Content and scope of Step F
Overview
This section is an introduction to Step F: Design of a recordkeeping system. This section:
- outlines the aim of Step F, and what it can help you to achieve
- summarises the major elements of Step F
- explains why it is important to undertake Step F for particular DIRKS projects, and
- shows how Step F relates to the other steps in the DIRKS methodology.
Aim of Step F
Step F is where you turn the strategies identified in Step E into actual system components. Step F is intended to help you turn:
- an awareness of the requirements your organisation is subject to
- an understanding of problems with current systems and practices, and
- an understanding of possible strategies
into an actual blueprint or program for putting together or redeveloping your systems to transform them into recordkeeping systems.
Tip: Focus of Step F
Step F involves putting all your knowledge and research together and turning it into a range of viable and workable strategies and products for your organisation. It’s where you determine how strategies you’ve identified in Step E can be put together to create the most effective recordkeeping system for your organisation.
Summary of Step F
Step F involves system design, the actual process of developing the components of your recordkeeping system.
Step F, like the other steps in the DIRKS methodology, adopts a broad definition of systems, encompassing people, policy and processes as well as tools and technology. Therefore this step is likely to involve:
- designing changes to current polices, processes, practices and tools, and
- adapting or designing and integrating technological solutions.
Why should you do Step F?
Step F is where you actually start to design tangible solutions for your organisation. This step will enable you to:
- address issues that have hindered good recordkeeping in your organisation
- design a recordkeeping system that meets a range of business needs, and
- liaise with a range of stakeholders to ensure good recordkeeping is conducted in your organisation.
Example:
Step F will help to consistently work through the problems affecting your systems and design appropriate and thorough responses to them. Rushing through design work is a common problem, but it can have significant negative effects. An investigation into banking collapses in Jamaica identified rushed and inappropriate system design as a problem that contributed to the problematic business environment that lead to the collapse of the banks:
Many managers seized on digitisation and electronic recordkeeping as the solution to their information retrieval difficulties. However while digitisation did lead to faster information retrieval, systems were inadequately designed and did not incorporate appropriate metadata fields or database structures to assist with information retrieval issues. [1]
Working through Step F will enable you to design the systems that are the most efficient, useable and appropriate for your organisation.
Relationship to other steps
Steps C, D and E
It is very difficult to design a successful recordkeeping system if you do not know and understand your recordkeeping requirements and organisational constraints. Without this knowledge, you will potentially waste a lot of time unnecessarily backtracking and re-doing tasks before you accomplish a successful implementation.
To ensure you have adequate knowledge to progress with system design, your work in this step should ideally have as its basis:
- the recordkeeping requirements identified and documented during Step C and
- any organisational recordkeeping inadequacies or gaps identified during Step D, and
- the strategies for improving recordkeeping identified in Step E
to ensure your system design encompasses all organisational requirements.
Step G
In Step F you design and develop your recordkeeping system. Step G involves implementing your revised or new system in your organisation. There is therefore a close relationship between Steps F and G - in one you develop your solution and in the other you unleash it. If you are undertaking Step F it is important to consider Step G and ensure that the system you have developed is effectively implemented and used across your organisation.
Footnotes
[1] Victoria L Lemieux, 'Let the Ghosts Speak: An Empirical Exploration of the 'Nature' of the Record, Archivaria, Number 51, Spring 2001, 106
