11 January 2007 - Scotland Group Meeting - 11 January 2007
Records Management Society - Scotland Group Meeting, Thursday 11th January 2007
Electronic Records Management
University of Edinburgh
Sponsored by McPherson Document Solutions, suppliers of document management and document scanning solutions - www.trmcpherson.co.uk
Meeting report by Edith Pringault-Adam
Dr Julie McLeod, Northumbria University, opened the meeting by taking a holistic approach to electronic records management, elaborating on records management requirements, the challenges of Information and Communication Technologies, the legal and regulatory environment and finally the human and organisational dimensions. She emphasised the personal mind-set prevailing in organisations, where electronic records are not seen as a corporate asset but as belonging to the individual employee who creates/receives them and on the different working practices within offices. She reminded participants that Records Managers do not "do" records management, but facilitate it by defining and promoting policies and procedures.
She then presented the project being undertaken at Northumbria University, under her leadership: Managing e-records . The project was inspired by McDonald J. The wild frontier ten years on in McLeod J. and Hare C. Managing electronic records (2005), where McDonald proposes four steps to manage electronic records:
- Establish a vision
- Raise awareness
- Design architecture
- Build capacity
The overall objective of the project is to develop a framework which can deliver on policies, procedures and people and share practical approaches. As electronic records management crosses disciplines, it is essential that all stakeholders of information management are involved: records managers, IT specialists, system designers, records creators, office/department managers. Dr McLeod called for volunteers to actively participate in the project, especially via the blog created and by attending meetings which will take place throughout the UK.
Although now underway, the project was delayed slightly at the start, mainly because of the difficulty in recruiting an information management professional, as there is a clear shortage of people with such skills. The main phase of the project is a literature search.
After Dr McLeod's presentation, participants were then split into groups to discuss the organisational and the human issues of electronic records management.
Feedback from group discussions articulated around the following points:
Change management
- Change management is not deemed a core skill of a records manager.
- It takes a long time to change people: up to 5 years.
- A key role of the records manager is to support change.
Training
- Training staff seen as essential for change to take place.
- Training at induction and also education of all staff.
- ICT skills: training on (Microsoft) applications is too general and not focused on trainees' tasks back in the office.
- Information literacy: secretaries no longer available and now everybody needs to understand their role and be equipped. Needs to be incorporated in job descriptions as an essential skill.
User Motivation
- Records Management seen as a barrier, therefore it is necessary to articulate benefits for the organisation, internal and external customers, and most of all for the staff themselves. Make them think of their own objectives.
- Treat Records Management as a road-show: Sell, sell, sell. Training on its own is not sufficient: records managers must make a personal engagement and be themselves motivated.
- Demonstrate that records management will make life easier.
- Little uptake because no value demonstrated to staff. Requires a clear vision, structure and tools and people involvement.
- Staff already doing records management but not in the way records manager want. Therefore engage with them positively.
- Comfort zone to fight ('it is becoming acceptable to spend time searching for information'). Give responsibility back to staff.
- Marketing: getting advocates/champions. Realisation of benefits.
Records Management organisation and competency
- Heavy investment of time for Records Managers: appoint records champions/information officers.
- Records champions versus word of mouth.
- Include records management in job descriptions.
- Encourage organisation to support and provide transferable skills.
Organisational issues
- Ownership of information is seen as personal, but it should be corporate.
- EDRMS project led by ICT without any involvement or a late involvement from Records Management.
- Who pays for EDRM: is it a corporate project, or is it up to individual departments to opt for it?
- Senior management difficulty in understanding records management issues.
- Senior management buy-in essential, but difficult in big organisations, better buy-in small organisations.
- Dealing with different formats.
- High turnover of staff is a problem.
- ICT Strategy/Records Management Strategy: strategies and policies in silo. Gather under one Information Management Strategy which encompasses all elements including ICT.
After lunch, presentations from three speakers took place in advance of the panel discussion.
Russel Bailey, of Learning and Skills Council (LSC), presented the organisation, what records it creates and holds and went into more detail on the electronic records management policies in place. An Information Management Charter and a Records Management Policy are endorsed by senior management and issued to staff every year. The focus is on good recordkeeping. LSC has developed in conjunction with Meridio an interim records storage tool: the extensive use of templates allows for the capture of metadata and partial automation of file naming. The tool is available on Open Source.
After introducing the organisation, Alan McKirdy, of Scottish Natural Heritage, presented in great detail the EDRMS in place, supplied by Objective. He emphasised the following points: the project board must be led by a senior officer; it is essential to speak to other organisations that have the same system in order to assess pitfalls and benefits; it is necessary to have a support team in departments; implementing an EDRMS is definitely a "charm" offensive". Once implemented, records managers must keep an eye on the development of software.
Kate Knight, of HBOS, took on the human perspective of electronic records management, highlighting the fact that technology must come last in the list of priorities. From a financial institution point of view, bad records management in the financial sector has grave consequences and can be the root of financial crime such as money laundering and identity theft and lead to share price drop. Records management is core to financial activities. She emphasised the following points: organisations must not rely on suppliers to solve their problems and must bear in mind that some products have been developed for markets other than the UK. Sarbanes Oxley requirements are quoted by suppliers frequently, though this is not UK law and only applies in certain circumstances. They rarely address the new EC legislation which has major implications for the UK financial sector. It is easy to lose focus and target the product rather than the reasons behind ERM. Individuals take liberties with corporate information but are looking for guidelines. Records Management is always relevant and exciting, but records managers must have a relentless enthusiasm.
The panel discussion raised the following questions:
Q: How do you get your Chief Executive/Senior Management to commit and support the project/change?
A: It is all about building relationships, finding out what makes the Executive "tick". You must overcome any fear or apprehension regarding the hierarchical superiority as the reason for establishing ERM is core to the organisation's objectives.
Q: Is EDRMS the solution?
A: EDRMS is not the solution. It is a step towards better electronic record keeping. EDRMS will evolve and tackle other elements of records keeping. The difficulty with electronic records is that the human brain is not programmed to remember what has just been scrolled down and although portable solutions exist, it is still easier and more practical to carry paper around.
Q: Does the interim solution at LSC support a retention schedule?
A: No but the review/disposal date is indicated. LSC has taken the view that there must be an element of human intervention when disposing of records, therefore the review/disposal date is flagged up but there is no automatic deletion.
Q: For the interim solution at LSC, how much metadata is appended automatically and how much is added by users?
A; The use of templates with mandatory fields allows for automatic capture (eg date and type of record), but the choice of subject is down to the user. Users find it difficult and time consuming if they have to add more than 3 pieces of metadata, therefore making the users entering more needs to be risk assessed and managed. The naming of documents is a critical part of information sharing and must be prescriptive.
Q: Does the interim solution at LSC cater for personal data?
A: Yes, the access to specific personnel folders is restricted to HR for example.
Q: How are legacy records handled by organisation putting ERM solutions in place?
A: If a legacy record is open, it should be renamed and captured in the system.
Panel members highlighted that the classification scheme/file plan may not be liked by all staff. However it is important to stress that it has to be organised one way or the other. Support to users is essential via a helpline number, visits, etc.
Heather Jack then provided an update on the activities of the committee, and called for volunteers to help the committee. Ken Glasgow proposed vote of thanks and closed the meeting.
McPhersons Document Solutions kindly raffled a bottle of champagne which was won by Joan Shearer, from University of Glasgow.
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