Records management at Flinders University - Flinders University Staff

Effective record keeping makes it easy to find information quickly and informs decision making and business processes. University staff are responsible for creating records as part of their employment, and ensuring that their records are maintained, stored, and disposed of appropriately as established in the Records Management Policy.

Records can be in any format, including paper and electronic files, emails, data in computer systems, maps, plans, books, registers, forms, photos and others.

Record keeping at Flinders

Administration and support

Policy and legislation

Service One request

University archives

Content manager

Record keeping at Flinders

Some records that are part of daily operations are created and captured automatically in certified business systems. Other records, such as emails, or those that are manually created or signed will need to be actively entered into a secure record management system so that the information is available to others for business purposes.

What is a record?

The formal definition of a record is “information created, received, and maintained as evidence and information by an organization or person, in pursuance of legal obligations or in the transaction of business”. 

A record should clearly demonstrate:

What happened, an order of events, and who was involved 
A decision or recommendation
Any advice or instruction provided
The results of any decisions or actions relating to the events

Examples of University records include:

correspondence
information about the management of University buildings, assets, and finances
legal agreements and contracts
research agreements and contracts
course development and delivery
employee and student records
administrative information including policies, procedures, meeting minutes, and reports

Where should records be kept?

Records should be stored in systems or locations that are secured against change, loss, or deletion of information but can be easily accessed by authorised staff who require the information for their work. 

Within the University, secure systems include certified business systems, such as:

The Student Management System
Workday
Service One
Content Manager (the official records management system)

Most business systems can store short-term digital records effectively.
Other records, including those found on shared drives, cloud locations, in email accounts, or other systems should be moved into Content Manager, the preferred storage system for both temporary and permanent records.

Content Manager should hold records that contain:

Personal information, which could be staff or student information
Sensitive information or data
“Restricted” or “Highly Confidential” information classifications

Content Manager has security measures that include:

Documents being assigned a business classification scheme based on content
Access and security settings that are based on the business classification
Are appointed a minimum time for which they should be kept

Further security is added by staff being granted permissions specific to their business role to work with records at varying security levels.

This ensures that the integrity of the records within Content Manager are maintained in a secure system, accessed only by authorised personnel, and kept for as long as needed prior to being disposed in accordance with legislative requirements.

What are my reponsibilities for keeping records?

All University employees are responsible for ensuring that records that they create or receive are managed appropriately, which will include:

Capturing all records, including email, which authentically document the University’s business activities
Titling documents and records in accordance with the naming guidelines to ensure they can be retrieved easily by all users
Declaring documents as records (finalising to prevent further editing)
Ensuring records are consistent, accurate, reliable, and complete
Applying security controls to records where appropriate

Staff will work differently with records depending on their role and business unit.

Research or legal staff, for example, may enter contracts into Content Manager files via a Service One form. Student Administration staff, on the other hand, may enter correspondence into Content Manager student files via email integration, or directly from a share drive.

If staff are unsure of record keeping responsibilities or processes within their team, please submit a Records query for advice.

Guides for working with records

So that records can be easily found and accessed by the staff who need them, standard procedures and best practice principles should be applied to records management. 

The following guides provide further detail about working with records on a regular basis:

 Naming conventions for digital documents
Records and Information Management guidelines (available soon)
Scanning specifications for hard copy to digital documents
Information Asset Metadata guideline (available soon)
Guide to email handling

Record keeping policy & legislation

The University has legal obligations to keep accurate records, as well as being answerable to a range of other external bodies.

Policies and legislation that affect University record keeping include:

Flinders University Records Management Policy
The Freedom of Information Act (1991)
The State Records Act (1997)
The Australian Code for Responsible Conduct of Research (2018)
South Australian Government Information Privacy Principles (2020)

Flinders University Records Management Policy

The Flinders University Records Management Policy establishes a framework for the control and management of records throughout Flinders University from their creation to their ultimate disposal or retention in the University archives. Records, also known as information assets, comprise information in any format, including hard copy and electronic files, emails, data in computer systems, bound volumes, maps, plans, books, registers, forms, photographs, microfilm, and microfiche. 

The policy is consistent with the provisions of the South Australian State Records Act 1997 and other legislation containing requirements for the management of official records and with the requirements for management of research data and primary materials set out in the Australian Code for the Responsible Conduct of Research. The State Government of South Australia’s Information Privacy Principles and Best Practice Provisions of AS4390 are also incorporated into the Policy.

Retention and disposal of records

The University is subject to General Disposal Schedules issued by State Records under the State Records Act 1997.

General Disposal Schedule 21 (2023)
For hard copy source information assets that are converted to digital formats as part of business processes.
General Disposal Schedule 24 (2023)
For records made and received by Universities in South Australia
General Disposal Schedule 30 (2023)
For administrative records common to State Government Agencies

Disposal Schedules use classification schemes to identify records which have permanent retention value and authorise the legal destruction of temporary records at the end of the minimum retention period listed for each record category.

Once the minimum retention period has been reached, records are reviewed, and:

Records that are needed for current business, classified as permanent, or have ongoing historical value will be moved to the University Archives.
Records that are not needed will be marked for destruction.

The review, archiving, and destruction processes are carried out after consulting relevant stakeholders and follow an internal approval process.

Records containing personal information

Personal information means information or an opinion about an identified individual, or an individual who is reasonably identifiable, whether the information or opinion is true or not, and whether the information or opinion is recorded in a material form or not. 

A general rule is that any business records that can possibly contain personal information are either kept permanently or destroyed after the retention period for those records has elapsed, according to their content and classification under the relevant disposal schedule. 

The documents below contain examples of records (including their functions and activities) that can contain personal information and outline how long those records should be kept for.

Administration and support

The Central Records team administer active and recent business records within the University in electronic and hard copy format.

Electronically created records should be entered into Content Manager by University staff as part of regular business practice.
Hard copy records must be digitally scanned into Content Manager by University staff before the physical copies can be transferred to Central Records for manual filing.

The Central Records team are the contact point for questions about:

The administration, maintenance, and security of user accounts and digital records in Content Manager.
The administration, storage, and security of physical files.
The design and dissemination of training programs to University staff to address the roles, responsibilities and practical elements of record-keeping.
The provision of advice on record-keeping policy and records management standard of best practice in accordance with the State Records Act (1997) and other legislation.