Michael Hoyle, currently Project Manager and Lead Researcher at the International Records Management Trust. This is a London-based NGO which concerns itself with helping developing countries establish electronic records-keeping tools and wrestling with the obstacles that are related to this endeavor.What does the IRMT do?
- Established 1989
- Small NGO in the UK
- Meant to respond to the collapse of records-keeping and management in developing countries (A set from one of their conferences included officials from: Angola, Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe)
- Help build “evidenced-based governmence
Three key parts: 1/ Consultancy Services, 2/ Education and Training Activities, and 3/ Development Research
Research focus
Note: The definition of records that we use: “information created, received, and maintained as evidence and information, by an organization or person, in pursuance of legal obligations or in the transaction of business”
ICT and developing countries
(Issues like: cellphone adoption or merely the lack of electricality)
Computerised information must be reliable and trustworthy over time if it is to be used:
- to provide the basis for informed decision making
- for effective service industry
- for addressing corruption through increased transparency
The trustworthiness and reliability of computer applications is affected by
- quality of the documentary evidence input to and generated by electronic systems
- and the need of an audit trail to ensure accountability
Issues:
Many governments are attempting to move to the electronic evironment without taking account of the implications for managing records as evidence. Many are seeking to introduce electronic systems based on manual systems that have been poorly managed or have collapsed.
Question: When you convert governments from “no records” to “records”, how do you verify the accuracy of the new records?
Response: Agreed, the verification process is essential and, yet, can be almost impossible. How do you start with “zero”? Integrity of data is fundamental and essential.
Some Foci:
Primary focus on human resources and payroll information as a means of exploring the issues involved in transitioning from manual to electronic systems.
- Exploring the management of manual data as inputs to payroll, the management of electronic records as digital outputs, and the links between them.
- Examining the management of digital records scanned into human resource information systems.
Some problems facing developing countries: dealing with corruption & lack of transparency, finding ‘ghost workers’, meeting national and international audit requirements… Ghost workers might be people who have multiple “positions”, people who don’t exist or are dead, or who don’t work — all of which have salaries that are being collected by someone.
Question: As you get rid of corruption, is there pressure on the archivis to stop doing thier work because it exposes corruption?
Response: There is resistance to change. We have seen resistance from groups that profiteer from the old system. This is not to say that all systems are corrupt, although this is prevalent in poorer locales.
Methodology
To coordinate across researchers in North America, Europe, and Africa, we created a toolkit for researchers. Our method was to : 1/ collect qualitative information through documentary research and interview, 2/ map information flows, noting inputs and outputs plus information created and authorisation, and 3/ conduct quantitation research: collect employment data, etc…
(One trouble here is that records are often fudged for different reasons. One example is where an older employee fakes his age so as to remain employed.)
A Few Findings
- Significant human resource system upgrades either planned or being undertaken to systems.
- Flexible next generation software, using web-based browser technologies, being introduced.
- Human Resource Management often highly centralised – MDA’s will have greater system access and control.
- Devolution to local regions or office… producing a need to manage records and other information requirement implications.
- Infrastructure and regulatory environment need strengthening (records and ICT) due to this decentralisation.
- Manual systems often date from colonial times.
- ICT is seen as the solution to information management problems, but little understanding exists of records as evidence and for accountability.
- Relationship between eGovernance and electronic records management needs strengthening.
- Professional project management skills, including planning, stakeholder management, training and sensitisation are required.
- Business process re-engineering is being driven by procurement considerations as much as by information requirements.
- Interface between human resource information systems and payroll (often part of an Integrated Financial Information Management System) needs to be strengthened.
- HRIS driving the payroll rather than being used for management of human resources (planning etc…)
- Information is created in a mixed media (manual/electronic) enviroment that is often disconnected, lacking in integration…
Particular Challenges
- Gaining approval for researching in the case study nations
- Consultant and research fatigue by host countries
- Access to manual & electronic data
- Access to officials (Occasionally receiving hostile emotions about how intrusive and disruptive their research would be)
- Building resources and rapport (Sometimes taking weeks to establish)
- Language cultural issues
- Dealing with slow times in the field
Our deliverables
- A route map providing sequence strategy for moving from manual to electronic environment
- Guidance materials for good practice in recordskeeping
- Six training modules on managing electornic records
- Database of case studies with a report summarising the findings
