Developing RIG Training

As a Records and Information Governance (RIG) leader, it may be your responsibility to create policies, procedures and processes that meet legal and regulatory obligations and the business needs of your organization. However, creation is just the first step. The key to successful compliance comes with developing what I refer to as the three A’s of RIG: Awareness, Access and Accountability.

Development

Before an overall design for a training program is created, you must determine what concerns should be addressed, who needs training, and the most advantageous way to roll out your training program. Consider the following:

• What are my organization’s current goals for RIG compliance?

• What are my organization’s biggest RIG gaps and challenges?

• Who is my initial target audience?

• What is the current knowledge level of the target audience?

Once you have established firm goals, identified specific high-risk areas, target audience and training topics you can begin designing your program.

You don’t need to have every training session completed before beginning to share content, as long as everything you create, and implement, is part of a long-term training plan. I have given an illustration of this long-term plan. It divides RIG knowledge into the three A’s – Awareness, Access and Accountability, which is part of my overall strategy of “Intentional Impact”.

RIG Awareness

• Introduction to RIG

• RIG Policies

• RIG Procedures

RIG Access

• Record Retention Schedule

• Key Forms

RIG Accountability

• Disposition

• Legal Holds

• Security

Design/Course Content

You don’t have to use this exact terminology or all of these specific areas. Your organization may have additional areas that RIG is leading. What you must include in your training and development plan are: Foundations of your RIG program; how to use primary tools and forms; and documentation and reporting for training metrics.

Each of these individual areas may have several training courses. I would suggest creating a course description for each piece of training (very brief), Like those used in a university catalog. You don’t need to have completed training for all topics. Training will be added as the organization grows in RIG knowledge and has increased compliance. However, by creating a course-by-course description, you will maintain consistency in format, design and concept. This not only gives YOU a blueprint to follow, but it shows your organization that the RIG program has intentionally designed training for a holistic approach to compliance and risk reduction. Keep basic design and teaching techniques similar between courses. This allows you to better brand the RIG program for your organization.

Need more specific training topics based on this sample? Check out the other blogs I have posted.

Need more tips on branding? Check out this recently posted blog.