Records and Information Management Mon: Sunshine with a Chance of Compliance

What's not to like about the month of April? Sure, there's bound to be a few days of rain when you're hungry for a plethora of sunshine. And while stepping in puddles loses its charm after childhood, there's much to look forward to. April ushers in spring with a colorful array of blossoms, bushels of fresh produce and a healthy dose of organizational maintenance. Yes, Records and Information Management month is here again!

The purpose is simple: To better manage active files and store or destroy what's inactive. April is a month for taking action. Expect a few nudges from your friendly records manager, roll up your sleeves, dig in to your stock piles and fill those storage boxes to be shipped offsite. Walk that leaning tower of files that have outlived retention regulations over to the secure shred bins. Say goodbye to duplicate media and old CDs and send them off for secure media destruction.

It's freeing to shed unnecessary information. Work spaces look and feel cleaner when employees are able to function at optimal efficiency. Nothing slows you down like piles of irrelevance and clutter taking up space for no good reason. Often it's not until afterward, when you look at the overflowing to-purge bins, that you realize the enormous volume of outdated, inactive non-information you've been holding on to.

Knowing what needs to be kept and what's safe to throw away isn't always easy, especially when people are busy, which is pretty much all of us. Records and Information Management month wouldn't exist if the principles of this practice were naturally intuitive. This is why it's critical to highlight guidelines and put them into action.

Every record has a place; information is valuable when it's properly stored and a liability when it's not. Make time this month to train people with the tools and instructions they need to properly manage the data and records of their respective departments. Teach them to let go of business information on a regular basis by shipping it to offsite storage, scanning or secure shredding. When employees trust the system, thoughts of better hold on to this because what if fade away, leaving plenty of space for the business at hand.

ARMA couldn't have chosen a better month to celebrate the value of records and information. When rain is in the forecast, you keep one eye out the window on what lies ahead and one eye on what matters right now. Everything else is safe and dry because it's tucked away precisely where it belongs and where you can get it when you need it.

For more on RIM month, keep visiting our blog and check us out on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn for more tips and advice on keeping your RIM resolutions!

LINK:	http://blog.ironmountain.com/2013/records-management-and-storage/recor...
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