I believe in grouping records into large series for retention policy
development and management purposes.  Personnel Files; Equipment History
Files; etc.

In the description field define the usage and system(s), data set
titles, servers, workflow info, etc.  Define ownership in the
appropriate field.

I do not believe legislation has a lot to do with it.  Set your
policies (admin, fiscal, regulatory, legal, historic) for the record
series (SERIES) and go with it.

Recently I saw some retention policies from a colleague's organization.
 I was shocked to see they still used 1960's style RIM proprietary
acronyms, A/T, BC, etc.; the types of things we used when publishing the
schedules on a mainframe; back from before flexible word processing
tools and internet publishing tools; before customer service and client
ease of use were as valued and necessary as now.  If I took over that
program that would be one of the first things I would change; make it
easy to read and understand; don't force all clients to learn our RIM
lingo and acronyms.  Make it easy for the clients to read and
understand; make it easy for attorneys and auditors to read and
understand; regulatory agency; judge and jury...  Some in our profession
still do not understand that the retention schedules are for our
clients...

Not pointing out anyone in particular, but I still see a widespread
lack of backbone in the RIM profession.

Best regards, Steve
Steven D. Whitaker, CRM
Records Systems Manager; City of Reno

>>> [log in to unmask] 4/26/2007 4:31 AM >>>
I would agree that minimizing categories is not a tenable approach
given
that the multiplicity of categories tends to be a function of
legislation.
My limited view as an IT person is that the legislation accounts for
the
bulk of the growth in categories.  <snip>

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