Planning for records management

IBM® Enterprise Records is an optional Content Cortex product that manages document lifecycles according to retention rules. Authorized users can declare federated documents as records in the same manner as declaring native Content Platform Engine documents as records.

To implement a records management solution for federated content, determine the file plan and records management rules that are required to support your implementation. A file plan is an implementation of a records management solution, and includes the folders and classifications for storing records, as well as the schedules, triggers, events, actions, and workflows that process the lifecycle of a record.

Design, implement, and test your records solution before you start any federation. If you are already an IBM Enterprise Records customer, review the current records management implementation and determine whether you need to modify the file plan in use, or if you need to create a new file plan specifically for use with federated documents.

Consider the following questions:

  • When a document is declared a record, what information will be used to classify the record. For example:
    • Will the document in the source repository have a specific property or metadata value that requires specific classification?
    • Is the document associated with a specific document class or item type that indicates how to classify the item?
    • Is the federation date of the document a significant property?
    • Is the record classification determined by a combination of items?
  • What rules are associated with each classification of record?
    • What is the length of time that the system must maintain a record?
    • What causes the record to begin the disposition process?
  • When will a federated document be declared a record?
    • Will the need to declare a document as a record cause the document to be selected for federation?
    • Will the record declaration action occur some time after the document is federated and added to the object store?
  • Who requires access to the record from the Content Cortex environment?

The federation rules and the data mapping must support the classification of the federated documents according to your records management rules. The federation rules and the data mapping must also federate any metadata from the source repository that is needed for the disposition process. For example, if there is source metadata that will be used in the disposition process, this metadata must be federated to the Content Platform Engine document so that the metadata can be used by IBM Enterprise Records.

As you work through the records management design, in addition to creating the file plan and configuring the file plan object store, you must also update the records object store. Make sure that the records object store to which you will be federating content is configured with the following options:

  • Document classes that support the data mapping from the source repository.
  • Custom properties for data mapping from the source repository properties.
  • Folders to contain the federated documents.
  • Events that can trigger the record declaration. Events can occur immediately after a document is federated or later. For example, create an event action to handle a change to a specific property value that triggers the record declaration.
  • The full-text indexing capability if the document content drives some of the records management rules.

After the design of the file plan and the records object store is complete, you can build the data maps and the federation rules.