Importance of Records Management

Records management is a key business process that underpins strategic planning, decision-making and operational activities. In the context of human rights, records provide the information by which government and other organisations can meet and discharge their obligations to citizens and communities. For example, without good record keeping and adequate records citizens may not receive entitlements such as pensions or housing allowances. It is a sad fact, however, that so many organisations (understandably in some cases) concentrate heavily on their core functions and lack the records management mechanisms that will enable them to discharge these functions effectively.

Definition

Supporting the delivery of services –documenting how policies and statutes are carried out, what services were provided, who carried out the work and how much it cost, and, in the longer term, an organisation’s accomplishments.

Records are therefore created or received in the conduct of business activities and provide evidence and information about those activities. They come in all kinds of format and media. A formal definition of a record might be: ‘Recorded information produced or received in the initiation, conduct or deletion of an institutional or individual activity, and which comprises sufficient content, context and structure to provide evidence of an activity, regardless of the form or medium.’ 1 Many organisations are moving quickly towards the creation, storage, maintenance and retrieval of their records and information solely in electronic form. In most areas, however, while many records are created electronically they are maintained in paper form - often filed systematically but just as often managed in personal systems. Records may also be created on media other than paper or electronic - microfilm, microfiche or computer output microform (COM); or as photographs (prints, negatives, transparencies and x-ray films), sound recordings on disk or tape or moving images on film or video. A set of records, in context, may be in more than one of these formats or there may be close organisational relationships between records in different formats.

Records management life cycle

The process for managing records is often likened to a living organism in that it /they are conceived and created, live and are used, become dormant and are retired, and die and are archived. Records management provides a framework to enable these actions to be undertaken. It aims to ensure that:

There are many principles underpinning the management of records. One of the important things to remember is that records are a corporate asset. They form part of the corporate memory of an organisation and are a valuable corporate resource. From the point at which a document is created as a record and used in the course of official business, it becomes corporately owned. The records you and your colleagues create and use don’t belong to you – they belong to the organisation. The second most important thing to remember is that electronic records that are generated by or received in an organisation in the course of its business are in this context no different from any other records – they are official, corporate records. Although most current practice is still to print electronic information to paper, your organisations should be making plans to maintain their electronic information as electronic records.

Thirdly, it is imperative that records should be reliable, authentic and complete. They should be able to function as evidence of business activities and processes through sound record keeping practices. In order to be reliable and authentic they must adequately capture and describe the actions they represent and once created must not be altered without creating a new record. Fourthly records should be accessible and the record keeping systems should aim to make records available quickly and easily to all staff and to others who are entitled to access information from them. Information is the lifeblood of any organisation; yours or any other cannot hope to function effectively without it. And lastly the responsibility for capturing, maintaining and ensuring access to records rests with everyone in the organisation, and all staff should ensure that they are familiar with and are adhering to the records management policy and any procedures and guidelines that are issued through it. Good record keeping is not just the province of the records manager – it’s everyone’s responsibility.

Benefits

The organisations with good records management practices benefit in many ways, for example:

Some of the symptoms of poor records management are inaccurate or incomplete information, out of date information, duplicate records, not knowing which is the latest version, related information in different locations and unable to be linked, and information that is susceptible to loss or damage from fire, flood, etc. Time is also wasted in looking for records through having a complex filing system, keeping too many records unnecessarily or not controlling the creation of records. Some other symptoms are poor-decision-making and poor working environment, user dissatisfaction, non-compliance with legislative requirements, lack of security for information and space wasted by storing unwanted records.

A good and efficient organisation could double its output by having a sound records management mechanisms in place and would prioritise on the latter along with its main programme areas.

The Association of Commonwealth Archivists and Records Managers (ACARM) was founded in 1984 to promote professional development in the field of records and archives management throughout the Commonwealth. It provides a link for Commonwealth archivists, archival institutions and records managers which is especially important because of the common heritage of legal and administrative systems, and hence of record keeping practices, which the countries of the Commonwealth share. ACARM shares practical solutions to the problems of managing records and archives, and disseminates professional and technical information through its Newsletter, listserv and website – www.acarm.org