OPINION PIECE
The future of managing
electronic records
David Ryan
London, UK
Abstract
Purpose – To share personal opinions on the future of managing electronic records, which is
complex and goes beyond the procurement of an EDRM system
Design/methodology/approach – Draws on experience, personal opinion and discussions with
peers to challenge thinking about the role and value of EDRM systems.
Findings – Concludes that records managers need an understanding of current IT trends and
business processes and must accept that EDRM systems are products of the moment, a moment that
has already passed for many business processes. If the EDRM system is not yet in place, the future
may well lie in systems that are more recent in business logic and more useful in business support.
Originality/value – This paper challenges the value of procuring an EDRMS as the main strategy
for managing electronic records and examines how well this concept is understood by records
managers. For records managers to have a role in the future management of electronic records they
must not confuse managing electronic records with the procurement of document management
systems.
Keywords Document management, Records management, Project management, Classification schemes
Paper type Viewpoint
The future of managing electronic records is complex, and goes beyond the
procurement of an EDRM system. Sounds simple, but how well is this concept
understood by records managers? This week I attended a seminar on the retention of
e-mail. The talk was lucid and well illustrated and the product under discussion was
set in a realistic business context. The speaker and the other attendees at the seminar
were IT security professionals. Two years ago, “retention scheduling” and “legal
citations” were not phrases generally to be heard tripping off tongues in the IT
industry. Now they are, so where does it leave records managers? I’d like to offer a few
thoughts.
For the last few years, EDRM systems (formerly EDM) have been the “hot” topic in
records management. As background to this article, I attempted to discuss with fellow
records managers the benefits and limitations of EDRM systems, mentioning in
passing that the software industry has moved on to more promising solutions for
solving business process and data retention problems. Depressingly, the responses
were a variation on “well it’s too late now, we’ve bought it and at least it’s better than
Windows Explorer”.
Technical problems with the logic of EDM systems stem from their age. They were
first conceived in the late 1980s and early 1990s, before the impact of the web allowed
The Emerald Research Register for this journal is available at The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/researchregister www.emeraldinsight.com/0956-5698.htm
The views expressed in this opinion piece are personal and do not necessarily represent the
views of the Royal Household where the author is employed.
RMJ
15,3
128
Records Management Journal
Vol. 15 No. 3, 2005
pp. 128-130
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0956-5698
DOI 10.1108/09565690510632300

extended, mobile enterprises to work in real time, 24/7. Moreover, many local EDRM
deployments have occurred without the full range of management tools built in, as this
requires precise planning and pre-existing high-quality data such as accurate retention
schedules. This makes the result little more than an extended version of Windows
Explorer, but often with limited integration with Microsoft Office and Windows itself.
I have noticed at conferences over the last five years how most vendors rely on the
same few case studies each time. This demonstrates relatively few successful
implementations compared with the number of projects started. Such projects include
too many elements – technical, cultural and behavioural change, business process
re-engineering, records management – to ever stand a reasonable chance of success.
EDRM systems have also suffered, in the public sector at least, from disengaged
communication and business benefits plans. As a mandated product, the need to
convince end-users and to do the planning described above could be viewed as “nice to
haves”, but not as factors that would prevent the project proceeding. The EDRM
system, when delivered, appeared to offer little or no business advantages to end-users,
who were waiting eagerly for the arrival of “line of business” workflow applications.
Instead they came out of training sessions disheartened (yet resolved to defeat the new
enemy).
If records managers are pleased to have their shiny new EDRM software, and think
that it shows their role is at last taken seriously, could it be rather that IT departments
have procured such systems simply because a budget was dedicated to do so? From
what I’ve seen in organisations, the IT department treat the EDRM system as record
management’s departmental application and not a business critical support as it does
the HR or finance systems. EDRM products are certainly not regarded by IT as a
method for controlling data within the organisation. IT departments are much more
vexed by the uncontrolled growth of e-mail, where often RM and IT, in mutual
confusion, agree retention decisions such as enforced deletion after three months or
transfer to EDRM systems. This removal of e-mail from its original environment does
not offer improved legal compliance for the business or convenience for the user.
Records managers can be accused of sitting back and allowing niche product
vendors to dictate the direction of the profession over the past few years, leading to a
paucity of fresh ideas and intellectual rigour at just the time that our organisations are
looking to us for answers. Migration and software obsolescence are just two issues that
EDRM systems have not resolved. Compliance with ERM-related standards such as
Moreq have made EDRM systems more transparent. Yet this will not allay much of the
costs of system replacement in the future, when a new version is deployed or a new
product selected.
What records managers need now is an understanding of current IT trends and
business processes beyond the records centre. They must accept that EDRM systems
are products of the moment, and a moment that has already passed for many business
processes. If records managers do accept this, it will make it easier to adapt to the new
requirements of business in the twenty-first century and the more sophisticated
technologies available for supporting the “virtual” or mobile organisation.
These new requirements do require a new approach – managing all electronic
records in the organisation is a complex, fast moving, co-operative exercise that is true
“records management”. This may well result in new business functions, and has
already led to new job titles emerging in a variety of information management
Managing
electronic
records
129