Insights
Intelligent Automation of Recordkeeping – an approach that really works
Over the past few months a remarkable collaboration has taken place between three parties: Pingar NZ, Synercon Australia and our client Auckland Transport. We each brought existing knowledge and toolsets, which we combined to build an Intelligent...
Why you need ontologies to automate records appraisal and classification
In my last post I shared an auto-classification project that we undertook recently. Even information professionals need a helping hand to appraise and classify the growing document stockpile. Not surprising then that most organisations we work with have reached the...
Eating our own (auto-classification) dogfood and loving it.
It's always been my contention that we folk in information management should use our own products. So that we can experience the same pain as our users are feeling. So here at Synercon we use our own a.k.a.® software to build metadata and classification schemes which...
A rehash on DIRKS
This is a rehash of an article published in 2012, but still relevant today DIRKS – a Tool for Achieving Better Business Outcomes Few people outside of the records management sector are familiar with the DIRKS methodology. What is DIRKS you ask? DIRKS stands for the...
Before you start building your new classification scheme…
It is a simple process to create terms and categories and build them into information systems. And easy to justify building a new classification scheme (tick whichever is appropriate): We don’t have a scheme We have too many schemes We need to standardise language...
Classification Definitions and Sources
In my next few posts I'm going to write about building classification schemes. So it's probably a good idea to explain the definitions I use upfront. Before you take me to task, bear in mind that my context is the information governance space, and while I make...
The dark art of classification
Everywhere I go people are creating classification schemes. All sorts of people are doing it: programmers, business and data analysts, information and enterprise architects. Mostly they are doing it because they are in the process of building an information system and...
Building an Enterprise Framework for Data Governance
We live in an age where data is used to represent what happens in the real world –operations are being transformed from hands-on experience to a data and process model. Data is now used to describe our business – people, places, events etc. Enormous efficiencies can...
Why do we need canonical data models for information governance?
A canonical data model refers to a logical data model which is the accepted standard within a business or industry for a process / system etc. In programming, canonical means "according to the rules." The term canonical is the adjective for canon, literally a 'rule',...
Metadata and taxonomies in a “broader” context
Managing metadata* and developing taxonomies* is easy! And so it is - when you are working within a confined context. As Patrick Lamb suggests in his book Organising Knowledge, most people are confident in building taxonomies i.e. lists, lookup sets, hierarchies,...
Metadata and Taxonomies – who’s in control?
Take a look at any organisation and you will find thousands of taxonomies in every database and information system across the enterprise expressed in the form of lists, lookup sets, metadata, tags, taxonomies, file plans, classification facets etc… Who’s in control?...
Understanding Metadata
The third article in a series of insights about metadata. We’ve talked a lot about language, but language is just one, albeit a big one, of the metadata elements we use to manage information objects. In fact there is a whole range of terms and Identifiers which make...
The Metadata Challenge
What exactly is the metadata challenge? As discussed in our insight The Language of Metadata, using precise and consistent language as a business tool is a vastly different concept to using it as an expression of social behaviour, as a means of differentiation between...
The Language Of Metadata
The first in a series of Insights about metadata, the challenges, how to use it to your advantage manage it over time. Why do we all get so confused about metadata – after all it’s really just words, right? Right! But how many different ways are there to describe the...
The value of Metadata
One of the best chapters I've ever read about metadata can be found in Darin Stewart's book Building Enterprise Taxonomies. To quote Stewart: Metadata is a hard sell. It is expensive to create and difficult to maintain. Executives have a tough time understanding how...
What IM Professionals need to know: Entity Relationship Modelling
For information management (IM) professionals, entity relationship modelling has become a necessary skill set. Until recently the Enterprise eCM systems we worked with presented a ‘standardised’ information architecture with file...
Automating recordkeeping – what’s holding us back?
February, 2014. Conni's paper has been selected for the IRMS Conference in Brighton, United Kingdom, May 18-20 2104. Here is the precis: We live in a world of technology where process automation is the norm. So why, in 2014, is...
“Government agencies and programs operate in an informational stone age”
The ObamaCare Website Failure Was Inevitable. This recent article in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reinforced my belief that functional information governance in a digital world is still a long way off yet. ...
Classification – more than just searching
Some of my favourite quotes about classification are from Organising Knowledge: Taxonomies, Knowledge and Organisational Effectiveness by Patrick Lambe. Taxonomies are at the same time deceptively simple and fiendishly...
Enterprise DNA
What do we need to know about the organization that will helps us to manage information ? At the very least… We need to know what our organisation does We need to know what products and services we provide We need to know what assets we manage We need to know who we...
Taxonomy software vs the spreadsheet
You may wonder why anyone would want to spend money on specialist software for building taxonomies or metadata when you could just use a spreadsheet. Here are 5 good reasons: Relationships and mapping There are many more relationships to a taxonomy /thesaurus than...
5 Information Governance Essentials
In the age of Big Data and advanced analytics, apps for eveything, mobile computing, cloud computing, etc here are my top 5 recommendations for better information governance. 1. Invest in Cross functional training All staff who work in IM need to be able to see the...
A is for Aggregation
I’ve always considered aggregation a cornerstone of records management. Conceptually aggregations make sense to me –...
Recordkeeping and Digital Transition WRT Child Protection
Tomorrow (June 1) is International Day for Protection of Children. At the Digital Mandate conference in Canberra yesterday, David Fricker (Director General of the National Archives of Australia) and other speakers, eloquently put the case for Digital Transition....
C is for Continuum
The Records Continuum A consistent and coherent process of records management throughout the life of records, from the development of recordkeeping systems through the creation and preservation of records, to their retention and...
Are records managers the next technology refugees?
The Australian government’s digital transition policy intends to move all Australian government agencies to digital recordkeeping over the next few years. It’s not hard to see why. Commonwealth agencies are currently spending $200 million plus a year storing paper...
UTS Information Management courses: The right stuff for digital transition
I’m seriously impressed with the courses offered by the University of Technology Sydney. http://handbook.uts.edu.au/courses/c04203.html#F8 In particular I like the following subjects – core for the Masters degree and the Graduate Diploma in Information Management,...
Do you see what I see?
What we need in 2013 vs. what the industry thinks we need! At the start of each year, it’s customary for the oracles to gaze into their crystal balls, and pronounce their 5 (or 10) technology predictions that become the want list for the coming year. Big data, apps...
“It’s time for Information Governance”
This article by Barclay Blair was the first in a series about Information Governance published in CIO Update. It provides good definitions and examples of information governance and helps to establish records management's part within the bigger information management...
Defining an IDEAL Information System
Information management systems are complex beings, often over-engineered, commonly dysfunctional – as far as end users are concerned. Most established "records management" systems have been shaped by compliance requirements and “industry” standards (more about this in...
