EROS: CASE STUDIES: DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH: MANAGEMENT OF ELECTRONIC DOCUMENTS STRATEGY

by David A Smith
Document and Information Management Strategy Manager
Information Services Division, Department of Health

1.	Introduction/Background

The original business justification for OIS, the Department of Health's Office Information System, now one of the largest Whitehall computer networks, was the transfer of a large part of the Department of Health's business, mainly concerned with the then NHS Management Executive, to Leeds.  This move of 1,000 civil servants created an urgent need to ensure that good communications were set up between the London and Leeds communities, and the ability to transfer documents as easily as possible between geographically disparate sections within the same division.  Supplemented by video conferencing facilities, OIS was installed in the DH estate over 24 months, which is a very short timescale considering the number of staff to be networked, and the fact that a number of them were in the process of moving to another part of the country.

One consequence of the short installation timescale imposed by the Leeds move was that considerations of the use of OIS as a means of disseminating corporate information  were left to later, while the more immediate requirements of training and supporting users in using wordprocessing and email facilities took priority.  In 1993 DH's Information Services Directorate, which encompasses the DH's computer services sections as well as library services and Departmental records, issued a Document and Information Management Strategy (DIMS) paper which was approved by the Departmental Information Strategy Steering Committee. DIMS recommended the development of appropriate policies, procedures and systems for document management, as well as the development of corporate sources of information using the existing OIS infrastructure. It proposed a number of initiatives to improve the management of information and documents both on OIS and in the Department generally.

One was a Document Management initiative (DMI) to look into the management of electronic and paper based documents and records.  This ambitious programme involving training all 5000 staff in the importance of good record keeping was completed over a 2 year timescale by the Departmental Records Section.  The DMI did highlight the growing problem of managing Departmental records that existed in electronic format, chiefly as electronic mail or as wordprocessed documents.   Findings from the DMI indicated that by the end of 1995, due to the fact that most Departmental business and electronic communication was carried out on OIS, 75% of all documents that should be included as part of the official record were in electronic format.  However the DMI guidance was to print out copies and keep a registered hard copy file.  Given the challenge that this presented to the Department, and building on the work started by the Document Management Initiative, the Management of Electronic Documents Strategy (MEDS) was initiated in January 1996.

2.	Aims of the Strategy

The Management of Electronic Documents Strategy (MEDS) has a number of strategic aims, which it shares with the Document Management Initiative:

•	to improve the level of Departmental accountability by reducing the number of gaps in the official record caused by important policy documents being missing

•	to improve the overall corporate memory of the Department, so that the thinking and justification for past Departmental actions is clear

•	to provide training/awareness of records management

•	to meet the need to comply with the Open Government Initiative

These all serve to reinforce the message that it is important that good records management practice, whether for paper or electronic documents, are encouraged within the Department.

Besides these concerns, a number of other MEDS aims specifically concerned with the management of electronic records dictated the need for Departmental action:

•	to address the lack of any management legacy for electronic records

•	to challenge the perceived primacy of paper as the only acceptable kind of official record

•	to reduce the proportion of storage space on the OIS fileservers needed to hold documents

•	to encompass the proliferation of different formats in which electronic records are stored

•	to manage the huge number of documents held electronically that need to be included in the official record.

3.	Major Requirements

There are a number of formats in which documents are stored electronically on OIS include:

•	Word Processed files
•	Emails
•	Spreadsheets
•	Graphics
•	Images

This list is by no means exhaustive, but did indicate that any procedures proposed by MEDS for handling electronic records needed to be capable of application to a number of different file types.  This is an important issue in ensuring that some element of future-proofing was built into the procedures, so that each new technological advance, e.g.the Department adopting a new Wordprocessor or email standard, did not render them redundant.

In addressing the management of its electronic records with MEDS, the Department of Health has assumed that:

•	funding for electronic document management will be a relatively low IT priority for Government Departments, and consequently a low cost approach needs to be adopted and,

•	technology continues to change at a rate that makes the need to ensure any electronic records management approaches are future-proofed for the medium term, allowing low cost migration and flexibility  (i.e. capable of being applied to future IT packages and the electronic documents they will generate)

Overall the Department of Health is seeking to balance flexibility with low cost to provide a value for money approach to electronic records management.

4.	System Structure/Architecture

As the organisational structure of the electronic records is viewed as key to the Department's approach to electronic records management, MEDS will be concentrating on developing good practice and procedures in this area.  This will be taken forward in a number of ways:

•	the issuing of electronic records management guidance.  This will be compiled from the guidance that exists already but is usually subsumed within other IT printed training material.  This is intended to ensure that a consistent approach and message is put across, and that emphasis can be given to this subject by specifically addressing this issue within the guidance.

•	the provision of training, either as part of standard induction IT training or specifically themed, on electronic document management.  This would look as topics such as logical file directory structures, moving files, and archiving emails.  
•	the promulgation of electronic records management procedures, outlining preferred file directory and email folder structures, and naming conventions.  These will be tested out in a series of pilots within the Department, and refined in the light of these, before being proposed as Departmental standards.

The intention is to make procedures as "user friendly" as possible, while still ensuring that the overall strategic direction is adhered to.  In terms of what this direction is perceived to be, it is the longer term objective that DH electronic records be capable of being transferred securely to the Public Record Office, and in a format that allows a user to retrieve and view these records again.  At present a PRO working party is looking at the technical issues concerning the composition of this bundle.  In the meantime the DH is concentrating on instilling a culture shift towards organising electronic documents into logical "bundles" for future integration with such a system.

5.	Controls/Rules/Standards

Best practice guidance is being drawn up indicating how file directory and email folder structures may be constructed technically.  With regard to the logical structure that should be adopted, proposed records structures and rules will be piloted so as to assess the extent to which these meet user and Departmental needs.  In defining electronic document control procedures and rules, the Departmental Records Office will be extensively consulted, to ensure compliance with the requirements of the Public Records Acts, and it will also act as one of the pilot sites.  Central coordination will be conducted by the MEDS Working Group, which will provide strategic direction for the strategy, and will feed the results of its work into other strategic Departmental IT committees as necessary.

6.	Information/Records Structure and Retrieval

In approaching the issue of a multiple electronic formats, the Department has concentrated on ensuring that documents, irrespective of whether they be wordprocessed, emails or spreadsheets, are grouped together by subject.  The "subject" would be analogous to the paper registered file number, thereby linking electronic with paper records for retrieval purposes, and acknowledging the legacy of paper records that exist.

The issue of records retrieval is being addressed pragmatically.  A two stage approach to information retrieval is envisioned, which will allow a degree of flexibility in which formats can be retrieved and viewed, while not requiring a major tranche of Business Process Re‑engineering to meet the requirements of a third party document management system.

Stage One

The retrieval system (no specific system is assumed or required) used for locating paper records is enhanced to include locations for electronic records.  There may be a number of locations given, reflecting the diverse storage media and structures of different file types, but they would have a common point of entry at the registered file level.  For example retrieving on the phrase "Internet Publishing" would indicate registered file BZH/3/37 giving a list of locations for papers, emails and wordprocessed documents.  Although the physical locations and structures might be different, they all make up the same policy file.  The key to successful retrieval at this stage would be the use of the Department of Health's thesaurus, which would ensure consistency in indexing the coverage of a registered file and assist in following changes in terminology that retrieving material that may be over 30 years old will engender.

Stage Two

Having located the appropriate set(s) of electronic records, users would employ the appropriate text retrieval facilities available for retrieving individual documents.  By acknowledging the diversity of formats available, tools that are intended to be used for specific purposes can be used, rather than searching for an elusive (and inevitable expensive) all encompassing solution - or at least all encompassing until another format appears that was not allowed for in the original design.  Instead the Department will concentrate on training users in making the fullest use of the text retrieval tools available with the product set they are familiar with.

The two stage document retrieval procedure will allow for a pan-document approach to records management, permitting paper records to coexisting with electronic ones, and thus avoiding the need to scan in papers that do not exist in electronic format.

7.	Conclusion

The overall strategic thrust of the Department's approach to electronic records management has been to lay out the route staff need to take in arranging their electronic records for inclusion in the official record, while allowing for local flexibilities.  By concentrating on the best use of existing facilities, and in particular the administrative procedures underlying these, the Department has sought to develop a system that can be easily migrated as new IT facilities and products emerge, thereby ensuring some degree of future proofing.  It is still the case that the majority of "average" IT users tend not to use the existing document management tools they have access to fully and efficiently. By keeping procedures relatively simple, and using the facilities currently available, the Department will continue with its value for money approach to electronic records management, and start to inculcate a records management culture into its staff that can be used as a basis for all current and future systems.