RECORDS MANAGEMENT

The Information and Records Management Society (IRMS) curates a regularly updated “Records Management Toolkit” to assist UK public sector schools in their compliance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Arena Group's Neil Maude has written for us a series of articles looking at the practical application of the principles described in this toolkit. In Part 5, Neil looks at e-mail management.

E-mail has become the communication tool of choice for most office workers. It’s quick and cheap, with the convenient benefit that the recipient of your message doesn’t have to be available when you are.

But even though e-mail, like a letter or a memo, is just another way to pass on a message, somehow we treat it differently. For starters, e-mails tend to be written using less formal language, and most people spend less time on the layout of an e-mail than they would if sending the same message in a letter.

The protection of information relating to children is clearly a key responsibility, yet it is an obligation that is shrouded in layers of legislation.

It is tempting to think that locking away your information and restricting access is the best way forward but this can slow down and frustrate day-to-day work. Some information, such as medical records, must be both quickly available and restricted only to those who need to see it. It is therefore paramount that information access and security are considered together and in balance.

Information is generally accepted to be a key asset in any organisation and should be managed with the same care as more tangible assets such as money, buildings and classroom equipment.

Effective information management is all about keeping information secure and getting it to the right people at the right time. The IRMS toolkit rightly states that an information audit is a key step to achieving these aims.

What is an Information Audit?

Simply put, the information audit is a survey of the records being used and held by the organisation. It’s a structured process of finding out what you have, where it is kept and how it is used. The IRMS toolkit suggests a step-by-step process which encompasses the same principles that Arena has used extensively in both the education and wider public/commercial sectors.

The Information and Records Management Society (IRMS) curates a regularly updated “Records Management Toolkit” written specifically to assist UK public sector schools in their compliance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000. In a series of articles, Arena Group’s Neil Maude looks at the practical application of the principles described in this toolkit, using his 20+ years of experience in the provision of document management solutions within and outside of the education sector.

Is there really a need?

Before we get into the detail of records management and the practical elements of implementing a policy, there is a fairly obvious first question to ask. Most schools have been around for a while – some for a very long while – and already have processes in place to manage documents in line with legislation and sector best practice. So is there really a need to change?

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