Records management: managing government information in the information age / Sulasteri Abd Hamid

Many Centuries ago records were created on the clay tablet, papyrus, parchment papers and today it was created on the electronic and digital media. Since then people have been trying hard to manage and preserve records as it contain valuable information. That is how records management begin.
It is the objective of this paper to look for a better way to manage and organise the new medium of records and information, that is the records in electronic form in government agencies. The study is also to find out about the effectiveness of electronic working system to human working culture, particularly the government employees. Whether they are ready and aware of the new information system used by their agencies in their daily work process. Their awareness of the Electronic Government (EG) program, which is to reinvent the public sector with the aim of using information technology as tools to improve quality and productivity.
This study was done through the observation, informal meeting, discussion, review of related documents and interview with the staff on information management program in selected government department or agencies.
From the observation, it is obvious that gevernment agencies need to have an integrated records management programme, to manage and organised the government information. The paper is giving recommendation on how to starts an integrated records management programme and system based on several best practices that was done in other countries. It is hope that this paper could throw some light in search for best Electronic Records Management (ERM) practice in years to come.