In 2005, amendments to the U.S. Federal Rules of Civil procedure enlisted the requirements to provide electronic information, which is considered to be the first step in cases of litigation. In this process, the parties involved in the particular case are requested to hand over the electronic data pertaining to the case. This is referred to as electronically stored information (ESI).
It includes:
- Spreadsheets
- Audio and Video
- Word documents
It is a known fact that searching for this kind of data without any previous knowledge is often laborious, time-consuming and expensive owing to the huge volume of data one has to go through, stored in an electronic form in the most haphazard manner. Record management staff is thus needed to deal with such gigantic volume information. In becoming adept at record management, one must be in possession of certain skills which include:
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- Information management skills should be current to keep up with the competitive market.
- Develop the ability to be able to bridge the gap between business and the field of information technology.
- Strive to constitute the next wave of information management professionals in keeping with the changing demands.
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Not only is the acquaintance of such skilled professionals necessary, equally essential are record management policies, which need to be developed for such work. The areas on which such policies should stress upon are:
- The destruction and maintenance of required data: The data under disposal should be constantly kept under surveillance and the unwanted data should be deleted to make space for the required ones.
- Systematization of record keeping: The data that is stored should be saved in a manner that its availability can be guaranteed without sparing much time.
It is interesting to note that this new wave of record management has given rise to a new genre of cyber record keeping that has spread its wings in directions of use.
Cloud content: It is a matter of awe that the cyber cloud or websites largely meant for the preservation of data has been devised to aid the enterprise of the people to not only preserve the data but also to make it available at times of need. The prevalence of the internet is a boon in this respect as one may save huge quantities in ether and with the continuous development of technologies one may make use of tablets instead of heavy weight laptops to make the stored data accessible at any time and place.
Furthermore, this field of record management has got its share from the various organizations that provide adequate training for expertise in this field. Mention should be made of Electronic Record Management, Social Media Governance, and Enterprise Content Management and so on bringing the boom to this ever emerging field.
