The collateral perfection analysis and recommendation knowledgebases-CPARK

In any large corporation the number of policy manuals, regulatory guides and product documents is often overwhelming. To find a quick answer to a question, be it simple or complex, is rarely easy. There is just too much information. Turning information into knowledge is a major corporate challenge moving into the 1990s. Manufacturers Hanover's (MH), internal audit department, charged with responsibility for evaluating the bank's compliance with a wide variety of policies, procedures and regulations, is keenly aware of this challenge. To be widely effective, auditors must be the prototypical jack-of-all trades, part lending officer, part attorney, part federal regulator, and part sleuth. With a job as knowledge-intensive as this one, it is no surprise that senior audit managers become interested in software tools and techniques for the lap top computer, particularly expert systems. MH identified several potential expert systems applications. From these, the problem of collateral perfection was selected because of its value not only to the audit department, but to the bank as a whole. Auditing contacted MH's legal department, the collateral perfection experts, and MH's advanced technology group, the expert systems experts. Together the three departments formed a joint partnership to build a series of collateral perfection knowledgebases, called CPARK, collateral perfection analysis and recommendation knowledgebases. >