Newsletter: Overwrought From ROT?

Just wrapped up a Google Drive migration?

Did you just migrate your records from a UW Google drive under a shared NetID? Maybe you used our very helpful webpage in the process. Need more help with those records?

• Maybe you have a lot of older records you aren’t sure what to do with?
• Maybe you feel like it all could be better organized in a new location?
• Maybe you aren’t quite sure about the finer points of using SharePoint?

We are here to help! Contact rotsquad@uw.edu for help with clearing out mystery items or improving your filing system.  Contact Sean Whitney, seanw13@uw.edu, for a consult on managing records in SharePoint

Retention Update

OLD: Request for Outside Work Approval – Professional and Classified Staff was previously its own unique record series listed on our General Records Retention Schedule, with a retention of 3 years after end of academic year in which services are completed. Our office has removed this stand-alone record series from the website.

NEW: Any department creating and processing Outside Work Request for Approval forms for Professional and Classified Staff should keep the completed form as part of the employee’s Personnel Record for 3 years after termination of employment with the department. Please note, Request for Outside Work Approval for Faculty (Form 1460) are not impacted by this change. For any questions, contact our office at recmgt@uw.edu.

Records Management with Workday Finance

With Workday Finance having gone live on July 6, our office has received some questions regarding records management in the Workday Finance environment. In the hopes of clearing up some lingering confusion, we are re-sharing the recording of a presentation the Finance Transformation Change Management team kindly asked us to give last April. This recording outlines how to manage your office's records in the Workday Finance environment. Check out the first 30 minutes of the recording here: What's Changing - Records Management.

If you’d only like to review the two informational slides, you can find a copy here: Cross-Functional Records Management PowerPoint Slides.

The key points to remember are:

• Records management policies and retention periods have not changed and all policies the UW currently implements remain the same. Records retention requirements can be found on our General Records Retention Schedule.
• You do not need to keep a local copy of a document (e.g. packing slips, receipts, invoices) you've uploaded (or attached) to Workday Finance. We strongly recommend disposing of the local copy after uploading (or attaching) it to Workday Finance. Keeping the local copy means your office has to produce it in the event of public disclosure proceedings, litigation (including reasonably anticipated litigation), investigation and audits. And It gives you one more place to search for records that can be found in Workday for the full retention period.
• At this time, please avoid uploading any attachments that contain sensitive information (such as SSN), Protected Health Information (PHI) or Personally Identifiable Information (PII).

Please don't hesitate to reach out to us with any questions by contacting recmgt@uw.edu. We recommend taking a look at this FAQ section as well in case you have a question we may have already answered on our website. Lastly, if you have any colleagues in your office who have voiced confusion about this, feel free to forward this information to them.

Trivia question of the month

The five people in our office all agree that the one topic we get the most questions about is e-mails. E-mail can quickly shapeshift from useful communication tool to unwieldy monster project if not managed.  It may seem easier to let e-mails accumulate but doing so carries inherent risk. E-mails are records and subject to Washington State law, RCW 40.14, which applies to the preservation and destruction of records. And emails are subject to the Washington State Public Act. Now that we've reminded you of the importance of email management, let's see how much you know about how to do it.

There are many sides, nooks and crannies to managing your emails but what is a good example of a transitory email that you can delete?

1. Documentation of departmental/office actions, decisions, operations and responsibilities
2. Policy and procedure directives
3. Routine replies/requests for information
4. Legal, discipline, or audit issue

Want to challenge your co-workers? Feel free to forward this email to them and see if they know the answer. Scroll down to see the answer below…

Website changes ahead

In the coming months, we will implement some long-planned changes to our website. The updated look of our website reflects a user experience analysis project we conducted last year with the gracious assistance of several of our website users, from novices to experienced RMS website explorers.

Is there anything you’d like to see changed about our website? Please email your thoughts to recmgt@uw.edu. We welcome feedback at any time, but it’s particularly valuable now as we wrap up our planning stage.

DocuSign Purge Notification

Records Management Services is working with UW-IT to purge signed documents out of our DocuSign account. You might have signed a disposition notice, retention schedule, scanning policy or other form sent to you by our office over the last couple of years. These records have been downloaded and saved appropriately to a location in our office. Beginning August 18th, you may receive an automated email from DocuSign about this purge. There is no need to take action.  Please just delete the email as soon as you receive it. If you have questions contact Laetitia Rhodes Kaiser at larhod@uw.edu.

FETCH THE FUTURE...GO DIGITAL
Click here to watch the video on this new University-wide initiative.