John James O'Brien, CRM, MALT's Page

This short video clip was captured--candid camera style--by David Gurteen in Hong Kong.

Back in the 80's, Canada was a leader in the domain, pushing the envelope to focus on achieving fiscal benefits through description and management of multi-media information resources, paralleling and in some ways grounding Australia's move into first place with development of the Continuum Theory. Sadly, however, the hegemony of the US economy has relegated records management to a narrowly defined, compliance driven approach. Our US friends increasingly see it as a legal and administrative burden, necessary but, perhaps, evil.

Defined as I see it, recorded information management (RIM) is a balancing act that supports accountability and transparency on the one hand, with authentic ways of knowing on the other. I find it startling that something as basic as evidence-based practice is not fully embraced in knowledge and KM circles. Some take it for granted (perhaps our academic friends?) and others disdain it (too much time and effort required and far too little macho "kick" in the leadership).

Whither RIM? As I develop curriculum for the University of British Columbia's School of Library, Archives and Information Science, I plan to ground thinking in the balancing act, firmly focused in the context of organizational realities and desired outcomes.