Margot Note's Blog, page 18

Connection with Users and Within Collections

Archives, both grand and practical, are part of a longstanding story of human knowledge and experience. Archivists and key stakeholders at repositories should re-envision and revitalize special collections programming in the archives.

A range of programs can represent changing practices at a certain point in time. More importantly, they can raise the visibility of the professionals managing archival departments and conducting archival projects. When programming and outreach are shared through public relations, it can foster professional exchange around archival programming. Engaging outreach programs and thoughtful reference services allow archival repositories to connect with their users and forge connections between materials in their holdings.

From Static to Dynamic

The changing perceptions of archives from static repositories to dynamic networking institutions are driving some of the access and collection management expectations. In some cases, archival departments are moving away from typical exhibits to more interactive and imaginative outreach models, although exhibits and lecture series continue to be popular with the community. The amount of creativity and imagination depends on the organizational culture of the archives, the open-mindedness of its decision-makers, and the communities that the archives currently works with and hopes to attract.

Archivists are engaging their communities while increasing the use of their collections and, in some cases, augmenting those collections. If no one is using the materials, collections become dead: collecting for collecting’s sake. Most archivists are pleased when researchers use their collections and get excited about contents or make a remarkable discovery. This enthusiasm is infectious and re-energizes archivists in their work.

Deeper Connections with Materials

While “connection” typically means connecting with external users or institutions, deeper archival connections can also be forged within collections. Archival holdings are organized with the principles of original order and provenance. This organizational structure has a logic and rationale that makes sense to archivists and historians. However, standard archival practices can be limiting, confusing, or quite frankly odd to researchers who may be more used to searching by subject or theme.

Experiment with ways for users to explore your collections, much in the same way that patrons seek out a specific book on the shelves, yet browse books with similar call numbers. Look over your collections. What are the themes that emerge from the holdings? Is there a way to present them to users to spark exploration? For example, if a user is looking at a finding aid online, does your website suggest other finding aids with similar themes? Can they suggest similar digital items?

Connecting with New Archival Researchers

For novice users, common archival practices can be intimidating. Instead, think of the ways of exploration within the collections similar to what new users may be used to. By acknowledging that new users can feel daunted by researching archival collections, archivists can consider making the archives more welcoming to first-time visitors. Information seeking is a subjective process in which people approach with prior knowledge, strong opinions, and differing levels of cognitive development. Most users may not be familiar with best practices, so develop ways to impart this information in an easily understandable way.

Strategic Alliances

The better archivists understand their constituents, the better they can serve them. Archivists interested in connecting with users should assess their access policies, make outreach plans, and consider instruction methods that they could implement at their institutions to move from service providers to effective educators. They should look for partners with whom they can collaborate and discover the most needed knowledge and skills. Archivists and their users should align as information literacy participants and agents in teaching, learning, and practice. Strategic alliances between archivists and their patrons, developed over time, can establish information literacy and research methods as a foundation for lifelong learning. By doing so, archivists can gain a new generation of loyal users and advocates.

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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Reusing Archival Content to Connect with New Audiences

In online marketing, thought leaders suggest ways to reuse and repurpose content. For example, a popular blog post can be repurposed into an updated post, a series of social media posts, an infographic, or an expanded e-book. 

Through these means, the materials reach new audiences, allowing information to more easily be found and minimizing the effort to do so. 

The same can be said for archival content, enabled by actionable ideas that archivists can implement easily. From experience working as a lone arranger for ten years, I know first-hand how to adapt, repurpose, and remix content with limited time, money, and labor. In addition, in my consulting practice, I have worked with organizations that have archival materials but no professional archivists, so I have developed methods to share collections outside of traditional archival practices.

Reuse > Creation

Reuse trumps creation in several ways. Archivists can make archival materials more widely known by finding various ways to remix content. Doing so presents the archives as more than just a physical repository. Materials exist online, allowing 24/7 access to researchers across the world. Creative reuse also displays leadership. In an environment where time and money are scarce, archivists can make their collections more findable, especially by non-traditional archival users. In addition, reuse demonstrates expertise in collections, information management, and the digital environment.

Why Repurpose?

Repurposing materials saves time and uses less bandwidth to create content. In addition, archival information captured in different formats and available at different times reinforces messages, grows engagement, and reaches new audiences. It also allows archivists to gain more authority and increases the return on investment for the labor used to create content. Another benefit is that it extends the life of the materials. 

Candidates for Repurposing

The best content to repurpose is evergreen content, material that is continually relevant and fresh for users over a long period. For example, at a position I held at a historic preservation organization, I harvested imagery and captions from books, brochures, and newsletters created over fifty years. The organization owned the rights to the photographs, and I knew that past employees selected the best, most aesthetically pleasing imagery. I also knew that the captions had been vetted and approved for publication; this knowledge was critical to my work because the copyediting and approval process of new content was labyrinthian and best avoided. 

Everything that I chose was timeless both at the time of publication and at reuse. As an archivist, I had at my fingertips a vast amount of quality information that took very little time to present to contemporary audiences. In a similar vein, I also chose popular content. At that same position at a historic preservation organization, I chose iconic sites like Angkor Wat, Easter Island, and Hagia Sophia, which always attracted interested researchers. Hence, repurposing content related to these sites proved successful. Finally, I also focused on easily updated content. If some of the materials needed minor tweaks to their descriptions to make it current, I did so and reformatted them for distribution. 

Examples of Repurposing

The ways that archival content can be repurposed are endless. Here are some examples that I have used:

Updating or expanding finding aids, resources, and blog posts

Creating or updating FAQs and user guides

Rewriting internal documents for external use

Finding where audiences meet online and share content

Creating social media content

Sharing posts across platforms

Creating pins for Pinterest

Reusing content for blog posts, webinars, podcasts, videos, and infographics

Creating round-up posts

Creating crowdsourcing projects

Create Once, Use Many Times

Archival work demands deep work, intellectual labor, and creative thinking. Therefore, whatever an archival repository creates, it should live perpetually to attract new users. The timelessness of repurposed archival content allows the investment in time and labor to pay off in the long run.

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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Visible Archives, Vital Communities

Archival repositories may never fully compete with the services offered by community centers and the extensive outreach efforts provided by libraries, museums, and art centers. 

However, they can become active partners with such institutions to ensure that the needs and expectations of their communities are met and exceeded. 

Creative Crucibles

“Creative Placemaking,” a paper published by the National Endowment for the Arts, cites archives and special collections as excellent examples of “creative crucibles,” one of many satellite cultural spaces that contribute to the cultural and economic well-being of a community. Archivists can employ their collections as a resource to develop exciting programs and projects to promote their institutions and to connect to their users. Archival-focused art programs, oral history projects, educational outreach, and commemorative events have benefited archives in many ways. Such efforts can make archival collections more visible, create collaborative opportunities with other institutions, and help archives build relevance. Moreover, these programs have proven valuable to users in supplying learning and research opportunities, encouraging social interaction with other users, and engaging the public in community and collection development. 

Archival repositories can create outreach programs that can engage more people, including hard-to-reach populations with the archives. This can also provide a way to interact directly with the community audience, hear their thoughts and ideas about the work archivists do, and communicate the organization’s message.

Archivists can become creative with activities, whether they are at large, well-funded institutions and smaller departments with more modest resources. For example, activities can rely on specific types of special collections and archives, such as art and oral history collections. In contrast, other types of archives can consider innovative types of programming, including educational initiatives, exhibitions, and interactive archives. 

Ever Present Challenges

Of course, there are constraints associated with outreach projects, such as ubiquitous budget and staffing cuts and changing priorities. Specific challenges can be related to particular efforts, such as the logistics associated with mounting a public program that includes a performance component or the need to reallocate existing financial resources to pay for server space in support of digital projects. Archivists can suffer from isolation, lack of funding, and conflicting loyalties. Daily, they feel the tension between taking care of their collections, preparing them to last, and making them accessible to users. 

These challenges unite all archives professionals. It is interesting to learn how others have coped with these challenges and maintained their projects when outreach activities are often viewed as an additional service rather than a core one. One way to jump over this hurdle is to institutionalize projects within the archives department’s routine work as soon as possible. When a line item in the budget changes from a project to an operational expense, it is most likely to remain that way. 

Being Evident within Communities

However, increasing archival visibility in the community is not just a worthwhile venture; it can be a desperate attempt at survival. The simple truth is that the members of communities in which the archives reside will not necessarily engage with the archives. Instead, archivists must be initiative-taking in reaching out to their larger internal and external communities regularly and in various ways. Effective community engagement leads to more patrons, monetary donations, and job security. 

Reaching Out to Communities

Engagement opportunities can be used to raise the visibility of the archives or special collections and increase the content of collections. For example, materials may also come in as the community learns more about what types of collections institutions have in the archives. Donors then become new stakeholders in the local institution and will encourage further donations through word of mouth. The result can be the vital communities built between archives and their constituents. 

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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Spotlight on Archival Labor

One of my passions within my profession is finding ways to demonstrate the value—both in the literal and figurative sense—of archival labor. This, understandably, has been a challenge because few people understand what archivists do. 

Our work is a black box, in which materials flow in and materials flow out, with our work being invisible. The truth is that some decision-makers within our organizations may mistake our work as just preserving old, dusty things and view our departments as places to spend money without adding value. 

Recognition for Our Work

I remember visiting the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas in Austin and seeing a placard on the wall with a few lines recognizing archivists’ work. The gesture touched me because I had not seen anything similar elsewhere. Users of archives and patrons of historical centers do not realize the significant amount of education, skills, and experience that archivists need to perform to provide intellectual and physical control of acquisitions. The materials, their creators, and high-profile directors overshadow archivists. 

Demonstrating Value

In my consulting practice, I have found that people are captivated by the work I do—once I explain what it is! Archival work has a perception of romance and mystery. In a field where so much is misunderstood, having the ability to showcase our work and demonstrate its value is needed.

Demonstrating archival value can be done in a variety of ways. Providing a backstage view of archival work opens our day-to-day activities. Consider blog posts, social media posts, or videos walking through various stages of processing. When archivists reach out to discuss their work, it provides an opportunity to discuss our decision-making processes. It displays our vulnerability as we step away from the façade of neutrality and talk about the very human choices we make, especially when staff and budgetary shortages constrain us. 

Touring the Archives

Another way to highlight archival labor is to give tours of the archives. For example, before the pandemic, my local archival professional development organization hosted Archives Week during National Archives Month where organizations provided open houses. 

During the 2019 Biennial Audio-Visual Archival Summer School (BAVASS), hosted by the Indiana University Libraries Moving Image Archive at Indiana University, Bloomington, I had the opportunity to tour the massive climate-controlled warehouses of books and archival materials, rode a cherry picker, and browsed through the aisles of manuscript boxes, costume archives, and the collections of the Kinsey Institute—quite an eye-opening experience! The visual of the enormity of their holdings is forever etched in my mind, and I understand this field. However, I cannot imagine the impact of such a tour on current and potential donors—emphasizing the undertaking they are funding. Whether the tour is in-person or remote, it provides a unique peek of the archives and the processes performed. Due to safety and security concerns, leading patrons through the depths of your stacks may not be possible. However, delivering even a limited view of your holdings can inform interested users, donors, and stakeholders. 

Informed by Digital Humanities

Although an essential part of preserving history, archivists are often not recognized for the work they do. For example, the presence of archivists frequently remains undocumented in finding aids and uncited in research. For example, if archivists are thanked in a book or article, it is usually the reference archivist acknowledged for the help they provided. Likewise, the many hands that organized and made accessible paper-based, digitized, and born-digital collections remained unacknowledged because their work is not visible beyond a line in a finding aid, if they are lucky. Following the established practice in the digital humanities to foreground all collaborators’ contributions, archival repositories should document all the people involved in shaping a collection that will inform later academic inquiry. We owe it to ourselves and our profession to shine a light on our labor. 

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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Reaching New Audiences by Adapting Archival Materials

The richness and creative potential of archival material is limitless. As the COVID-19 pandemic has transformed archival access, archivists can enhance online collections by adapting and repurposing content to release the untapped potential of records of enduring value.

This new online world requires more than just adopting a position of openness. The challenge is how to make users aware of organizations seeking to open collections for purposes beyond traditional research.

In supporting collections reuse, the archives acts as an enabler and a catalyst: a platform and resource providing the appropriate content and permissions to allow digital creative work to happen. For some projects, the role of the archives is one of collaborator. Audiences value collections and subject expertise, but they also appreciate the archivists’ input when developing ideas. As well as increasing online traffic and engagement, adaptation, reuse, and repurposing allows for understanding how to generate new audiences and inspire public dialogue.

Community

There are various ways to use collections to tell stories to connect with people. How can archivists reach new audiences, reconnect with the communities within their collections, and reimagine their holdings? The first is a focus on the community. Archivists may use their collections to:

Connect public and private memories by asking users to “talk back” to archival materials.

Build community with local groups by sharing materials that reflect their history.

Reveal archival labor by highlighting the work needed to bring collections online.

Present a show-and-tell of historical materials to share stories and discuss context.

Document notable events in their community by soliciting personal accounts and items.

Connection

The second is to concentrate on connection. Forging deeper relationships between items, collections, and institutions creates long-term partnerships. Some examples include:

Make websites more browsable by cross-referencing similar items and collections.

Host an online “crawl” with other institutions to share collections in a fun, informal way.

Solicit in-depth subject knowledge for records, their context, and uses via social media.

Request comments on items to capture richer descriptions and links between records.

Partner with similar institutions to highlight holdings and relationships.

Creativity

Creativity is another aspect to focus on within institutions and has the most potential to push the limits of access and present opportunities to capitalize on grant-making opportunities. Activities may include chances to:

Establish artist residencies to create visual, performance, and literary works.

Decentralize archival curation by inviting users to build online exhibits with the holdings.

Encourage users to reuse recontextualize images by hue, lightness, and saturation.

Employ crowdsourcing for tagging, rating, reviewing, transcribing, and text correcting.

Provide Creative Commons licenses on select items to make them accessible.

Communication

Lastly, communication techniques can adapt and repurpose archival data to tell stories in new ways. Consider these projects to:

Ask users to create illustrative timelines based on their interests and research.

Invite researchers to create geospatial projects with Google Earth, StoryMaps, or ArcGIS.

Employ text mining to find and interpret recurring words, phrases, subjects, and themes.

Reach out to STEM and social sciences groups to repurpose open data sets.

Partner with groups that use digital image analysis and visualization techniques.

What’s in It for Archivists

Archivists can adapt and repurpose content to release the untapped potential of records of enduring value. Using archival materials in new ways requires a spirit of experimentation. The rewards for the risk of trying something new can be enormous. Archivists who organize and provide access to collections and participate in newsworthy projects learn that these notable projects can bolster their career, especially if adaptation and repurposing projects present strategic, cultural, or technological challenges that will allow them to learn and advance professionally.

Archivists’ innovative interventions allow researchers novel ways of interpretation. By combining archival management with innovative digital collections, archivists can advocate for their collections, enriching their value in a period of uncertainty.

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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Engaging with Artists in the Archives

For some institutions, serving artists is a core component of their identity. For example, the Wallace Library at Juilliard serves musicians, the Harry Ransom Center serves writers, and the National Gallery of Art Library serves visual artists.

Archives can also find ways to engage with creative communities to explore their collections and find inspiration in their holdings.

Combining Creative and Archival Practice

Archivists can combine creative and archival practice for the potential for fulfilling a significant function of cultural heritage: its role as a catalyzer in processes of social transmission of memory and community building. Creative practices in the archives can connect the organization, curation, and communication of memory with present-bound creative, performative, and participatory processes. These practices do not necessarily stand in the use of archival records, nor are they driven by archival institutions and stakeholders. Instead, at the core of archival creativity is the celebration of the past through contemporary acts of creation and transmission. Archivists who seek out creative users marry the archival and the artistic by recording and tracing the past with contemporary creative practice.

The creative use of archives can encompass performances, participatory exhibitions, communal celebrations, and commemorations. In a sense, the creative use of archives has existed in forms as simple as storytelling to enrapture an audience and by using objects to evoke past events. However, trends in the democratization of arts and heritage and the advent of digital media have provided archives with new creative valences, making them potent means for the sharing of memory in previously impossible ways for the archives or the arts alone.

Advancing Awareness

Working to increase the visibility of and emphasis on the arts within the larger structure of archival repositories also advances awareness of records of enduring value. Ways to reach out to the creative community to promote increased use include:

Developing artist workshops

Hosting artist residencies for the archives

Creating materials highlighting arts resources or the history of local arts

Partnering with arts groups or other organizations that serve artists

Working with local art schools for research tips, tours, or open houses

Increasing digitization of materials, including audio-visual resources

Mounting exhibits based on the aesthetic features of items rather than their historical significance

Allowing artists to curate exhibitions based on the organization’s holdings

Improving outreach to nontraditional users

Expanding interdisciplinary efforts for outreach

Developing materials on how the arts and history have influenced each other

Hosting performances, readings, and events for artists

Offering research services to local art commissions

Investigating arts collecting initiatives, depending on collection and acquisition policies

Pursuing arts, research, or digitization grants

Proactive Outreach

Archivists must be proactive with their outreach to artists because archives, and their potential for creative use, are not well known. Unlike museums, archives may have fewer staff members, be open fewer hours, and not have a robust online presence; some are part of institutions that may not highlight the archives. Specially focused collections may not appeal to the broad audiences that the comprehensive collections of a public library have. Because items are kept in closed areas for preservation purposes, visitors may misjudge the quantity and nature of the resources. Some materials may not be easily described and overlooked by online researchers. These factors combine to hide primary sources from artists.

The Creative Process

Artists in repositories can find inspiration in the collections themselves, the diverse ways they can use the materials, and the staff expertise that supports the collection. Many archival repositories will not replace the role of large public and academic libraries or arts-related special collections and archives in the research lives of artists. However, archivists can rethink the conceptions of their collections and find ways to serve artists as a user group better.

Archives host a world of resources, inspiration, and expertise that can enhance the activities of artists. By reframing their collections to appeal to creators and adding archives to the traditional repertoire of sources for artists, archivists employed in all types of institutions can enhance their services to artistic patrons by helping them access resources for their creative process.

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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Access, Privacy, and Security Considerations for Archivists and Records Managers

In large organizations, archivists and records managers—individuals with specific expertise— handle access management, privacy protection, and systems security related to documents and files. 

Sometimes these areas are combined, but from a theoretical perspective, information management and security professionals are the ones who implement the requirements for access and privacy controls. 

Expectation of Privacy

The first and older issue for privacy is what expectation, if any, employees have for privacy of their documents, especially email, at work. There is no expectation of privacy in a work environment unless the employer expressly grants it. I often joke to clients, “Dance like nobody’s watching. Write emails as if they’ll be read in court,” because they certainly could be. 

The expectation of privacy is absent when employees use company computers and networks. Legal rulings are still evolving about ownership of what employees can do on a personal computer that they own. Both employers and employees need to be clear about rights to information on employee-owned computers. However, the issue will become murkier the more work and home life merge in a post-pandemic, 24/7 work environment. 

Personally Identifiable Information

The newer privacy issues swirl around personally identifiable information (PII). The United States lags behind several countries, especially the European Union, which have taken a much tougher stance on protecting the privacy of individuals. The US Patriot Act gives the Federal government considerable access to various types of personal information in the name of national defense. The act highlights the many places where personal information is stored, and the price people pay in the diminution of privacy for the many advantages of digital services.

The most significant issues from an archives and records management perspective are compromised data, deductive disclosure, and the question of whether making hard-to-locate public data available on the internet is an invasion of privacy. It may arise in various formats, but there are two classic ones. One example is putting the names and addresses of those convicted in court of driving while intoxicated or other crimes online. The records are public, but they have been hard to find without going to the court itself. 

Deductive Disclosure

For many years, the Office of Personnel Management, an agency of the United States Federal Government that manages US civilian service, had made available a complete listing of federal employees and their phone numbers. The list was requested under the Freedom of Information Act and was provided to the Washington Post in electronic form as requested. The Post put the information on its website to facilitate people contacting government officials, but it eventually pulled down the listing because of deductive disclosure issues. For example, criminals might identify the federal employees employed by the Drug Enforcement Agency or other law enforcement agencies who live in small towns. Deductive disclosure is when individuals can be identified even though their personal information is not provided. For example, in public use versions of the census, income is top coded (e.g., over $250,000), and ages or number of children are put in ranges to make the pool of people larger. These and similar masking techniques are used to protect the identity of individuals. 

Data Breaches

Data breaches have also been in the news in recent years, including charges that NARA allowed PII to escape its custody, once on a lost hard drive and once on a hard drive that was returned to the manufacturer because it was broken. Other examples abound of data from public and private organizations being lost or compromised due to hacking. Health and banking information are the two most sensitive areas. Others worry about employers using health data to determine the best people to fire based on projected health care expenses. Archivists and records managers should establish policies and procedures and monitor PII in their organizations to minimize the risks of compromised information. Part of those procedures should cover restrictions on the collection and retention of PII. 

Protecting Authenticity and Integrity

Archivists and records managers should work closely with security staff because both are interested in protecting the authenticity and integrity of the records and information assets of the organization. Controlling access and monitoring what access takes place is central to the work of computer security staff. Security overlaps with archives and records management in that both seek to control access to information to ensure its integrity while striving to provide legitimate access as broadly as possible. But the two are complementary in focus. Security is focused on the threats to the integrity of the information and defeating those threats. Archivists, records managers, and other information professionals concentrate on the records themselves and maintain their integrity over time. 

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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College and University Archives: An Evolving Role

Government archives were the most significant component of the profession until the 1970s when the number of academic archives increased. Since then, every survey of archives and archivists has indicated that colleges and universities have the largest contingent of archivists in the United States.

College and university archives are a diverse group for a variety of reasons. Academic institutions come in various shapes and sizes, from small private colleges to large state-funded systems. Some academic archives emphasize the institution’s records, while others function more like a manuscripts repository or even a local historical society. Reporting structures vary. Most academic archives are part of the library, but others are placed elsewhere, such as an administrative unit or the President’s office. An institution can have one archival unit, including institutional archives, faculty papers, other manuscript materials, and rare books and special collections. It can also have multiple libraries and archival repositories.

Records ManagementThe existence of records management programs that support efficient record keeping and transfer to the archives is uneven. Some universities have active records management programs where records are scheduled to transfer regularly. That records management authority may be part of the archives or reside in another administrative unit, requiring cooperation and coordination. In some publicly funded universities, records scheduling occurs with other state agencies, with schedules approved by them.

Research suggests that the institutional culture of colleges and universities has been changing slowly. College and university archives were traditionally established to document the history of the school. But over time, academic archives are evolving into a more informational role. The custodial frame of mind, emphasizing the institution’s history, predominates in many places, while other repositories have embraced the role of the archives as an essential information center for the larger academic institution. This shift will be increasingly important with electronic records and tight budgets where the relevance of the archives to the institution’s mission must be demonstrated. This issue is a microcosm of what is going on in archives in all kinds of institutional settings.

Connecting to the Mission

Consider the relevance of the archives to the institution’s larger mission. One would think this would be clear in an educational setting, or at least more evident perhaps than in a corporation where the bottom line is the most important. But, frankly, many colleges and universities act like corporations. The question for any college or university is how well the archives’ mission is linked to the larger institution.

For appraisal, the approach is to apply functional analysis to the academic setting. Functional analysis is quite a realistic approach since comprehensive records management is often lacking in colleges and universities. A small archival staff will not devote attention to assessing all offices and all recordkeeping systems.

Where should they start? In Varsity Letters: Documenting Modern Colleges and Universities (1998), Helen Willa Samuels notes that colleges and universities have three missions: teaching, research, and service. Within those missions, she identifies seven functions that define colleges and universities. 

These institutions confer credentials, convey knowledge, foster socialization, promote culture, provide public service, conduct research, and sustain the university. She points out the importance of seeking official and non-official materials within those functions because they complement each other.

A More Comprehensive Record

With functional analysis, the environment, players, and influences are described within each function, and relevant documentation is suggested. The idea is that the archivist can translate that documentation into the structure of the specific academic institution to identify where significant materials would exist.

Archivists should not just deal with the records they have but also identify gaps and respond to scarcity areas. If archivists understand the scope and mission of higher education institutions, they know what records to pursue and preserve to document all aspects of collegiate life.

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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The Ins and Outs of Business Archives

Calvin Coolidge once said, “The chief business of the American people is business.” This is true in many respects, but business has not traditionally received much archival attention. 

Archives are not profit-making enterprises, and haven’t always prospered in the for-profit sector. Institutional archives have more likely thrived—or, frankly, at least survived—in government settings, educational institutions, or within religious groups. In addition, business records tend to be misunderstood as huge collections, full of financial records, and hard to manage, especially if the businesses are ongoing. In many ways, business seems to be unscholarly, with a tendency to focus on the future and not the past.

The Influence of Business

Business influences everything in a capitalist society, not just the delivery of goods and services, but as a component of culture and values. Businesses should have archives to document the company’s history, become more efficient, and provide legal protection. Therefore, it is important to understand how businesses changed in the context of other changes in the world. For example, evolutions in transportation and communication, distribution and production, and the integration of mass production with mass distribution have changed both types and quantities of records.

Archivists need to understand business trends to understand potential research use beyond internal use by the business. This becomes important when an outside institution collects records, as there is a history of businesses maintaining their archives and then transferring them to repositories. 

The Evolution of Business

American business has evolved in three stages. The first is traditional when small, specialized firms or family partnerships conduct a single function, such as manufacturing. They have one or two owners. In the early days of the business, the tendency was towards oral communication, with written documentation limited to transactions, such as accounting, and some correspondence between partners and agents. Correspondence was less predictable and structured. 

The second stage is functionally departmentalized, emerging in the 1880s. Complex firms with sub-units integrated vertically to control all production and distribution phases or horizontally to control greater market shares. The business is separated into departments, such as purchasing, production, and sales. Changes in transportation, production, and communication enabled the expansion of markets, and structures became more complex. These businesses have a more routine flow of information, especially top-down, with memos and reports flowing up. Minutes are viewed as documentary records because they relate to issues rather than simply act as communication between individuals. 

The third is multidivisional, which is a decentralized operation common today. They have divisions among products, or sometimes geographically. Some records and communications are companywide; some are at the division level. Each division tends to be autonomous. 

Documenting History

There are three ways to document the history of a company: unsolicited donations, surveys, and records schedules. The first two seem accidental, while functional analysis is focused on discovering: 

What are the functions?

Which functions are more important?

How does the organization change over time?

Functional analysis may not work as well in a collecting repository. For example, when records are separated from the creating organization, the archivist rarely has a chance to conduct an internal analysis of an ongoing business; businesses are reluctant to open their records to outsiders. Additionally, duplication issues among corporations come into play in ways they would not exist in institutional archives. 

Communication Systems

The roles of records changed with each of these stages. Therefore, archivists need to reveal the structure of communication systems within each business. Communication acts as a dynamic system with three interrelated components: organizational structure, communication technology, and records. In addition, communications reflect and embody structure, so lines of authority are often lines of communication.

One of the key issues related to information is whether the corporation is collecting business records, leading to institutional archives—or whether the records are destined for a collecting repository, which will be managed as one of many collections.

Then there is the question of who does the collecting: the businesses or collecting repositories. Archivists in a collecting repository have the advantage of greater neutrality. However, user issues differ depending on primary and secondary audiences, which will affect what archivists collect and how they make it available. No matter who collects, records of enduring value provide a rich legacy of the business and how it has changed throughout its history. 

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

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Government Archives

The public records tradition realizes that government authorities are the creators and keepers of records, which takes place at all levels of government. There is also the assumption of public access and accountability—that records exist to be used by citizens. 

Thus, archival records are not simply preserved for theoretical reasons but saved to be accessed by anyone who wishes to view them. The tradition is incorporated in the Constitution, such as requiring Congress to keep a journal. 

One of the problematic aspects of tracking public records in the United States is that government archives have been slow to develop; thus, government records are frequently in nongovernmental repositories. For example, the National Archives was established in 1934, the New York City Municipal Archives in 1950, and the Philadelphia City Archives in 1952.

Many state archives have been in existence far longer, although this is not true in all states. County records are frequently in local historical societies where they are treated similarly to manuscripts and where there is a disconnect between the genealogical approach to managing the records and the county government agencies that produce records. In other words, government records are retained for evidence and public trust, but secondary research is often for other reasons. 

Another element of government records is that there are three branches to most levels of government. As a result, government archives tend to focus on the executive branch agencies, and less on the legislative and judicial sides. As a result, the official ownership of records of the different branches is often complicated.

The Role of Records Management

The breadth of government records is daunting, as is the quantity of materials with which archivists must cope. As a result, most archives lean heavily on records management to identify records of enduring value. Performing records surveys, creating records retention schedules, and overseeing regular transfers to the archives are common ways to identify government records of enduring value and orchestrate their transfer to the archives. Despite the separation of fields, records management and archives rely on each other throughout the records lifecycle. 

Retention schedules are usually established on the series level. This results in a bottom-up approach that can be unwieldy, especially with electronic records that often merge multiple traditional series. Strategies such as functional analysis were developed to inform better choices. 

Functional Analysis

Functional analysis prioritizes appraisal and processing based on the importance of an office’s functions within an organization. A model of functions includes three levels: governmental functions (which are broad, such as law and order), agency functions (which functions are broken down further, such as courts administration and corrections), and business functions (which agency functions are more granular, such as parole within corrections).

Functional analysis can occur in stages. A preliminary investigation gathers background information on the organizational role, purpose, and critical factors. Next, an analysis of business activities identifies functions, activities, and transactions. Archivists and records managers can identify recordkeeping requirements, analyze existing systems, and identify strategies. Finally, they can further design and implement a recordkeeping system and perform a post-implementation review.

If information professionals can do this, they can control how the records are created, ensure they link directly to function, and determine retention, handling, and control. However, it is uncommon for archivists to be involved at the systems creation stage in most organizations. The stages are also similar to the stages of records management, but they occur at a higher level and are organization-based, not records-based.

Democracy in Action

Government archives are examples of democracy in action. They allow citizens to have access to records that affect their daily lives. In tandem with records managers, archivists bring order to chaos when preserving government records of enduring value.

The blog was originally published on Lucidea's blog. 

Get Started

Looking for archival advising, records management, and historical research services? Click below to speak with an expert consultant.

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