Will the RIM Profession Become Obsolete? -

I am president of the Northern Virginia Chapter of ARMA (ARMA NOVA). We had our summer planning meeting this week, preparing for the upcoming chapter year that starts in September.

We agreed upon a theme for the year: "RIM 2.0, Opportunities and Challenges." The term "RIM 2.0" came out of our discussion about Enterprise 2.0, Web 2.0, and the challenges we face as RIM professionals with the new media. We barely have a handle on paper records, electronic records and email, and now we have to deal with instant messages, Twitter, Facebook and the rest. It creates a significant tension between collaboration and control.

In the discussion we discovered lots of "red meat" discussion points that will make for good fodder for our program year. For example:

One discussion point revolved around how this will change the RIM profession. One board member made a very thought provoking statement: "In five years there will be no more RIM profession!"

She said this because she sees our profession evolving significantly with the advent of electronic records management and the changing requirements for retention based on electronic storage and the cloud, auto classification and the like. In our discussion we all agreed that major changes are coming, particularly the move to a role of setting and enforcing policy rather than the traditional filing room type of approach.

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Submitted by Lawrence Wischerth July 23, 2010 - 4:02 PM

The RIM profession won't be obsolete in 5 years. It will simply drop the "R" from RIM and morph into Information Management professional.

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Submitted by Jesse Wilkins July 23, 2010 - 6:35 PM

Hi Mark,

Very interesting line of discussion to me - as you may know I just completed my term on the ARMA International Board of Directors and one of the things that is always important is to keep an eye on what the profession and the professionals will look like in the future. It's something I've spent some time thinking about as well. Love to see what you end up with for the lineup for this year and do let me know if I can contribute, even if it's just playing devil's advocate for one position or another. :)

Best,

jesse

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Submitted by Daniel O'Leary July 29, 2010 - 10:47 AM

The amount and volume of information that we have to manage is still growing at an exponential rate. You don't have to be a genius to figure that one out, just look at your inbox / growing repositories. As the volume of information increases, the science of managing it becomes even more important. If you can't find something, how useful can information be?

I think a better summation is that in 5 years, the RIM profession will have evolved into something different, but it won't be dead.

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Submitted by Zaheer Master July 29, 2010 - 3:05 PM

Social media adds another aspect to the question of "what is a record?" We are seeing this in the financial services sector, where advisors are asking if social media such as twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook are records that are subject to regulatory compliance. I agree with Dan that RIM won't be dead, but it will evolve as technology and business evolves.

For more information, check out our blog at http://blog.aisww.com

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Submitted by August 03, 2010 - 7:46 PM

Statutes, standards, codes and the like make provision for records to be created and maintained for various periods of time. So long as these obligations remain for business to adhere to and abide by there will be a need for professional records managers. Quite apart from this, good business practice dictates that the information resources and assets of the business require sound professional management for the business to operate efficiently and effectively and to grow and prosper profitably. Tinker with the details - technologies, name, etc. but "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

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Submitted by Mark Mandel August 09, 2010 - 1:48 PM

The increasing trend is to keep things longer, in digital form. Not saying this is good, it just is what's happening. As storage options get increasingly cheaper, better, faster, etc. the need to delete is not as strong as it was when we were dealing with paper files and filing rooms, staff, etc.

This thinking says we should keep everything, forever. No need to delete. Why bother enforcing file plans and retention rules when we are keeping everything? With eDiscovery rules, everything is discoverable anyway, and there is no way we can police the entire network, PC hard drives, flash drives, home computers, etc.

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Submitted by Owen Ambur August 03, 2010 - 8:13 PM

A better question is, what is NOT a record ... and WHY is it not a record?

A closely related question is whether each record is linked to the strategic objective(s) it supports, and if not, whether it should have been created in the first place.

Record or nonrecord is a false, binary choice. Every bit of information that persists for any period of time is in fact a record of the act that created it. The only question is its quality and quality can best be evaluated on a continuum based upon the metadata associated with it (including, for example, whether it is linked to a strategic objective). Records lacking metadata are of poor quality, uncertain value, and unmitigated risk.

Organizations failing to manage all of their information in accordance with the values and risks associated with each bit of it deserve the results they get.

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Submitted by Mark Mandel August 09, 2010 - 1:40 PM

I agree that the RIM profession will evolve to become something different than it is now. The reasons:

1. With eDiscovery everything is a record - the rules have changed
2. There is a tendency with new technologies like Google Apps and the Cloud, to keep everything, forever
3. Old file room strategies for indexing and file plans are being replaced with enterprise search tools
4. The old ways cannot begin to keep up with the new social media technologies

There will still be a need for records professionals to ensure that paper and other media files are maintained as permanent records when necessary, and scanning those old documents is still very expensive.

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Submitted by George Darnell August 10, 2010 - 9:05 PM

I have been working with a diverse group of RIM practitioners on a standard to provide RIM guidelines for using web-based collaborative technologies, aka, Web 2.0, social media, social networking. It is now open for comments on the ARMA website at . It is the only one on the pull down list. It will be presented at the SAA conference in Washington DC on Aug 15. I think its GARP foundation provides solid guidance for RIM pros to remain relevant in the ever evolving world of information management. Let me and ARMA know what you think.

P.S. I was in the same ARMA NOVA planning session with Mark. It looks like and exciting year.

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