3 Ways to Get Ahead with Records Management in the New Year

If you have a large number of business records and don’t know where to start with your Records Management Strategy here are the steps to get you started:

1. Effectively Sort and Store Records-  Implement an effective strategy to securely store or destroy records you have converted digitally.

   1. Locate and look through all your records to see how many records you have and to make sure you have accounted for all documents. The new year is a great time to take stock of all of your paperwork. Tag and label anything that needs further review and begin building the foundation for how you will intake and sort documents moving forward. 
   2. Sort through your records to see what your business needs to keep long term vs. what can be converted to digital and securely shredded. This is a key part of good document handling. Identify which records contain valuable Personally Identifiable Information (PII), which include key business data, and which are superfluous. 

   3. Establish a document lifecycle for retention and destruction. After you have a clear picture of your records decide different types of documents will be handled and by whom. Will you be storing in-house or off-site at a secure facility? What about secure destruction? There are many elements to consider but taking stock and developing a plan is the first step. 

2. Get Your Records Converted to a Digital, Searchable Format- Going digital makes access to your records fast and secure.

   1. Having Records converted by a third party, such as DOMA, allows you to open up space and save time. Employees will be free to concentrate on important, high-level tasks rather than endlessly searching for records they need.

   2. After records are converted they will be indexed and available for employees throughout the company digitally improving company efficiency and performance. Apply secure protocols through your storage platform to ensure that each employee only has access to the documents they need for their role. 

3. Implement a Content Services Platform (CSP) Hosted in the Cloud- Using a CSP to centrally store and manage your documents can make your business run more smoothly. A CSP allows you to:

   1. Easily search through documents to find what you need.. Many CSPs’ have Advanced Search options to help you find exactly what you’re looking for using keywords, file type, metadata, barcodes, and more. 
   2. Upload any new documents with ease so that they can be indexed and searched. Once the difficult lift of digitization has occurred it’s much easier to move forward with a more streamlined intake process. 
   3. Create workflows so that daily tasks can be completed with ease. Eliminate rote operations and increase accuracy using custom workflows and integrations. 
   4. Be confident that your records are secure in the Cloud. With consistently improving security measures the Cloud is one of the safest ways to protect your data from theft, damage, or destruction.