Earlier in my professional career, I used to hit the snooze button 4 or 5 times every morning when the alarm went off. I did this for years until I realized it was the root cause of being late to work and getting my wrists slapped far too often. It seems simple, but we all hit the snooze button even though we know the repercussions. Guess what … the repercussions are getting worse.
For years, the federal government has been hitting the snooze button on electronic records management. The GAO has been critical of the Federal Government’s ability to manage records and information saying there’s “little assurance that [federal] agencies are effectively managing records, including e-mail records, throughout their life cycle.”
During the past few administrations, similar GAO reports and/or embarrassing public information mismanagement incidents have reminded us (and not in a good way) of the importance of good recordkeeping and document control. You may recall incidents over missing emails involving both the Bush and Clinton administrations. Now we have Wikileaks blabbing to the world with embarrassing disclosures of State Department and military documents.
Information Mismanagement
This is taking the impact of information mismanagement to a whole level of public embarrassment, exposure and risk. Although it should not be surprising to anyone that this is happening considering the previous incidents and GAO warnings it has still caused quite a stir and had a measurable impact. Corporations should see this as a cautionary tale and a sign of things to come … so start preparing now.
Start by asking yourself, what would happen if your sensitive business records were made publicly available and the entire world was talking, blogging and tweeting about it. For most organizations, this is a very scary thought. Fortunately, there are solutions and best practices available today to protect enterprises from these scenarios.
Implement Electronic Records Management
Update your document control policies to include the handling of sensitive information including official records. Do you even have an Information Lifecycle Governance strategy today? Start by getting the key stakeholders from Legal, Records and IT involved, at a minimum, and ensure you have a top down executive support. Implement an electronic records program and system based on an ECM repository you can trust. This will put the proper controls, security and policy enforcement in place to govern information over its lifespan including defensible disposition.
Getting rid of things when you are supposed to dramatically reduces the risk of improper disclosure. Although implementing a records management system has many benefits, including reducing eDiscovery costs and risks, it is also the cornerstone of preventing information from falling into the wrong hands.
Standards (DoD 5015.02-STD, ISO 15489), best practices (ARMA GARP) and communities (CGOC) exist to guide and accelerate the process.Records management can be complemented by Information Rights Management and/or Digital Loss Prevention (DLP) technology for enhanced security and control options.
Leverage Content Analytics
Use content analytics to understand employee sentiment and as well as to detect any patterns of behavior that could lead to intentional disclosure of information. These technologies leverage text and content analytics to identify disgruntled employees before an incident occurs enabling proactive investigation and management of potentially troublesome situations. They can also serve as a background for any investigation that may happen in the event of an incident. Enterprises should proactively monitor for these risks and situations … as an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Content analytics can also be extended with predictive analytics to evaluate the probability of an incident and the associated exposure.
Leverage Advanced Case Management
Investigating and remediating any risk or fraud scenario requires advanced case management. These case-centric investigations are almost always ad-hoc processes with unpredictable twists and turns. You need the ad-hoc and collaborative nature of advanced case management to serve as a process backbone as the case proceeds and ultimately concludes. Having built-in audit trails, records management and governance ensures transparency into the process and minimizes the chance of any hanky-panky. Enterprises should consider advanced case management solutions that integrate with ECM repositories and records management for any content-centric investigation.
Stop hitting the snooze button and take action.
Any enterprise could be a target and ultimately a victim. The stakes are higher than ever before. Leverage solutions like records management, content analytics and advanced case management to improve your organization's ability to secure, control and retain documents while monitoring and remediating for potential risky disclosure situations.
Leave me your thoughts and ideas. I’ll read and respond later … after I am done hitting the snooze button a few times (kidding of course).