Are we assuming (this includes myself) that the fileplan is forced on us so that records managers can control access and retention more easily? From talking to vendors and search fans this seems to be the belief; ‘ordinary’ business users have to tolerate a filing structure that reflects old school archiving ways of working so that the records management community can do what they do with physical files but in an electronic environment.

Valiant vendors may even attempt convince corporate records managers that EDRMS document profiling templates are the best way forward, and there will be some locking of horns over that. After all, who needs a fileplan when you have advance search functionality?

I have a hunch: most users prefer to organise their documents in folders, and will even browse a fileplan to get to the information they are working on. They do however prefer fileplans they have created, ones that reflect their way of thinking (not a records managers way of thinking). Fileplans allow us to file related documents together, without having to load the document title with context, therefore, the fileplan enables us to find related documents more quickly than a search tool could.

This habit of using a fileplan to create context (audit trail) has its challengers, who favour tagging. Do we load context into the document title, or into other metadata fields e.g. EDRMS Project – ITT – Vendor X – clarification meeting 01Jul2009, or do we just stick all documents from Vendor X to do with the EDRMS project in folder for quick retrieval, and filing?

I made a mistake about the LCSH – it was the series authorities that have been discontinuted. I note however in a statement adopted by the American Library Association on the 12th of May 2006 they recorded that:

“officials at the Library of Congress were indicating publicly that the Library is actively considering alteration of other cataloging practices, such as abandonment or radical alteration of application of the Library of Congress Subject Headings.”

I’m pleased to hear they are continuing to produce them. My example about Modern Art was similarly wrong – I think I had meant Art, Modern – 20th Century and the related term Modernism (Art) both of which have since had their almost identical scope notes removed.

My point, however,was that there are a multitude of ‘related terms’ within LCSH that often make it difficult to classify a document into one or the other. Take for example ‘Libraries and Readers’ (about services for users involved in specific activities) and ‘Reference services (libraries)’ (which come without a scope note). How would one classify a book entitled ‘Reference services for readers’? Though after some debate I’m sure we could agree on the correct classification, such a debate just makes things difficult for the untrained user of an electronic content management system (rather than a highly trained user of the LCSH). And where the system has made things difficult for the user is a failure of records management.

The success of such an approach would appear to be largely dependent on 3 main factors (though I am sure there are plently more once you get into the detail!)

1. Are EDRM vendors able to adapt their product sufficiently to move in this direction? It would need a substantial revision of the basic architecture underpinning most systems and it will be a brave vendor to move beyond what the testing regimes say is mandatory in such a radical way.

2. Will records managers be willing and able to be flexible in how they approach the management of such resources. It may well be that the kind of detailed micro-management we are used to and aspire to is not possible. Records management may need to operate in a very different way in order to be effective.

3. Will users be willing to leave behind their favoured web.20 application/service provider and adopt the official, authorised version? The rate of development by small, agile web2.0 houses will always exceed what the organisation can deliver so there will be an inevitable sense of the organisation’s offerings always playing catch up and looking slightly ‘old hat’. Unless the organisation is also going to open up its tools for use by their staff in their domestic lives it is also likely that staff will lose some of the familiarity with technologies that they are using in both their domestic and work lives (i.e. Flickr).

Cheers

Steve Bailey