Like apples and oranges, Information Technology systems managers and Records Managers act, think and feel differently, though they are similar in many ways. Both IT system managers and ERM software system administrators must deal with governance, retention rules, and other information management issues but with different priorities and perspectives. IT admins are systems, technology, and performance focused. RM software admins are governance, retention, and policy focused. However, both perspectives are needed to enable an Electronic Records Management application to achieve its goals.
The basis of ERM software that differentiates it from ECM software is the need for retention rule implementation in a manner that supports information governance and addresses policy adherence challenges. Though most typical RM professionals relate to these issues and are comfortable mentally focusing on them, most IT admins see information governance and policy enforcement as something they have to do before they get back to their real job – systems maintenance and enhancements. This chasm in perspective creates a dilemma for successful implementation of ERM systems – who is in charge of information retention rules and actual enforcement – IT or RM?
Records Managers that are participating in ERM implementations must learn metadata management concepts, rules creation within applications, data import facilities for retention schedules, and file plan configuration routines. They need to learn new computer skills for operating particular software but not too much in the way of new concepts, except for how to apply system security and user id management through groups with inherited parameters. They are mostly learning the hands on technical implementation of concepts with which they are already familiar.
However, IT systems administrators need to learn new concepts entirely. They really do not understand the concept of a “record” as a static evidentiary document as defined by courts, litigators, auditors, and regulators. They typically confuse data with information and have little knowledge of issues like provenance, context, and chain of custody. This can easily create governance and compliance implementation failure as they try to design simplistic retention rules that apply to collections of information with little commonality in content. They have extensive systems skills for configuring software modules, but have little understanding of or interest in real records management.
So, we have the often witnessed dilemma. One group has the skills and the other group has the knowledge. And despite watching ERM systems implementations for probably 15 years, it seems to me this dilemma has changed little to date. That is why education and training is still needed by both sides and real teaming is the only thing that makes ERM really work. I think both ARMA and AIIM are going to be around a long time with plenty to do!