Companies often struggle with numerous issues when developing and administrating Records Retention Schedules. Among them is the determination of how long to keep records, how to capture and process participation from selected individuals, and the accessibility and view-ability of the resultant Records Retention Schedule (RRS). Iron Mountain has long been an excellent partner for the development of a Records Retention Schedule, but always looking to improve, now has a new tool with solutions for these issues! Specifically, this new tool, called Policy Center Solutions (PCS), offers the following improvements:
- Improved facilitation of participation and collaboration in the development of the Records Retention Schedule: PCS provides a comment field for each component of the RRS. If your schedule is organized by (Best Practice) Business Functions and Record Classes (see Maturing Your Records and Information Management Program – All Records Retention Schedules Are Not Equal) – that’s perfect. If your schedule is not yet developed to that level, Iron Mountain can work with your existing RRS structure. However your RRS is configured, PCS provides a comment field for the RRS components that allows for the client review team to place individual comments, and/or participate in a collaborative exchange when needed, that can include Iron Mountain Consulting as appropriate. This not only provides for different perspectives to be reconciled to a solution, but also provides a history of the final determination that was reached for future reference.
- Precise legal retention requirements: Iron Mountain uses three components to produce precise, client specific, legal retention requirements. First, Consulting Services works with the company to establish the company’s business profile identify the company’s industry, the full scope of business activities, and the jurisdictions where the business activities are performed. Second, Global Research Service utilizes their worldwide network of 190 local legal offices to identify specific legal requirements for the company’s business profile within the identified jurisdictions. Each of these Global Research citations includes 26 descriptive fields to provide a summary and detailed citation review, as well as access to original citation text. Further, the worldwide retention research is subjected to rigorous quality workflow checks by our in-house counsel to ensure that it’s relevant, complete, and consistent. Those citations are then assigned (mapped) to the applicable company Record Classes within PCS. Each Record Class then, has a list of all applicable citations from all jurisdictions. A key feature within PCS, is the availability of each individual applicable jurisdictional citation in an easily viewable format, within that Record Class list. This provides for easy review and confirmation that the citation is applicable to the client’s specific business activity, and the records within the Record Class. Should there be an “outlier” for retention requirements, it can potentially be relocated into another Record Class, or into a new Record Class to minimize the overall records retention requirements
- Always current legal retention requirements: No longer is there a need for a periodic Legal Research “refresh” event. Changes in retention requirements are updated as they occur. Thus, legal requirements are always up to date. How does Iron Mountain do this? The Global Research Service network of 190 local legal offices around the world provides real time retention updates as legal requirements within those jurisdictions change. So, for example, it is not attorneys in the US trying to monitor, interpret, and comment on changes in laws in Great Britain, there are attorneys in Great Britain constantly reviewing, updating, and commenting on law revisions in Great Britain.
- Improved access and visibility of the Records Retention Schedule for work groups and employees: PCS resides in the cloud. It is accessible 24/7 to anyone with access rights providing visibility according to their privileges. PCS provides the ability to distinguish between administrative roles, subject matter experts, work groups, and individuals. Access and views can be tailored to provide just the right amount of information according to the identified need. PCS can also be linked to electronic repositories to provide retention requirements, facilitating the disposal process.
This breakthrough in Retention Schedule development, maintenance, and presentation is truly amazing. If you have waited to develop or upgrade your Records Retention Schedule – this is what you have been waiting for! You can find more information and a short descriptive video clip here: http://www.ironmountain.com/Services/Records-Management-And-Storage/Global-Research-and-Policy-Center.aspx. Of course we are always ready to speak to, and work with, you directly, so please contact your Iron Mountain representative when you are ready for a demonstration and/or more information. You’ll be glad you did!
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