August 1, 2007
Dear Everyone:
Still busily working on the Enterprise File Plan at work. Some people are working on Design Sessions. This is where you meet with some people from a particular work group like, “barns”. You start out with some introductory stuff about the overall project and where the File Plan fits within it.
Then you get them to identify processes that they work with. There’s a drawing called a “Context Diagram” with a circle in the center. This is where you write in the process. Around the circle are rectangles. This is where you identify the other entities that you interact with during the process. Then you draw lines between the process and the entities and this is where you identify the documents that pass back and forth.
Example: There is a group that manages company facilities. One of their processes might be having the facility cleaned regularly. They have contracts and agreements with a custodial agency to supply janitors to clean the restrooms, empty the waste baskets in the offices, etc., every day. The custodial agency sends an invoice every month and the facility management group approves the invoice, sending it to the accounting department, who authorizes the bank to transfer funds to the agency.
This is how we find the many different kinds of information that flow in and out of groups and that need to be stored for the right amount of time. And more and more of these documents are electronic now. And, as electronic documents, they need to be stored in the Enterprise File Plan.
Once these Design Sessions are completed, the
Context Diagrams are sent to a contractor who (I think) lives in
“Rationalization” is the process of analyzing the diagram and determining if these types of documents are already represented in the File Plan, or if they need to be added. This is what I’ve been doing lately. It’s kind of like a treasure hunt. You look at a document type, then try to find it in the File Plan. If it’s not there, you identify what kind of document it is (invoice, payment, title deed) and see if there’s something similar in the File Plan. It may just be another example of an Information Type that has already been added.
Sometimes, it turns out to be something entirely new. Then you get to decide where it should be placed in the File Plan. Talk about Power. Unless, of course, someone else disagrees with you and says it belongs over there. Records and Information Management: It can be a dangerous game at times.
So we’re having a really big workshop in “Hobby”
next week. I’ll be flying
out of
And we won’t be at the office this time. Instead, the whole team will be staying at a hotel so we can’t be distracted by other work. On the plus side, this cuts way down on taking cabs to and from the office. Again, we’ll see how well this works.
Programming Note: No Letter next week.
Love, as always,
Pete
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