The reports are in! Records management officials at federal agencies throughout the U.S. government have submitted their annual Senior Agency Official for Records Management (SAORM) reports to the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). Though NARA is still processing and assessing these reports, they already shed light on a pressing question: how prepared are [...]

Is electronic records management truly more cost-effective than its analog alternatives? That’s an argument we’ve made before, and it’s one that’s substantial enough that it’s worth unpacking further. A white paper from the Federal Records Management Council (FRMC) on the cost benefits of digitization details the myriad areas of potential cost savings, writing that even [...]

Most U.S. federal agencies have now submitted their annual Senior Agency Official for Records Management (SAORM) reports for 2020 to the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). This year’s questionnaire included a new and pointed question: “Has the COVID-19 pandemic changed any policies or practices related to records management at your agency?” These reports [...]

The ongoing digitization effort throughout the U.S. government poses many challenges for government agencies and the organizations that work with them. These organizations must acquire the right tools, find enough budget to meet an unfunded mandate, update their records management policies and schedules appropriately, and more. But the single biggest challenge is the living, breathing [...]

Digitizing is difficult even under the best circumstances. Federal records managers may be facing an even steeper challenge. They’re also having to comply with the aggressive schedule set by the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration and the Office of Management and Budget in memorandum M-19-21 in an environment that is notorious for scheduling and [...]

“There never are enough resources,” says one federal records management specialist of the drive to convert to electronic records management. Federal agencies are under the gun: they are facing an ambitious (and unfunded) mandate to make an almost complete transition to electronic records management by the end of 2022, with limited resources for the effort [...]

Failures related to records management can be very serious. When records are not managed properly, agencies and other organizations can fall out of compliance with federal or state laws, make themselves vulnerable to legal action or some form of oversight like an audit, and may even incur penalties or find themselves subject to legal fees. [...]

Social media presents unique issues for federal records managers trying to figure out how to collect, manage, and preserve these digitally complex records. As far back as 2011, the government has been assessing how to best handle social media records. A 2011 study conducted by the Social Media Subgroup of the Federal Records Council evaluated [...]

Cyberattacks targeting the U.S. government are growing in frequency, sophistication, and severity. In 2020, for example, a massive attack successfully breached nine agencies and hundreds of private companies that work with governments around the world. So, it makes sense that government personnel would take steps to protect their communications. Enter encrypted messaging apps. Such apps, [...]

The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) still expects federal agencies to submit all records in electronic format by December 2022. But, with the COVID-19 pandemic still ongoing after more than a year, is that goal still achievable? This is a question we were already asking late last year, but now NARA itself is [...]