Doing Records Management in SharePoint 2007 Part 1 (Intro)
This is a three part post that will show how to deploy and configure Records Management Solutions in SharePoint 2007.
Records Management can be tricky business. Most businesses and corporates do it (manually) but they don't call it that way and it takes a while for them to make a connection when you try to explain what Records Management as part of their elaborative Enterprise Content Management suite actually is, and even if they make a connection, the mere notion of making this process electronic makes them only mildly enthusiastic, and they struggle to see direct business benefit of having this process electronic.
Yet in the same breath they can't believe their eyes and they get extremely ecstatic when they see that they can search and retrieve their file electronically after having it shipped to Metrofile (local service provider for physical file archiving) and at the same time worry about the archived documents, their disposal schedules. They'll end up paying a fortune not realising they can do it all themselves, using their Records Management solution, far more efficiently.
Luckily there's a serious player in this game, namely South African Government (National, Provincial and Local). They take Records Management so seriously that according to their policies every piece of paper that comes into the organisation (including the bubble gum wrapper) belongs in Records Management, collected in respective Registries and archived accordingly.
Records Management plays an important role internally (correspondence, policies, procedures etc.) and externally (with clients), for example, when you submit your Medical Certificate as part of the Disability Grant Application with South African Social Security Agency (SASSA), that Medical Certificate is only valid for 6 months, after that period the document is not valid hence why it gets disposed (destroyed).
Records Management for South African government is governed by National Archives (http://www.national.archives.gov.za/) or more accurately:
National Archives and Records Service (NARS)
National Archives prescribes how Electronic Records Management should be done (http://www.national.archives.gov.za/rms/best_practice.htm#managing_electr_recs):
"The National Archives and Records Service, in terms of its statutory mandate, requires governmental bodies to put the necessary infrastructure, policies, strategies, procedures and systems in place to ensure that records in all formats are managed in an integrated manner. The National Archives and Records Service endorses the SANS (ISO) 15489 Records Management Standard, the SANS (ISO) 23081 Metadata standard and the SANS (ISO) 15801 Trustworthiness and Reliability of records stored electronically as a benchmarking tools for sound records management. The National Archives and Records Service currently also endorses the US DoD 5015.2 Design Criteria Standard for Electronic Records Management Applications and the UK Public Records Offices' Functional Requirements for Electronic Records Management Systems. A product certified against one or both off these standards does possess the records management functionality required by the National Archives and Records Service.
The National Archives and Records Service requires governmental bodies to implement and maintain Integrated Document and Records Management Systems that provide as a minimum the following records management functionality:
- managing a functional subject file plan according to which records are filed;
- managing e-mail as records;
- managing web-sites as records;
- maintaining the relationships between records and files, and between file series and the file plan;
- identifying records that are due for disposal and managing the disposal process;
- associating the contextual and structural data within a document;
- constructing and managing audit trails;
- managing record version control;
- managing the integrity and reliability of records once they have been declared as such; and
- managing records in all formats in an integrated manner.
Not many governmental bodies have the capacity to implement fully automated Integrated Document and Records Management Systems. This does not however mean that they should not manage their electronic records. If these records are created to aid in decision-making and to perform transactions that support the governmental bodies' activities, governmental bodies are responsible for the proper management of those records. If records generated in such an environment are not managed properly it can lead to the possible illegal destruction of records. To enhance their accountability, bodies should ensure that, even without the benefit of an Integrated Document and Records Management System, they exercise effective records management.
Detailed information regarding the management of electronic records is contained in the National Archives and Records Service's two publications Records Management Policy Manual and Managing electronic records in governmental bodies: Policy, principles and requirements and Managing electronic records in governmental bodies: Metadata requirements. Both publications are available on the National Archives and Records Service's website or can, alternatively, be requested in hard copy from the Records Management Division of the National Archives and Records Service."
Ok so what you can see so far is the mention of the standards required and remember that SharePoint 2007 is DoD 5015.2 certified (http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/may07/05-29SharePointDoDPR.mspx?rss_fdn=Press%20Releases) making it now "kosher" for the Government use for official electronic Records Management. More importantly you can see the mention of a File Plan.
Remember it's actually not "kosher" yet, until later this year (meaning very soon), when Microsoft will release a free add-on pack that extends MOSS 2007's records management capabilities in appropriate ways so that customers and partners can deploy DoD 5015.2 compliant solutions in production environments. (http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2007/05/30/dod-5015-2-certification-for-moss-2007-we-ve-passed-the-test.aspx)
Definition of a File Plan is: A pre-determined classification plan by which records are filed and/or electronically indexed to facilitate efficient retrieval and disposal of records.
File Plan is actually a complete taxonomy structure containing places for every record in the organisation (bunch of headers, classes, case files).
In SharePoint 2007 File Plan is used more as Document Library, managed by a Records Manager with records that are, once declared, sent to the Records Repository. This is one very important difference with SharePoint 2007 Records Managemnt solution (as opposed to some other competitive Records Management solutions). It actually takes records completely away from the public domain, WOW, finally someone got this right the first time, suggesting a loosely coupled Records Management solution. It's as if Microsoft listened to all my clients in the past. Other leading Records Management solutions should seriously consider copying this from Microsoft.
File Plan will look something like this:
In my subsequent posts I will show you, step by step, how to set up a Records Repository using (South African) government type Records Management structure, and more importantly, use it.
I will also update this tutorial (based on MS virtual labs) once the add-on pack comes out.
One more thing, series numbers are not supposed to be in the 1-1-2-3 type format, but rather in 1/1/2/3 format but SharePoint doesn't support "/" character(among others) as folder names.
This is a serious error from Microsoft's side when it comes to Records Management solutions and if they want to acquire, potentally huge client base (ie SA Government) they should fix this immediately.