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A Premier General Management Principle:

“You can’t manage what you don’t know about”

An information survey determines the current content and records holdings and management practices - across all media, formats and locations.

It provides answers to the question “Where are we?”

This will influence the determination of where our organization wishes to be, by when and how it is going to get there.

An Information survey investigates:

The organization’s current content and records situation

How well it is aligned with the business needs

And logs:

What content and records are generated and maintained?

How they are held?

Where they are held?

In what formats?

Under whose responsibility?

An Information survey provides the following understanding:

What content and records does the organization need to support its operational objectives?

What content and records does the organization need to support its business objectives?

What processes and information flows currently operate, for both of these?

What content and records should be kept, and for how long?

An Information survey will:

Provide understanding of the organization’s content and records

Add support for the importance of content and records management

Determine business and system requirements

Identify user groups and user info

Contributed to development of our records classification system

Contribute to the business case

We cannot manage what we don’t know about!  We need to do our homework up front.

Tell us about your efforts to carry out an information survey within your organization.

What were the key success factors in collecting this information?

I will see you at the following event:

• May 8th – 11th, 2012 ERM Master Class in Silver Spring, MD