Records Meet Workflow

by Julie Gable

"Content"conjures up visions of rich text and graphics brought together in creative presentation layers, personalized to each user's needs. Records, in contrast, are fixed in time and unchangeable, evidence of business transactions, rights and obligations. If content is a pair of silver slippers, then records are sensible, everyday shoes.

The content life cycle spans creation to publication, with workflow managing routing for approvals and perhaps an expiration date beyond which content should not be used. Managing the life cycle of electronic records is more complex, governed by laws and regulations — the IRS for tax returns or the EPA for environmental safety reports, for example — and failure to comply brings consequences.

Software for managing electronic records has been around for about five years, emerging from older models for paper-based records. Products such as Captura from Tower Software, Reston, VA; iRIMS from OpenText, Waterloo, Ontario; and Foremost from TrueArc, Arlington, VA, require human intervention to work effectively: Documents become records when users designate them as such. The retention rules applied depend on how users classify the records in the file plan — either by drag-and-drop methods or by completing profile screens.

Experience shows that users avoid tedious extra work whenever possible, and studies confirm that user tolerance for records management activities has a 15-second limit. Records management software requires someone to turn the crank. Current technology puts demands on administrators to initiate action by generating reports showing which records are ready for preservation or destruction.

Clearly the door is open to automated alternatives. Analysis shows that records result from business processes, each with its own rules, procedures and deadlines. Records management requires time-driven task processing, routing for disposition approval and status reporting. What about workflow for records?

MDY Advanced Technology, Fair Lawn, NJ, is among the first to incorporate a workflow component in its records management product, FileSurf 7.3. The product can automatically and transparently trigger records declaration, create required folders and assign retention rules based on process workflows. The system is deployable for departmental workflows, interdepartmental workflows or business-to-business workflows extending across the Web. One customer, a large law firm in California, uses the product to automate its client/matter intake process.

Taking a different approach, Feith Systems and Software, Fort Washington, PA, is using its Workflow IQ component to add automated records classification, cut-off, disposition approval and vital records review functionality to Feith Document Database 6.0. The system is slated for July testing for Department of Defense 5015.2 certification (a widely adopted records management standard).

These fledgling workflow approaches manage internally generated records, but the emergent need is to capture records that result from interactions with suppliers, partners and stakeholders. Experts believe that workflow will become a middleware service, enabling customer relationship management, supply chain management and knowledge management applications. When workflow can monitor human interaction with these applications' content, records management will become totally automatic.

Julie Gable (juliegable@aol.com) CDIA, LIT, is an independent consultant based in Philadelphia.