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The Royal Society of Chemistry Protects Vital Data With Dajon’s Help

The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) carries out vital research and publishes a wide variety of documentation in a continuing quest towards the advancement of chemical sciences. Having accumulated 378 boxes – equating to around 1 million pages – of irreplaceable historical paperwork, protection became an issue. The society needed the data to be stored in a central online system to ensure the safety of the information and to make sure that it could be referenced easily for years to come. Dajon stepped in – digitising the data and creating a highly effective, indexed DMS.

Courtyard of The Royal Society of Chemistry Burlington House

The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) certainly has a rich and illustrious past. Dedicated to the advancement of chemical sciences, the RSC perform vital research and publish a wide variety of documentation for members and peers. As the professional body for chemistry in the UK, the RSC also allocate professional statuses and award a number of prizes and awards to recognise excellence in various areas of chemistry.

Not surprisingly given their impressive reputation and background, the RSC has in the region of 47,500 members, arriving from very diverse areas of chemical sciences. Each member makes a contribution to the organisation – and in turn they are granted access to invaluable scientific information, careers advice and a wide range of exclusive benefits.

Past members of the RSC include a number of Nobel Prize winners and leading Government figures. Naturally, this kind of fascinating and useful historical information needed to be kept on record.

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The project began life in May/June of 2013, with Dajon taking 100 boxes in each rotation to scan. Dajon understood the importance of the papers – and with a proven track record in the processing of sensitive and often fragile documents, they embarked upon the task.

Great communication was vital to ensuring smooth-running of the project. RSC describe Dajon as being “helpful, attentive and always available for questions” throughout all phases of the assignment.

It was the aim of Dajon to create an easily accessible database using the very best technologies available. Many of the older documents had varying levels of degradation following long periods of storage; therefore scan quality was of key importance.

As Jim Wiggin (Sales and Marketing Director at Dajon Data Management at the time of the project) said:

We understood the importance of getting the documents scanned in quickly, but accurately, with optimum readability.

After the initial conversation with Breast Cancer Care and better understanding of their personnel files digitalisation requirements, Dajon Data Management proposed a solu­tion to help the charity to move paper HR files into a dig­ital format for better compliance, easier file management and faster access to the records, whenever it was needed. Dajon had provided Breast Cancer Care with a full cycle HR records digitalisation solution as the files had to be collected from client’s premises, barcoded, indexed and scanned. Moreover, Dajon Data Management has also seg­regated and sorted personnel files into different sections, such as medical records, contracts, leave and others, for easier post-scanning records management.

Now, the charity can access its personnel files instantly without a need to go through paper records and look for the required information. This allowed Breast Cancer Care to achieve not only a smooth merge with another charity, but also concentrate on achieving its main goal without using extra valuable resources for operational tasks, such as looking for personnel’s information.

Great care was taken to capture the historical data accurately

Apart from the obvious advantage of freeing up physical space, the RSC/Dajon project ensured the safety of documents that will be referenced for many years to come. Much of the information contained in these sacred documents simply cannot be replaced.

RSC praised Dajon for their efforts on the project, saying:

We are very happy with the work that Dajon carried out for us, would highly recommend them, and with no hesitation would use them again in the future.

Thanks to the hard work performed by Dajon, key RSC member communications are now preserved as a permanent reminder of years gone by. Existing and future members can now access documents that may have otherwise remained un-read in storage.

As Rob Stiles commented:

The true value of the project is now being realised, as we look through the wealth of data scanned in – in particular the documents dating back to the turn of the century.

If your company needs help with a data project, Dajon Data Management can help. From document scanning and storage to cloud enterprise and backup, Dajon have tailored, cost-effective solutions to fit your requirements.
Dajon are not your average company – they create personalised solutions to cater for individual company needs and always add real value to any work that they do.