Why records works best as a value centre

Records works best as a value centre because it sets up virtuous cycles - cycles in which action leads to the opportunity for more action.

This is as opposed to vicious cycles - in which every action leads to fewer opportunities.

One way to think about it, is to think about how you want people to think about you and your team.

When they see you coming do you want it to be "oh no, here comes the records team again" - followed by a bunch of promises to do better that no one is going to follow through on (because they have stuff to do, and managers in their line are managing them on it).

Or would you rather they called you semi-frequently to hassle you about when your team were going to implement the next productivity improver?

Basically, records works best as a value centre because people like people who help them.

And we'd all rather be liked - because being liked is a virtuous cycle, the more people like us, the more they want to talk to us and the more we understand them.

Or we can be a compliance centre - and no one will want to talk to us, which sets up a vicious cycle.

Obviously it's not that simple.

Modern records management is not dealing with a simple problem - the problems are at least complicated, and are often complex.

The thing with complicated and complex problems, is that if we have to try and design solutions without really understanding the implementation environment, we're going to design solutions that don't fit, and won't get used.

Which sounds a little bit like where most EDRMS systems are at the moment.

Records works best as a value centre, because when we're giving people something that really helps them get their work done, they want to talk to us.

The more they talk to us about what they do, the more we understand the task environment.

The more we understand the task environment, the more likely we are to design a solution that gives end users and managers what they want - improved productivity.

That's a virtuous cycle.

While we're designing things for them - we can design in compliance.

And they'll never know.

At the executive level, it's a better story too.

Executives aren't going to get into the nitty gritty, but they are going to think carefully about where they put their funding.

When records is a value centre, it's like a high interest bank account.

It's delivering a great return, so you want to put as much money in it as you possibly can - because the more money you put into it, the more you get out.

That's another virtuous cycle.

When records is a compliance function, they naturally look to minimise the cost, and if they reduce the funding and nothing happens - then why wouldn't they reduce it again next time they have the opportunity?

That's a vicious cycle.

Vicious cycles lead to fewer and fewer opportunities for us to show people how valuable records is as a profession, and how much we can help them.

I think we'd all rather be stuck in a virtuous cycle - in which the worst thing we have to do is ask for more resources so we can help more.