Responsibilities for Record and Document Management, Development and Control

[batman1056]

Probably a little off target, but I have been managing doc and record controls for a while and developing a corporate standard (QA Officer), recent changes in the organisation with the introduction of sharepoint has changed this.

In your organisation, who are responsible for Record and Document managment and development? and Do you think this should be managed by IT?

 

[prototyper]

Re: Record Controls - Responsibility

Probably a little off target, but I have been managing doc and record controls for a while and developing a corporate standard (QA Officer), recent changes in the organisation with the introduction of sharepoint has changed this.

In your organisation, who are responsible for Record and Document managment and development? and Do you think this should be managed by IT?

The answer is, it depends on your organisation and how well it fits the different functions.

I would imagine that in most organisations document control is managed by QA as they would have a better understanding of what should be a controlled document, revision control, records retention, etc. and would usually have more interaction with the document users. IT would be involved in maintaining the software for the document control, backups, etc.

 

[Marc]

Re: Record Controls - Responsibility

Note: There is a difference between documents and records.

 

[batman1056]

Re: Responsibilities for Record and Document Managment, Development and Control

I think that is where things are going wrong:

Document Control - IT
Record Control - QA

 

[prototyper]

Re: Responsibilities for Record and Document Managment, Development and Control

I think that is where things are going wrong:

Document Control - IT
Record Control - QA

Who decides what should be a controlled document?
Answer this and you have probably answered who should have responsibility for this area.

 

[qusys]

Re: Responsibilities for Record and Document Managment, Development and Control

ISO 9001 requires two procedures for this .
From QS point of view Documentation and Records control could be treated as a process with a process owner who has ownership of the objectives and results, these with functional managers of an organization that should be account for compliance in their own areas/depts.

However, the best solution depende on the largeness and the complexity of an organization.
IMHO, if there is the decision of separate the two processes, QA should be responsable to set criteria to manage documentation ( procedures, quality manual, check list, froms, drawing, documents of external origins like technical manual and so on), valid for the entire organization,while IT should set resources to retain records of an organization, based upon the requirements ( internal , external, law and regulatory compliance) as well the schedule and required procedure, which should reflect how the organization acts in this sense.

Generally speaking, I think that if an organization set robust process on Documents and Records control, it will gain so much as ROI in terms of simplification and effectiveness of the processes as well as in cost reduction ( did you ever calculate the cost to mantain data on server, rather than eliminate those ones that are not requestes?) , besides to avoid some findings in the audits.

 

[JaneB]

Re: Responsibilities for Record and Document Managment, Development and Control

Probably a little off target, but I have been managing doc and record controls for a while and developing a corporate standard (QA Officer), recent changes in the organisation with the introduction of sharepoint has changed this.

In your organisation, who are responsible for Record and Document managment and development? and Do you think this should be managed by IT?

Usually if not mostly it's a distributed responsibility, as it should be, in my opinion. The manager of each department/division/section is responsible for controlling and storage of records & docs in their area. Sure, IT usually gets the responsibility for long term storage (aka archiving) and backups, but I'd hate to see them pick up the responsibility for everything. Different areas create/use/store different docs & records. Make them responsible. Make them keep a watch over docs posted to Sharepoint by their team. Make them ensure that records are identified, stored, kept, protected,etc.

Making IT responsible for everything 'because it's in Sharepoint & that's electronic'? Nope. Bad idea.

 

[batman1056]

Re: Responsibilities for Record and Document Managment, Development and Control

Making IT responsible for everything 'because it's in Sharepoint & that's electronic'? Nope. Bad idea.

Exactly my thoughts - I have a meeting with them later this week, its a corporate issue that needs corporate guidance but departmental management.

 

[Peter West]

We have recently introduced Sharepoint to our working operations. Although IT are primarily responsible for it's implementation, the design of the system has involved members of staff from all areas. Just as Jane has stated.

There are now sharepoint "champions" who manage the input onto the system for their team/area. IT still are in charge of making sure it runs smoothly and having necessary back ups done, but record and document management falls upon the shoulders of the document owners to ensure correct use through provision of the necessary guidelines.

Subject to the way your company chooses to go with it, I would make clear in the meeting that IT are responsible for the technical side but would not have a clue which of the documents and records were meant for where, why how....etc.

 

[Raffy]

Probably a little off target, but I have been managing doc and record controls for a while and developing a corporate standard (QA Officer), recent changes in the organisation with the introduction of sharepoint has changed this.

In your organisation, who are responsible for Record and Document managment and development? and Do you think this should be managed by IT?

Hi
In our end, its the QA Department responsible for the Document Management and Development. the main responsible of IT in our organization is that they are the one responsible in making electronic backups and maintaining the system, since some of our documents are avaliable on line. They continuously monitor the status of our servers and internet.
All Department has their own way in Record Management. Document and Records Control Personnel responsibilty is to safekeep all documents and records related to the organization's process (manufacturing Process).
Raffy