SW needed to track regulatory items
October 2, 2006 9:22 AM
Recommendations for web research software please. I need to research several items a day, which arrive in email, or arise during the course of conversation, or during the course of other research. I need to track such items, record our current disposition, stance on the issue, record research underway, attach documents, links, analysis documents, slideshows, etc.
The emails that arrive often contain starting points for several avenues of research. Sometimes, the emails are informative as to the subject -- I don't have to follow a link to find out what the subject is. Sometime, they're not -- I have to follow a link to find out what the subject is, and I don't always have the time to immediately do that.
Due to the fact that some emails contain multiple items for research (and many that should not be researched), email flags are no good. Task management approaches are overwhelmed by this task. I am typically managing 200-300 of these open items at any one time.
Oh, and everyone else in our company needs to see what the status of the research is at any one point in time, and I need to be able to create review agendas for various meetings based on certain filters.
And just for fun, this is being done in a PC-only environment. Sorry.
The items being tracked are quasi-regulatory in nature. Regulations, decisions under regulations, etc. Hence "law & government" category.
The emails that arrive often contain starting points for several avenues of research. Sometimes, the emails are informative as to the subject -- I don't have to follow a link to find out what the subject is. Sometime, they're not -- I have to follow a link to find out what the subject is, and I don't always have the time to immediately do that.
Due to the fact that some emails contain multiple items for research (and many that should not be researched), email flags are no good. Task management approaches are overwhelmed by this task. I am typically managing 200-300 of these open items at any one time.
Oh, and everyone else in our company needs to see what the status of the research is at any one point in time, and I need to be able to create review agendas for various meetings based on certain filters.
And just for fun, this is being done in a PC-only environment. Sorry.
The items being tracked are quasi-regulatory in nature. Regulations, decisions under regulations, etc. Hence "law & government" category.
(You can also, of course, record each individual item as its own ticket, to avoid the email:item ratio issues.)
posted by disillusioned at 9:36 AM on October 2, 2006
posted by disillusioned at 9:36 AM on October 2, 2006
The Journal Feature of Outlook might be able to serve your purpose, but it would need to be customized by someone who knows their way around VBscript.
posted by Mr. Gunn at 3:43 PM on October 2, 2006
posted by Mr. Gunn at 3:43 PM on October 2, 2006
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Mantis Bug Tracker is a perfect solution.
It's open-source, and web-based, so it's distributed.
You can file each new email as a "ticket." Tickets allow you to assign users, allow users to monitor tickets, track the flow of a conversation in a ticket, link tickets to other tickets, close tickets, re-open tickets, request feedback from other parties, send reminders to other parties, search through all tickets with a solid search & filtration system and more.
You can easily upload and manage mutiple files and revisions for each ticket, monitor tickets you've reported, tickets you've been assigned, post system-wide news and maintain system-wide documentation.
You can also set individual email settings, so that you're receiving emails for every update to every ticket, or only when a status changes, or only when whatever occurs.
You can grant individuals within your firm an account each, and allow everyone the ability to see what's active from anywhere with an internet connection.
You can set user-level access, so certain individuals can only view/edit or just view tickets they've submitted, or only upload and not delete files, or do everything, based on your whims.
The software is powerful and free.
Let me know if you're at all interested in learning more, since the web site is definitely geared towards software developers and may put you off to it a bit.
I can definitely help you set up a working solution, either on your servers or in a hosted system.
My email's in my profile.
posted by disillusioned at 9:35 AM on October 2, 2006