Future Proof – Protecting our digital future

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On 31 August State Records sent out a survey request to all its recipients of the For The Record newsletter, asking them to complete a short survey on Electronic Document and Records Management Systems (EDRMS) use in NSW government.

This informal information survey ran for 2 weeks, until 12 September. 62 responses were received from across all areas of government, with the majority of responses from local government (37%) and government agencies (34%). The remaining responses were distributed evenly between the Health sector, the University sector and State owned corporations.

State Records undertook the survey as part of its regular information gathering activities which help to track trends and issues in government recordkeeping. EDRMS were the focus of this information survey because they are a widely used business system in government but there is little consolidated data that tracks what specific types of EDRMS are being used and how widely these are being used across organisations.

While the survey does not contain definitive data, it has given State Records some really useful information to use in its planning and guidance development processes.

Question 1

The first question in the survey asked which government sector the survey respondent was from.

The results showed that 37% of respondents were from local government, 34% from government agencies, 10% from state-owned corporations, 8% from the health sector and 8% from the university sector. 3% of responses were not from government and were therefore not included in this survey report.

Question 2

The second question asked ‘Does your organisation have one or more corporate electronic records and document management systems?’

94% of respondents reported having an EDRMS, with 6% of respondents reporting that they do not have an EDRMS.

Question 3

The third question asked ‘Which of the following EDRMS do you use? Tick all that apply’

58% of respondents reported using TRIM, with 17.5% using Objective, 15.8% using DataWorks, 7% using InfoXpert, 3.5% using RecFind and the remainder using a number of other off-the-shelf and purpose built systems. Four organisations reported using three different EDRMS, and one reported using two, but the majority of respondents reported having one corporate EDRMS.

Question 4

Question 4 asked ‘What percentage of your staff have access to EDRMS?’ and ten different options were listed, ranging from ‘Less than 10%’ through to ’91-100%’. The breakdown of responses is as follows:

• 91-100% of staff have access to EDRMS – 32%
• 81-90% – 5%
• 71–80% – 2%
• 61–70% – 11%
• 51–60% – 16%
• 41-50% – 4%
• 31-40% – 13%
• 21-30% – 2%
• 11-20% – 9%
• Less than 10% – 7%

Question 5

Question 5 asked ‘Of those who have access, what percentage of staff regularly use EDRMS?’ The breakdown of responses is as follows:

• 91-100% of staff with access to EDRMS regularly use it – 9%
• 81-90% – 11%
• 71–80% – 9%
• 61–70% – 9%
• 51–60% – 14%
• 41-50% – 9%
• 31-40% – 14%
• 21-30% – 4%
• 11-20% – 7%
• Less than 10% – 14%

At the end of this post is a list of all (anonymous) responses comparing their EDRMS access and use statistics.

Question 6

Question 6 asked ‘Have you integrated your EDRMS with one or more organisational business systems to capture records from your business systems?’

47% of respondents said that their EDRMS was integrated with business systems, while 53% said that theirs was not.

Question 7

Question 7 asked, ‘How many business systems are integrated with your EDRMS? Note: If you are in the process of integrating with a business system, please count this.’ Respondents were provided with the following options – 1, 2-5 systems, 6-10 systems, More than 10 systems.

54% of respondents reported having one business system integration, while 46% have 2 – 5 business systems integrated with their EDRMS. No one reported having more than 5 systems integrated.

Question 8

Question 8 asked respondents to identify what types of business systems they had integrated with their EDRMS and were given a list of possible options. The responses show that:

• 36% have property management systems integrated
• 24% have financial management systems integrated
• 24% have case management systems integrated
• 16% have client management systems integrated
• 8% have Content management systems integrated
• 4% have Human resource management systems integrated

Respondents could provide additional free text responses to this question and these responses included ‘Project management’, ‘Student CRM’, ‘Transactional databases’ and ‘Development application system’.

Question 9

Question 9 asked, ‘What is your organisation intending to have as its primary recordkeeping environment in the future?’ and a list of possible options was provided, as well as a free text field.

• 55% of respondents said ‘We will continue to use our current EDRMS as our primary recordkeeping environment for the foreseeable future’
• 28% of respondents said ‘We will have multiple recordkeeping environments, including EDRMS, business systems and collaborative workspaces’
• 8% said ‘We will be changing to a different EDRMS as our primary recordkeeping environment’
• 4% said ‘We will be capturing most records in collaborative workspaces (like SharePoint)’
• 0% said ‘We will be capturing most records in business systems’

Free text responses included:

• ‘We are about to undertake an external review all all the business systems in use with the possibility of changing’
• ‘Given low percentage of users of with EDRMS access, most staff save records in shared drives’
• ‘ITD are pushing for the use of SharePoint – fine if properly integrated with the EDRMS’, and
• ‘A decision will be made in the next 12 months on whether we move to a new system or stay with current EDRMS’.

Question 10

Question 10 asked ‘Do you have any other comments about EDRMS use that you would like to share?’ Thirteen responses were received, including:

• Doomed without it!
• Our EDRMS is one of our key business tools and enables us to perform our work effectively and efficiently
• * Our EDRMS promises much but delivers little * Our EDRMS is being implemented for the wrong reasons (eliminating paper and compliance, not better info management) and it shows * EDRMSs may be OK to great for RM, but very average at best at real DM (standards compliant document control)
• Typical resistance to using a EDRMS. Typically over the years so many systems have been implemented to get people more involved in record keeping but they typically have not made it ‘easier or more user-friendly’. The strategy that we are taking is to not implement further systems but develop tools that simplify capturing metadata and empowering current systems.
• I train use of our EDRMS and find that most ‘middle’ managers do not use it – they know it has value however are too busy to make the time to upload their documents. This, of course, filters to their staff…

As usual, we would really like to thank the excellent members of the NSW public sector who responded to our survey. We really do appreciate all the information you provide. It is invaluable for our planning and targeted recordkeeping assistance. Thank you!

Appendix: Comparison of EDRMS access and use statistics

The following lists bring together individual anonymous survey responses and compare the response given to the ‘percentage of staff with access to EDRMS’ question with the response given to the ‘percentage of staff with access who regularly use EDRMS’ question (questions 4 and 5).

Local government responses

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 21-30%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 81-90%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 71-80%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 41-50%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 81-90%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 81-90%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 31-40%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 81-90%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 81-90%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 91-100%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 41-50%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 61-70%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 61-70%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 61-70%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 61-70%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 61-70%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 71-80%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 81-90%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 41-50%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access:51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 41-50%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 61-70%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 21-30%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 61-70%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 61-70%

Agency responses

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 41-50%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 91-100%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 81-90%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 91-100%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 71-80%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 11-20%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 61-70%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 31-40%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 51-60%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 11-20%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 31-40%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 11-20%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 91-100%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 81-90%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 61-70%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 11-20%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: Less than 10%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 91-100%

Other sector responses

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 31-40%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 11-20%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: Less than 10%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 71-80%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 31-40%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 71-80%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: Less than 10%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 71-80%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 31-40%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 31-40%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 11-20%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: Less than 10%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 41-50%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 11-20%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: Less than 10%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 41-50%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 11-20%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 11-20%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 51-60%

Percentage of staff with EDRMS access: 91-100%; Percentage of these staff who regularly use EDRMS: 31-40%