On 2/2/07, Colgan, Julie J. <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> snip <This is long-overdue recognition of importance the role of Records
> Management plays in the federal IT infrastructure.> snip
>
> I agree, I just hope that they will look to hire seasoned RM
> professionals rather than arm IT folks with marginal RM knowledge and
> send them off half-cocked.


Won't touch the last part of that comment =)

The Federal Arena is an interesting place when it comes to trying to
understand who gets selected for what and more to the point, why they get
selected.  I won't go into detail, but I can already see a number of folks
that I know smiling as they read this... =)

RM has been in the CIO's area for a number of years now in MOST Agencies
organization charts, probably 5-7 years now for those that I'm personally
dealing with.  The Dept of Energy has even been combining the annual RM
meeting (which has been called the AIMC- Annual Information Management
Conference- for many years) with IT for the past 4 years.  And while IT may
not think about it this way, it was RM that invited THEM to attend OUR event
originally!!  And to make them feel a BIT more comfortable, the first
combined event was held in Silicon Valley...

I think there is a definite understanding that there is no way to separate
the two fields in the Federal Government, especially since the failings in
the ability to gather and process information became painfully obvious in
2001 between various agencies.  There is such an enormous amount of data and
information that drives the efforts of all of these agencies, but the
ability to get at it and make use of it successfully has been a problem.
The techniques and practices employed by records managers get right to the
heart of the issue, and the CIO Council's decision to finally include RM in
the core competencies of any IT positions is spot on.  Take a look at Page 6
and 7 of these learning objectives:

http://www.cio.gov/documents/2006ClingerCohenCCLearningObj.pdf

This goes hand-in-hand with the work being done by ARMA's Task Force on
Competencies that is continuing the work to build the competencies model for
the Records Management Profession, and in a large part, the IT aspects are
included in these.


IMO (sorry John, couldn't resist!), the two professions come from two

entirely different perspectives, yet with complementary goals.  Those
> foundational perspectives are often where we end up butting heads - not
> on the outcome of any particular initiative.  As we've all said many
> times over the years, the business needs/process must define technology
> functionality, however there are still so many IT folks who just don't
> see it that way.


Well, IMNSHO (I'm sorry too, john =) ... and do we have to consider
"smileys" acronyms too? ) you're both right and wrong here. And I mean that
in a positive way... your conclusion doesn't support your original
argument.  While the perspectives are different, the fact that the functions
they support are severely interdependent clearly identifies WHY the Feds
have linked the need for IT workers to gain the RM competencies to be able
to achieve their functional objectives.  This is why RM has been included in
the CIO's office in many Federal Agencies now and why I think we'll start
seeing a shift in many private companies to this similar model.  While I'm
not fully supportive of the concept that RM should be a part of IT, I think
both IT and RM should have a common line of reporting and both should
logically be part of the CIO function within an organization.

(then again, maybe I'm just crabby because I can't seem to get my IT
> folks to understand why it's a problem that they took our networked MFD
> - oops, there I go again with an acronym! - on Wednesday and won't have
> a replacement until Monday morning)


Oh well, no BFD... who needs it over the weekend anyway?  =)

Happy Friday and Go Colts!


I won't take sides here... suffice to say, I think this may be the best
Super Bowl we've seen in a number of years, depending on WHICH Peyton
Manning steps on the field this Sunday.  We saw BOTH of them last week...
the lousy one played the first have and the exceptional one played the
second half.  If the exceptional one starts the game Sunday, it'll be a
blowout... if not, it'll be a GREAT game!!  I think the Bears will rise to
the occasion and we're gonna see a well played game.

Larry

-- 
Larry Medina
Danville, CA
RIM Professional since 1972

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