RMAA praised for its "vital role" in raising RM standards

By Stuart Finlayson

Sep 14, 2005: As the 22nd Annual RMAA (Records Management Association of Australasia) International Convention drew to a close, the event organisers came in for some praise for their efforts in helping elevate the level of understanding of records management issues across the profession.

One Perth-based delegate, who did not wish to be named, said the eventhighlighted the importance of possessing the neccessary skills in order tofulfil a records management role, citing her own place of work as anexample of how not to go about things.

"I had a situation in my department where the company was only sendingpeople that they could not find a place for anywhere else in theorganisation to come and work for us, as records management was regardedas a low level posting. In the end, I put a stop to it by refusing toaccept those who did not have any qualifications relevant to what we do,as well as those who I felt would not be up to the job.

"The RMAA event provides people with an excellent opportunity to becomebetter versed in the skills needed for such a role, and also does much topromote the fact that records management is a profession that requires afair degree of skill to do properly, rather than the menial, low-levelactivity it is sometimes portrayed as."

Meanwhile, the third and final day of the convention got underway with apresentation by Andrew Waugh of the Public Records Office Victoria (PROV)on the issues around digital preservation.

Next up was the chairman of Standards Australia's records managementcommittee, Stephen Bedford, who to his immense credit managed to make hisdiscussion on the functional classification of records lively andentertaining.

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