To paraphrase a quote by the classic American writer Samuel Clemens, the death of paper has been greatly exaggerated. Studies conducted as recently as 2022 have reported that paper consumption continues to increase.
“Paper is so ingrained culturally,” commented IG expert John Mancini in a conversational webcast recently with Access. “It’s very difficult to change that. Directionally we’re heading [down a digital path], but at scale, there’s always a lag that occurs.”
At the same time, digital records are proliferating across multiple systems of record, making it a considerable challenge to have a holistic information governance program.
This blog is going to outline the best ways to get a handle on the management of both physical and digital records, as well as how you might organize seemingly disparate media into one place.
Today’s information governance (IG) programs need to be prepared to deal with managing all records, regardless of medium.
The best way to approach that is to figure out where your program sits today.
A tool like ARMA International’s Information Governance Implementation Model (IGIM) has become a powerful standardized resource to understand not only where your program stands now against your goals but also how it measures up to other organizations.
After you’ve benchmarked your program using this tool or another one like it, it’s time to assess the results.
This assessment might include being able to answer questions such as:
Once you’ve answered these questions, it will be time to address physical and digital records separately, depending on the keenest need, and start the process of integrating them together.
Not all physical record files are of equal importance or relevant to current work. Access CEO Ken Davis describes files in terms of three tiers of use:
Obviously, the lower the tier, the less vital the records are in day-to-day activities. Still, the pandemic and events of the past two years have complicated the question of how to best manage these record tiers, especially in a hybrid, work-from-anywhere world.
There are solutions, however, like Access Unify, that can turn your physical file room into a digital library. If, in the end though, you decide to digitize certain legacy paper files, it’s important to have a plan behind what gets digitized and why.
As IG professional John Mancini put it, “Don’t just digitize [haphazardly] so you have a bunch of difficult-to-find papers in now difficult-to-find digital formats. You can’t just be scanning for the sake of scanning.”
As you’re sorting through which physical records go where, it’s important to consider 4 key steps:
Now that we’ve sorted through the physical records, it’s time to turn our attention to the digital ones.
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A global workforce requires technology to collaborate. Employees need the ability to communicate and share information securely and seamlessly – regardless of their distributed locations. However, if information management isn’t run in a methodical manner, an organization can create information chaos. To avoid this, set protocols that determine which record is the master and which are convenience copies, and control versioning of files living in multiple systems. Taking these steps up front to organize and manage information is important because it empowers your organization to quickly locate the information they need when they need it – for optimal productivity.
As you look toward managing your digital records in conjunction with your physical records, you’ll need a solution that is built to track and manage both mediums. Reducing the number of systems that an employee requires to do their job should be a primary goal, and this might include sunsetting legacy applications and/or practices.
Centralizing management of digital and physical files is not only helpful for streamlining, but also helps your organization maintain compliance because there is less risk of losing or misplacing information. The following are four key capabilities that a reliable solution needs to rescue your stranded legacy records effectively and compliantly:
In essence, a total information governance program is a combination of policies and procedures dictated by your company and legal team.
Bringing on the correct technology to support a holistic solution will marry the policies and technology accordingly, resulting in a tangible solution that can be managed in an ongoing fashion.
If you’re curious to learn more about what a solution like this might look like, talk to an Access solution specialist today, or watch the Out of the Box Live webcast featuring information management expert John Mancini: Why do we still have all this paper? The continuing challenges of going paperless in the age of digital transformation.
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