Engaged Learning

Social Media and Records Retention

Oct 6, 2009 Uncategorized

photo credit: history-art-photos

Over the last few weeks I have been leading “Social Media / Networking 101″ classes.  In one particular one, a librarian for an organization joined us.  Before hand, I was told she might be there and that it would be interesting to hear her take on social media.  But I was also given a caution – she might not like what she hears.

During the class she asked one or two questions, but was silent except for that.  Ahhh.  Silence is deadly because it is not discernible – is it concurrence or silent rebellion?  To find out I set up a meeting with her and we visited.  As we started the meeting, there was an old poster next to me and the title was, “What is a Record?”  And, pointing to that, I asked this question.  For the next 15 minutes or so she explained what an official record was.

Basically, any communication where plans or decisions were made or collaboration took place to come up with the plans and decisions is considered an official record – emails included.  Because we deal with sensitive information here, all information is given a level of security – from casual (my words) to top secret and everywhere in between.  Each level must be archived for a certain number of years.  Not only archived, but ‘indexed’.  And all information needed to have an owner.

One thing (I am sure of many) that concerned her with my presentation was that I mentioned that with social media, no one owned the information.  This I said to drive home a point that information is now ‘ours’ and just because I created it does not mean that no one else can add to it to make it better because of an ownership issue.  As we talked, I assured her, speaking from an organizational and legal perspective, that someone DOES own the information.  But from a user perspective, there needs to be a new way to look at info.  That rested her heart.

She fully admitted that she didn’t understand social media, let alone how we were to handle the indexing and records retention of it.  This was all new.  In fact, she is very plugged in with NARA, the National Archives and Records Administration, and from what she could tell, there is not a precedence set for social media.  Another concern was that I.T. ‘archives’ everything, but that it not records retention.

In asking about retention, I clarified that the purpose it to be able to access the information, and the surrounding information, years later if needed.  For example, I should be able to see what decisions where made, how we came to the conclusion and who was involved in the communication and decision-making process that led to the outcome.

When we settled that, we came to the conclusion that if we ‘archived’ the information for so long and kept it on a schedule, that would satisfy the requirements.  From the simplistic point of view from which we were looking at it, she agreed.

In the end, I told her that we would come up with a records retention policy and have her review it before it ever became official.  By the end of the meeting, we had made a new friend.  She was excited to learn about social media and was confident that we would work together to come to a conclusion that satisfies the stringent requirements she is governed by.

LESSONS LEARNED:

1. Yet again, find what could be a problem and tackle it early.  This was seen as a possible BIG road block and it looks like it will be easy to overcome.
2. The whole records retention issue is not as scary as I thought it might be.
3. Like everything else, it will work out as well.  Tackle every obstacle with the attitude that “we will work it out.”  And that everything will be fine.