in a local system;
• rules of export and import of packets — the automatic rules defining an order of formation of packets and structure of information included in packets. Rules of export and import are configured in each system, in the reference book 'Transformation Rules of Objects in the Structured Format'.

Services, according to internal regulations, perform transfer of tasks, documents and records of reference books from one DIRECTUM system in another, using possibilities of service workflow and also a possibility of special agents and controllers. At the same time the interacting DIRECTUM systems of the enterprises of holding are technically completely independent.

Based on DICS several successfully functioning solutions are already implemented. One of such solutions — the organization of end-to-end business processes in URALCHEM group. Implementation of DICS allowed to automate the following business processes.

• Approval of orders and orders on primary activity, acquaintance with them and control of their execution. The order can be issued in head or subsidiary company and is sent for approval according to the set list of reviewers.
• Work with memos. The author of the memo can be an employee of both head, and subsidiary company. After approval in accordance with the established procedure the note is delivered to the addressee who can appoint contractors and the controller on this note.
• Approval of contractual documents. The initiator of the agreement creates the document which goes to approval. The employees approving the document can also be both in head, and in subsidiary companies.
• The centralized work with powers of attorney. The initiator from subsidiary company prepares a set of documents. The packet undergoes prior approval then the approved option is printed and signed by the CEO of management company.
• Through DICS it was succeeded to make end-to-end business processes transparent for users. Also system administrators did not come off 'the loser'. The solution turned out simple in administration. Besides, the architecture of DICS allows without essential costs to add to a guidance loop the new organizations and new EDMS.

According to Dilara Kiselyova, the project manager from group URALCHEM, the implemented solution based on DICS allowed to implement essentially a different approach to business process automation in the company with complex structure: 'Implementation of DICS gave the chance of support of several flexible modes of data exchange between divisions and also accounting of different options of business processes depending on local regulations. It is important that during creation of project solutions first of all all features of interaction between the organizations of holding, taking into account their hierarchy and different conditions for these or those routes were taken into account. As a result the received development was completely focused on requirements of our company. Plus to everything it allowed to review need of some transactions during joint work taking into account the new, process focused model'.

The project manager from DIRECTUM company Pavel Krivitsky adds to it that increase in convenience of work to the staff of group became the main effect which managed to achieve from implementation of DICS: 'First of all the customer set for us a task of orientation to the end user. Therefore the proposed solution was not directed to reorganization of the existing business processes, and on the contrary, designed to make more visual and intuitive already fixed mechanism of interaction of employees. As a result, first, the uniform information field in group due to consolidation of the reference information from separate sources was created. Secondly, thanks to the fact that the project solution provided a maximum of options of interaction the end user needed only to select the necessary option of a standard route or the document that considerably simplified and accelerated the automated processes'.

Instead of the epilog it is possible to tell the following. Interorganizational electronic document management is a reality of today, development of the existing interaction both in state bodies, and in a business environment. To make MEDO effective, often there is an efficiency allows to replace exchange of paper documents of electronic document management insufficiently — бóльшую the process approach. This opportunity is given by the modern ECM systems, workflow-opportunities by default including. And means of the organization of interaction of ECM systems, such as DICS, allow to automate the end-to-end business processes integrating initiators, contractors and controllers from the different organizations but at the same time included in a uniform guidance loop.