What the CIO Thinks About the Electronic Records Management Project

The best CIO I ever worked for did several things very well: taught the organization how to plan strategically; bridged tactical IT implementations into organizational strategy; empathized with sta... read more

Nerd Alert: This Post is About Peter Jackson, Tolkien, and Project Management

I’m tremendously excited about “The Hobbit”. Opening in a month, Peter Jackson is gifting us with another literary-based, holiday treat filled with my preferred character actors.  So of course I ha... read more

Non-Records Books for Records Managers: Tracy Kidder’s “Soul of a New Machine”

2 Comments

I finished recently Tracy Kidder’s “Soul of a New Machine”.   As I read it, I thought a lot about the first time I heard the Benny Goodman Trio’s 1935 recording of “Body and Soul” (Benny Goodman wi... read more

Records Books for Records Managers: Soll’s “The Information Master: Jean-Baptiste Colbert’s Secret State Intelligence System”

At 22, I embarked on my journey to write the first of many bad but earnest pieces of nonfiction: my undergraduate thesis.  It described the voyage of the first shipment of women to (what is today) ... read more

Non-Records Books for Records Managers: “Glock: the Rise of America’s Gun”

Mr. Bryant Duhon and I have begun an informal list of non-records books for records managers. The scope is indeterminate at this time (translation: we have a lot of freedom). To inaugurate the book... read more

Krug’s Laws of (RIM Software) Usability

6 Comments

Oh, Records colleagues: I have two very easy reads that will only help you create a folder hierarchy in your electronic records and information management software. Steve Krug’s “Don’t Make Me Thin... read more

Algorithmus infinitesimalis

Books on algorithms make me especially happy. My latest read is Donald E. Knuth’s “Art of Computer Programming” series. You know the history of the word, “algorithm”, right? Abū ‘ Abd Allāh Muh... read more

Quality as an Afterthought

One of the most common software development paths is the waterfall: requirements specification, design, construction, testing (validation), integration, and maintenance.  Today it’s largely present... read more

The Rule of Three

I once had the privilege of working for a Corporate Sponsor who forgave mistakes easily. “If you don’t make mistakes,” he encouraged, “you’re not working fast or hard enough.”  I cannot tell you ho... read more

The Ones Most Adaptable to Change Survive.

Sustaining adequate quality control while assembling your electronic records management system (ERMS) is a huge piece of the implementation.  Thanks to the slightest provocation, your ERMS will bre... read more

Proselyte, or How I Learned to Manage SharePoint Debt

I have a professional crush.  Gary Hewett of Technical Magic manages the infrastructure of a well-known records and information management group.  I’ve had the privilege of working with him for... read more

Hitting the Post

2 Comments

Our poor corporate colleagues. Let’s be honest: in this bipolar economy, we’re either furiously implementing an electronic records management system under stressfully high expectations that the... read more

Two Interviews

As I've mentioned before, I have the good fortune to interview fascinating people for CMSWire--I wanted to share the insights of two smart folks with you. Jesse Wilkins: http://www.cmswire.... read more

Target Practice

Last week I posted an *early, unused draft* visualizing an approach to the difference between legal citations and best practices. Hi, my name is Mimi, and I am obsessed with improving retention... read more

Early Treatment, LCs versus BPs

read more

Here's a Top Ten For You...

Reconciling your company’s legal citations and best practices on the draft records retention schedule is a ten darn-it [1]job.   One. When you realize that an automated inventory is not a prior... read more

Reconciliation, Part One

So. Retention. Consultants may advise you to outsource your company’s schedule to a law firm.  If you have the time to do it, don’t cheat yourself. A retention schedule is still an essential to... read more

The Gift of Anticipation

What gift do you think a good servant has that separates him from the others? It’s the gift of anticipation. And I’m a good servant.  I’m better than good, I’m the best—I’m the perfect servant. I k... read more

Jumprope!

“Cinderella, dressed in yella Went upstairs to present her charter With multiple teams, had to add scope How many requirements (for her SharePoint 2010 Records Governance Plan) were eve... read more

Moga Moga and the Details of “Bureaucratic ‘GOO—Gobs of Obtuse Obstructions’”

Elston, Mary. Master Your Middle Management Universe: How to Succeed with Moga Moga Management Using 3 Easy Steps!. Littleton: Aascom Publishing, Inc. 2006.   Some days, there’s nothing bet... read more

The Year of Living Dangerously In Knowledge Management

1 Comment

I am for the record. I never categorized my work in records as part and parcel of Knowledge Management—it seemed disloyal.  I dismissed Knowledge Management as a pseudonym (in my eyes, at least... read more

Kaplan & His Working Knowledge

Bill Kaplan. (2010). Losing Your Minds: Capturing, Retaining, and Leveraging Organizational Knowledge. London: Ark Group. Mr. Kaplan’s new book, Losing Your Minds: Capturing, Retaining, and Lev... read more

In Search of the History of Algorithms*

I’m enjoying a closer look at the history of algorithms development in electronic records management systems. The book I’m reading at the moment uses Pascal to describe algorithm movements—that... read more

Records Inventorying: Deontic Questions with Criterial Leap

So, I’m trying a new (for me) inventorying technique: deontic questions with criterial leap. I know, I know--but stay with me here.  Basically it’s active listening influenced by the presup... read more

It’s a Matter of "primae impressionis"

I send interesting electronic records decisions to my Chiefs Trinity which is comprised of my Chief Information Officer (CIO), Chief Security Officer (CSO), and Chief Technology Officer (CTO).  Las... read more

Essential SharePoint 2010: Overview, Governance & Planning by Jamison, Hanley & Cardarelli

4 Comments

Jamison, Hanley, and Cardarelli.  (2010).  Essential SharePoint 2010: Overview, Governance & Planning.  Boston: Pearson Education, Inc. I’m in love with a new SharePoint governance book. If you... read more

Greene’s Laws 10—19: Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder?

Some love Mad Men, others love Robert Greene. Both are good. Law 10: Avoid the unhappy and unlucky. My experience is people who believe they are lucky *are* lucky.  Luck is pandemic.  Let it be... read more

Wanted: Information Management Policies

Oleson & Wagner’s template on MOSS 2007 includes two sections on policies: operational and application usage. Operational usage policies are more inclined to the technical. Under System... read more

Are You Experienced?*

A true confession: I read Robert Greene’s “48 Laws of Power” every six months to evaluate the development of my ethical compass.  I need this book. Every so often a colleague will do something erra... read more

“Yes, I Was Burned but I Call It a Lesson Learned”*

Each morning, I open two tabs in my browser window that refresh all day: The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times.  I find the FT more compelling and informative than TWSJ, but reading both ... read more

Records Management Mise-en-Place in MOSS 2010, or More Oleson and Wagner

In Oleson and Wagner’s SharePoint Governance Plan from 2007, the pictorial model on page 16 focuses on ungoverned (My Sites, project team sites, and department and team sites) versus governed docum... read more

Change Hurts! But You Can Prepare

Records and information change management. It hurts. Records projects are a tough sell when senior management doesn’t care. I looked through Tom Kendrick’s “Results without Authority: Controlling a... read more

Amending Oleson & Wagner’s 2007 SharePoint governance plan from a Records perspective (Part 2)

I often find myself looking at a records system for what’s NOT captured therein. When I find the gaping holes, I try to determine why--especially without directly asking why. Firewalls amongst depa... read more

Amending Oleson & Wagner’s 2007 SharePoint governance plan from a Records perspective (Part 1)

When I was a girl, some family friends divorced. An old and poignant story, I thought I’d heard all the details as they unfolded. I was wrong. As shocking as the separation was at the time, I learn... read more

Email Project Two: Return of the Killer Email Project

I’m always struck by the difference between Records Management’s perception of IT processes and IT’s perception of Records Management processes. For example, I’m looking more closely at Messaging R... read more

Records Managers: Break Down the Barriers

(Just Like) Starting Over. I cannot determine if it’s my eternal optimism rearing its ugly head, the state of the economy bouncing back, or my new, fresh work on the horizon, but I’m thinking a... read more

Fester, fester, fester. Rot, rot, rot.

I know colleagues who like to tackle the easy stuff first, but I believe in problems.  I love them. I try to encounter as many challenges as I can each day because seeing my way through to the othe... read more

IT owns the tools. RM owns the rules

I’ve matured professionally in an era of progressive electronic records and information management. My education in grad school 10 years ago consisted of hard copy, imaging, microfilm, and database... read more

Yin & Yang

I have two loves: jazz and Records & Information Management. The two are inexorably connected in my mind. I came to appreciate both art forms when I was young—ten years old, to be exact. I was ... read more