Warning - this post got really long! ...

I simply don't see IG as a threat to RM - it is an opportunity.  An
opportunity to build on your knowledge and skills, and to branch up and out
in your organizations.  Bruce's point about defining IG as a profession as
a means for clear job descriptions is a good one, and I'm hopeful that
ARMA's upcoming IGP (Info Gov Professional) certification will help with
that.

To Hugh's point, yes, absolutely, RMs are valid candidates for IGP roles
and I have clients who are hiring RMs into those roles.  No one is
re-branding RM.  IG is not a new name for RM, it encompasses RM and lots of
other specialties.  IMO, if RMs want a permanent seat at the table they
don't need better marketing, they need to be able to competently articulate
the actual problem and a viable, do-able, solution ... and do so in terms
that create a compelling reason to act by the organization.

To illustrate, here's an example of what I consider an IG-related problem
(based on a sanitized and round-numbered situation I personally
participated in) ...

Entity is a large, multi-billion dollar US-based organization.  They have a
$1B budget for their 'product support' division, which is essentially the
same thing as 'application support'.  They have many home-grown apps
written in a proprietary language, and some packaged apps - some vanilla
(installed as it came OOB) and some customized.

That $1B budget is for both sustainment of apps as well as for app
development/procurement to support the business.  Currently, about 80% of
that $1B is being spent on sustainment (yes, $800M!), leaving a paltry and
insufficient slice of the pie for new app development.

The apps contain some official record content, and some non-record content
... but they aren't really sure which is which or where it is, or how to
separate the records from non-records.  And they think there is likely a
lot of content duplication across apps.  Many of the apps are still
spinning because they perceive the content has a long retention requirement
and there is occasional (but not directly measured) referential activity;
and again, they aren't really sure if all of it needs to be retained or for
exactly how long so they keep it all, of course.

The driver for doing something about this situation is cost, pure and
simple.  Their budget has remained flat for three years and is expected to
stay the same or decline in the future, while their storage volume is
increasing at approximately 35% CAGR.  They are likely over-compliant at
this point (keeping all of the content effectively forever, with
appropriate security), so the compliance stick is more like a toothpick.
They want to immediately, and dramatically, reduce their maintenance costs
on any unnecessarily retained data and apps to free up money to divert to
mission-related application development (e.g. to directly serve the current
and future needs of the business).

What do you do?  How do you articulate the business case?  Who needs to be
involved?  How do you fix this problem?  Does RM bring all of the tools
necessary?  Let's see ...

-- A RM can tell you if content is a record or not, but can a RM tell you
what all of your privacy requirements are?
-- Can a RM tell you whether a decommissioning initiative will meet legal
requirements for discovery or even if any of the content is currently on
hold?
-- Can a RM explain storage architectures and storage procurement methods
that will impact whether costs can actually be reclaimed or if they are
allocated regardless of usage?
-- Can a RM help devise a dynamic archiving strategy to take advantage of
storage tier cost efficiencies as the value of the content changes over
time?
-- What about impacts to other initiatives such as KM, MDM, Case Management
or DAM?  Can a RM evaluate impacts to those and navigate any negative
implications?
-- How about any existing charge-back scenarios attached to the $800M -
what effect will that have on the actual dollars in the product support
division budget, and what impact will it have on customer department
budgets?

And a zillion other issues I won't type out here.  The fact is, RM, as a
discipline, by itself, cannot address all of these components to the
problem.  It can address parts of it, but not all of it.

That said, I'm not saying individuals who are RMs *can't* do these things,
rather to point out that in today's world the problems are waaaaayyyyy more
complex and the solution to the problem extends far beyond traditional RM
concepts such as whether it is a record or not, how to build a proper file
plan, and when content can be dispositioned.  Those are very important
pieces, but they don't and can't solve the problem all by themselves.  RM
is not a panacea or a silver bullet, but it *is* a darn good foundation and
perspective to begin to solve this organization's issues.

I also want to share that, in my experience, by and large, the driver for
doing ANY of this is directly related to cost savings/efficiencies in order
to have more money to achieve organizational goals.  Compliance and risk
mitigation are nearly always secondary benefits when you are dealing with
the most senior executives, and are often converted to hard-dollar ROI
anyway.  The Bottom Line is the driver (even for non-profits and
governmental agencies).  No one wants to WASTE money on useless stuff or
useless effort.  Ever.  It only ever gets in your way of doing the stuff
that is most important to you.  I've never worked with a organization who's
mission was "to be 100% compliant with every law and reg, and to achieve
zero risk".  Missions are usually something like "to serve [a
constituency]", "to build the best cars", etc.  What is your organization's
mission?

So, in order to solve the issue - reducing the cost of app maintenance in a
systemic and long-term way - it requires a strategic view of the entity and
a deep understanding of its business, financial acumen, business acumen,
technology acumen and understanding of the variety of information
management tactics at play on the content.  It takes collaboration with and
engagement of a variety of stakeholders (including RMs) to ensure all of
the working parts remain working, and all of duties and business needs for
the content are met.

And most importantly, it takes a leader who understands enough about all of
this and who is actually empowered to do it to drive the effort to a
successful conclusion.  On a light note, I once had a client describe this
leader as the Information Cruise Ship Director ... the one who knows enough
about what is going on and what the expectations are to get all of the
right people in the right places, doing the right things at the right time
(to drive out excess cost, mitigate risk according to their tolerance
level, and to actively leverage information for business value).

That leader is what I consider an Information Governance Professional.  And
I feel strongly that classically trained, yet up-to-date and broadly
skilled RMs are a prime choice to serve in that leader role.  Just look at
Patrick Cunningham ... :)

The only threat that the IGP might pose in existing organizational
structures is to the CIO, especially when there is also a CTO.  It most
definitely does not pose a threat to RMs, just as it doesn't threaten
database admins, IT controllers or privacy managers.  In the end, all that
matters to the organization is that their information assets are governed
in such a way that it costs only as much as necessary to achieve the
entity's goals while mitigating risk to the desired level.  If competent
individuals are available to achieve this, they will be hired, regardless
of where they came from or what they used to be called.

As always - all comments are mine, personally.

Julie


-- 
Julie J. Colgan, CRM

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