CMS? ECM? What do these terms really mean?
Submitted by joelhalse on May 7, 2008 - 6:34pm
I suspect there are many people in our industry that use these terms within their daily professional lives but aren't clear on their meaning. One indication is the notes found at the top of each page within wikipedia on this topic. Almost every page has a quality standards warning saying the article makes vague or superficial statements and focuses excessively on Web CMS.
So what does it take to be a CMS or an ECM?
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My definition...
I was kind of confused about this too. So much so that I wrote this post:
Moving from Content Management to Information Management
I realized after the fact that I was talking about the different between content management and enterprise content management.
In really simplistic terms, I've come to understand that managing content for external consumers is content management and managing content internal to your own business (content not for external consumption) is enterprise content management.
Again, this is a rough definition, but it's just what I've drawn from the context in which the two terms are used.
I like your simplistic
Deane, I like your simplistic definition for content management and enterprise content management. It may not specify the details, but it let's people understand the mission or intention of the information system better.
I do wonder why we struggle so much on these terms? I've written on my own past struggles with the various types of information systems. I think perhaps the difficulty for defining these systems is that in the real world none of these systems remain static. An information system we define today isn't likely going to be the same system that will be used next year. So much agility is needed in information systems for it to be of practical use in today's business climate.