Scheduling Transitory Records as Part of a Sustainable Information Management Strategy

1. Scheduling Transitory Records as Part of a Sustainable Information Management Strategy Sustainable Archives: AUSTIN 2009 Joint Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archivists and the Council of State Archivists (SESSION 407) Ralph R. Coram Archives of Ontario August 14, 2009

2. Records of temporary or short-term value in Ontario Transitory records are • Records of temporary usefulness in any format or medium, created or received by a public body in carrying out its activities, having no ongoing value beyond an immediate and minor transaction or the preparation of a subsequent record, of such short-term value that they are not required to meet legal or fiscal obligations, initiate, sustain, evaluate or provide evidence of decision-making, administrative or operational activities. • Includes the following classes of records • Advertising and Promotional Material • Surplus Duplicates • Failed Output Records • Records of Short-Term Value • Intermediate Records • Draft Documents and Working Materials

3. Is the information explosion sustainable ? • The creation of digital information is exploding at an exponential rate. According to IDC white paper: • The digital universe in 2007 (at 281 exabytes or 281 billion gigabytes) was 10% bigger than first thought • By 2011, the digital universe will be 10 times the size it was in 2006 • Amount of information created, captured, or replicated exceeded available storage for the first time in 2007 • Although most records are in digital format, scheduling has not kept pace • According to SearchCIO-Midmarket.com article: • third to a half of U.S.-based organizations still do not include electronic records as part of their records retention policies • only 14% of organizations say they always follow their retention schedules

4. Disposal of transitory records: a return to Jenkinson ? • The concept of the "transitory record" dates from Jenkinson’s time, when non-important records were “set aside” and not officially filed • Records creators and users know best the value of their own records for business purposes • They were the true “compilers of archives” where departmental staff would review files before their inactive phase – the Weeders (U.K.) • Principles set out in his 1952 essay & P.R.O. pamphlet (1950)

5. “Encouraging intelligent elimination, as well as preservation” • Even in heavily scheduled departments the essential problem was “a system of filing which made no discrimination between important and unimportant papers or business and, in consequence, a task for the Weeders which would be not only long but delicate and responsible.” (p. 21) • Jenkinson continues that: “The root of the trouble however lies further back…at the point where the Documents are made, or enter the office: the aim should be not so much to dispose of as to prevent the accumulation of unwanted papers.” (p. 22) • He envisaged that a proper government archival authority "over all documents from the earliest moment of their appearance” should be “providing for Departments… an authoritative and sufficient waste-paper basket, but one which cannot be abused.” (p. 23) Sir Hilary Jenkinson, “The Problem of Elimination in the Records of Public Departments” (1952)

6. Transitory records under the “non-record” regime • Gov’t-wide Recorded Information Management Directive (1992) defined transitory records as “non-records” vs. “official records” • Exclusion from recordkeeping or scheduling process meant they tended defacto to get interfiled with business records or included in classification schemes • Keeping these transitory records beyond their time of usefulness clutters offices and computer systems, absorbs staff time, and makes it difficult to locate important information quickly when needed • Risks: infiltration into operational records; exposure to costs for production in litigation

7. The Archives of Ontario IM “mouse pad”

8. Legislative imperatives forscheduling transitory records(Ontario’sArchives and Recordkeeping Act,2006) • Public record means a record made or received by a public body in carrying out the public body’s activities, but does not include constituency records of a minister of the Crown or published works; • Private record means a record that is not a public record; • Record means a record of information in any form, including a record made, recorded, transmitted or stored in digital form or in other intangible form by electronic, magnetic, optical or any other means, but does not include a mechanism or system for making, sending, receiving, storing or otherwise processing information. s. 2 (1) • Every public body shall retain and transfer or otherwise dispose of their public records in accordance with the public body’s approved records schedule. s. 13 (1)

9. Freedom of Information legislation & legal discovery • Transitory records may have to be reviewed and disclosed in response to a formal request for information (note: even if they have been kept when they could have been destroyed) • When an access request is received, any transitory records that are responsive to the request must not be destroyed until the request has been processed and any appeal period has elapsed • Transitory records related to any legal action must not be destroyed during the course of the legal action (cf. B.C. issue) • Personal information contained in a transitory record must be retained 1 year after last use, and disposed of in such a manner that the personal information cannot be reconstructed

10. New Definitions: Transitory Records Now • Legal defn. eclipses technical defn.: comprehensive scope of “public record” introduced by Archives & Recordkeeping Act required a shift in some assumptions and practice • Common Series Records Schedule developed to describe and provide examples of different types of transitory records (benefited from other Canadian provinces) • Government-wide adoption is mandatory for public bodies • Authorizes every government employee to routinely destroy the transitory records they create, receive or are otherwise responsible for; “personal records” excluded • Applies to records in all media (i.e. electronic, paper and other formats)

11. New Definitions: Transitory Records Then to Now Transitory Records (Now) surplus duplicates advertising & promotional material failed output records records of short-term value intermediate records draft documents & working materials (public records, must be scheduled) Transitory records (Then) duplicate records Publications/ duplicate stock blank forms insignificant drafts/ working papers personal records (not scheduled & excluded from RIM Directive) Archives & Recordkeeping Act 2006 Private (personal or minister constituency) Records Blank Forms Publications

12. Common Schedule for Transitory Records: a corporate-wide disposition authority

13. New Definitions: Transitory Records Series (cont’d) Examples of Database Related Transitory Records • Failed output records • Abnormally ended jobs or programming errors • Intermediate records • Used solely in the preparation of other records and aren’t needed once preparation is completed • Input source documents used for data entry, that become obsolete once the data entry is validated and backed up • Surplus duplicates: • Identical copies of information used for convenience

14. Familiar Actions: Then & Now THEN • Schedule for transitory records - not required • Staff figure out if the record is transitory: use guidelines and directives for definition; • Make use of the transitory record • Destroy when no longer required (authorization by schedule not required) NOW Common Schedule for Transitory Records - adoption required Staff figure out if the record is transitory: use records schedule for definition; Make use of the transitory record Destroy when no longer required (authorized by schedule)

15. You’ve got mail(… and lots of it !) • Bad news: a 2008 study of 4 formal organizations in the Netherlands found that 5 to 10% of e-mails generated or received by employees related to their personal interests • Good news: this study also confirmed employees tend to segregate communications related to their private interests from those that are task-related (official business) • The Attention Economy: More information competing for less attention among employees (Davenport) • Quest for information management discipline: every employee will soon be responsible for declaring e-mails as part of a recordkeeping system (RDMS), or deleting them as transitory

16. IM trends in Ontario and transitory records • Ontario Public Service (OPS) digital records IM experience mirrors other jurisdictions • According to Ontario’s Chief Information and Privacy Officer staff: • OPS managed more than 780 terabytes (TB) of electronic information in 2008; by 2013 will manage almost 2 petabytes • In 2007 there were over 400 million electronic office documents on OPS servers – that’s almost 6,000 documents per OPS employee • Currently spending $15.3 million a year on storage and back-up costs for redundant information • This situation is leading to increased risks for the government: Cost of time to find right information; Lost opportunities for leveraging information; Protection of personal and sensitive information

17. Office of the Chief Information & Privacy Officer:Context for Functional Classification

18. Enterprise Information Management (EIM) • Functional classifications under an EIM for business records; block, divert or delete for transitory records • Migration of legacy transitory records into EIM is not recommended • Mandatory Capture versus Optional Save? Former forces the capture of transitory and personal records within the EIM, which increases the likelihood of duplicate information and larger volumes of information • Major challenge is identifying and mapping transitory “records series” to IM categories in an RDMS, since they may be managed in the EIM August 14, 2009

19. “The Fine Art of Destruction” evolves • “Records and Document Management is not an isolated process handled by some person in Archives. It is a competency that is necessary in each and every staff member who creates, changes and handles documents in the OPS” (OCIPO, IM Conference 2008) • Employees as desk-top users will need a rational business process to “distinguish unerringly between ephemeral material and significant papers of permanent interest and value” (W. K. Lamb) • Goal is to have active and knowledgeable information management workers using an electronic version of Jenkinson’s “authoritative and sufficient waste-paper basket.”

20. References & Sources : • Archives of Ontario (December 2008) Government of Ontario Common Records Series for Transitory Records. Toronto • Archives of Ontario (June 2009) The Fine Art of Destruction: Weeding Out Transitory Records. Records Management Fact Sheet #8. Toronto • Davenport, Thomas H. and John C. Beck (September 2002) The Attention Economy: Understanding the New Currency of Business. Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press • Evans-Correia, Kate (2008) "Taking electronic records retention management to the next level." Midmarket CIO News 09 Dec 2008 | SearchCIO-Midmarket.com • Gantz, John F. et al (March 2008) The Diverse and Exploding Digital Universe: An Updated Forecast of Worldwide Information Growth Through 2011. Framingham, MA: IDC White Paper http://www.emc.com/collateral/analyst-reports/diverse-exploding-digital-universe.pdf

21. References & Sources (cont’d) • Jenkinson, Sir Hilary (1952) “The Problem of Elimination in the Records of Public Departments” in Government Information and the Research Worker. Ronald Staveley, ed. London: The Library Association. • Lamb, W. Kaye (1962) “The Fine Art of Destruction,” in Albert E.J. Hollaender, ed., Essays in Memory of Sir Hilary Jenkinson. Chichester, Eng. : Moore & Tillyer • Managing Information in the Public Sector: the future is now, Toronto, 24-25 April 2008 http://www.verney.ca/opsim2008/agenda.php • Managing Information in the Public Sector: meeting the challenge, Toronto, 28-29 April 2009 http://www.verney.ca/opsim2009/agenda.php • Meijer, A. J. (2008) “E-mail in government: Not post-bureaucratic but late-bureaucratic organizations”, Government Information Quarterly, Vol. 25, No. 3, pp. 429 – 447. August 14, 2009

22. References & Sources (cont’d) • Public Record Office [1950] Principles governing the elimination of ephemeral or unimportant documents in public or private archives. London: Public Record Office. Pages: 4 p. • Wilson, Ian E. (Spring 2000) "The Fine Art of Destruction Revisited." Archivaria 49 Ralph.Coram@ontario.ca Website:http://www.archives.gov.on.ca/english/about/sp07_10_priorities.aspx#leadership * The remarks above are my own interpretation and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer or the policy of the Government of Ontario. ** I would like to acknowledge Amber Amerlinck of the Archives of Ontario, whose work on transitory records issues informs this presentation. August 14, 2009