Well explained Dean!
And of course I'm prejudiced here since Dean is the archivist at our
organization, The University of West Florida. But, I'll repeat something
that I recently stated to students in one of Dean's Archives classes. That
is, if there is no archivist within the organization to analyze records for
"historical value" then the records manager MUST do this. This is certainly
not to say a records manager has the expertise of an archivist...but that in
some cases they have to do the best they can when there's nobody else within
the organization trained and educated to perform this function.
Gus Harris
Records Manager and Dean's partner in crime at UWF :-)
-----Original Message-----
From: Records Management Program [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of Dean DeBolt
Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2005 11:53 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Assigning Retention by Content
It is true that the function/basis for records existing in an organization
are
legal value, operating value, administrative value, and fiscal value.
Given
today's litiginous society, many of these may have retentions far beyond
three years. The fifth major value of records which is my pulpit is
archival
value (enduring value, historical, etc.).
More and more companies are utilizing history of their agencies to appeal
to consumers and as more and more consumers will comprise the 50+
demographics, these aspects are more appealing. There should be a
niche for historical evaluation in terms of function. Kenmore, I believe,
is
touting its new color washer/dryers which harken back to their brochures
and catalogs of the 1950s. Anheiser Busch routine uses history and
tradition
in their ads. To make these effective, you need to retain some core
publications,
catalogs, brochures, photographs, and historical items (that first signed
contract
doing business in China), the correspondence and letters proving the visit
of
the President of the United States to your plant in Toledo, things of that
nature.
These are unfortunately often "buried" within administrative files and don't
show
up in retention unless there is some attempt to review folders and
occasional
folder content after the retention period has been reached.
But you can identify series such as annual reports, publications, patents,
press
releases, etc. which should have a more permanent retention period. I get
all kinds of corporate requests along the lines of "our tv station is 50
years old
and we're doing video spots, do you have any of the old logos, call signs,
promo items" or "our company president is retiring after thirty years and
we're
trying to put together a scrapbook showing some of the key things we did in
the company under his tenure" ...and following these queries, they always
say the same thing "no one thought to save some of the history" or "the
files
are gone."
Dean (not an advocate for saving everying)
Dean DeBolt
University Librarian
Special Collections/West Florida Archives
John C. Pace Library
University of West Florida
11000 University Parkway
Pensacola, FL 32514-5750
850-474-2213
850-474-3338 (fax)
List archives at http://lists.ufl.edu/archives/recmgmt-l.html
Contact [log in to unmask] for assistance
List archives at http://lists.ufl.edu/archives/recmgmt-l.html
Contact [log in to unmask] for assistance
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