5 Steps You Need to Take Before Migrating from File Shares

In a previous blog, we explained why it is wise to store business documents in an enterprise content management (ECM) system rather than on file shares. Migrating your content from traditional file shares to an ECM platform can be a complex task. Before you begin, here are five essential steps to help ensure a successful migration.

1. Analyze the content

Maybe you have already made a short list of preferred ECM systems, but before you make the final choice, it’s a good idea to analyze the content that needs to be migrated. Maybe your file share contains special types of content, for example, AutoCAD files, that have an effect on the requirements needed for the target system. In short, don’t do a lift and shift of the content.

An archiving solution is a static environment, and most of the time, storage costs are a lot less than for a collaboration solution. Before migrating, try to archive as much inactive content as possible. Migrate only active files and data to the collaboration solution or Document management system.

Some applications require a network drive to dump files for later use or maybe for logging purposes. In this case, you will still need a file share after the migration to support these systems. Usually, we recommend keeping this file share in a closed environment which is not accessible to anyone in the organization.

Comparing content on file shares with your current ECM platform – in case you want to migrate your file shares AND a legacy ECM environment – can be useful to identify duplicate files. These files can be excluded from migration from the file share to a new environment. In practice we see that this is quite substantial.

We see many organizations struggle with their file shares after they have migrated their content to a new central system. Should I leave it open, take it out completely, or make it read only access? Read-only’ seems like a good solution, but organizations often think differently about this later. This ‘read-only’ mode often results in unsecure and incompliant workarounds, such as storing documents in Dropbox. The best way to solve it, is to make sure your new ECM system contains all the content your users need.

If your organization is planning on executing a migration of file shares, following these steps will start you in the right direction.

In the next phase, you might need to choose a migration tool that works best for your organization and will get you the business value you seek.

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