Records Management
Can you find your information?
Did you know that Privacy, Access to Information and Records Management
(e.g. retrieval and retention management) work closely together?
Managing your records (retrieval, security and retention management) is about naming and storing your documents in logical, consistent and protected ways so that anyone in your organization can retrieve a record with ease.
In each of these areas, we can advise you, teach your people the best practices or do it for you. And as always, we can help ensure your record-keeping complies with privacy, legislative and information management requirements.
Converting and Digitizing Records
Your office requires assistance and support with conversion of records. The records are in some order, but the sheer volume is taking up valuable space and resources.
Whether small-scale or large, we can help you convert physical or electronic records to a format that can be organized for effortless retrieval and retention. The records can stored on a restricted drive, shared drives or archived – either on or offsite based upon your preference.
Transitory Records, Organizing and Classifying Records, Naming Conventions and Version Control
We review how you organize your records and determine if they are managed and classified in the most effective and efficient way. We review and improve your existing methods of naming records to control multiple versions of the same document for easy retrieval. We assess your records using a transitory records protocol that instantly reduces your records’ volume, saving time and resources.
Retention Schedule Development
All records have a lifecycle. From creation to destruction, there are best practices and legal requirements for storage, organization, eventual destruction or retention.
We help you develop a legal record schedule, a formal document that outlines the records your organization has, how long to keep them and when you can legally shred or delete records. The records schedule also determines which records need to be retained for historical and/or archival purposes or in perpetuity.
Managing Personal, Confidential and Sensitive Records
We can advise how to safely store and retain your most sensitive records, such as your company’s financial information, human resources data, emergency preparedness materials and strategic business plans. This includes being prepared for the worst – if fire, earthquake or other unforeseen disaster impacts your business, we can ensure key information is retrievable so you can keep operating.
Electronic Records Systems
We will review your electronic records and assess if the current system meets information management and privacy requirements. We’ll also determine if they are necessary, duplicated or include a legacy system which can be removed.
Legal Discovery Preparation
Your business is preparing documents to respond to litigation – we can help with that. We will either advise and teach your staff how to do it, or come into your business and determine which records need to be retained for the discovery process, how to organize them and most efficiently provide them to your counsel.