 Today's speaker is Kay Harrington, a certified records manager who has worked in the field of records management in the legal environment for 30 years at both the local and national level. At the national level, she oversaw seven branch law offices and developed a nationwide records program that encompassed paper and electronic files and brought the backlog of closed files for all of the offices into compliance with the firm's retention policy. Currently, she serves as president of the Arma-Mile High Denver Chapter. In tonight's presentation, records management in the legal environment, Kay will introduce you to the ever-expanding and important world of records management within the legal environment of a law firm. And Kay, please take it away. All righty. Well, first off, I would like to welcome Mara students and any other participants, teachers, et cetera. Records management is one of the great passions in my life. And it's surprising how many businesses and fields in which records management is used, where the individual doing the job may not even be aware that the data they're collecting is part of records management. For instance, my husband works for the Colorado Department of Transportation and asset management, collecting data on roadside, roadside signs, things like that, and that's records management. And so, but I'm certain if you looked around, you'd begin to see how every business and field uses records management. And today, I'm very excited to have this opportunity to share with you the world of records management within the legal environment. Now, in order to understand records management in the legal environment, we need to review its revolutionary process. In the past, records management in the legal environment was considered as something that had no valid purpose, and all this paper needed to somehow be dealt with without any consideration as to the future. One method was to keep everything after a case concluded. However, with the ever increasing amount of records being kept, it became apparent that the storage availability and cost of storing everything was not a valid method. Out of sight, out of mind. Well, but by doing this, how could you possibly know what records you had? Plus, as I mentioned in the last slide, the cost for storage of all of these ever increasing amount of records is only going to continue to grow and grow and grow. Now, conversely, another method was to throw everything away after a case concludes. Well, this method eliminated the need to store records and the cost associated with doing so. However, this method did not protect the client's rights to their records according to laws, rules, and regulations. In the past, the records that were being handled were paper records and often on obsolete electronic records. I've been along for the journey of the development of technology, office machines and creation of records, not from back when they used stone and carved it in stone, but from the use of manual typewriters, electric typewriters, electronic typewriters with memory, large computers with key punch cards, large floppy disks, ASCII disks, CDs, DVDs, flash drives, internal hard drive, network drives, and now cloud storage. When records for obsolete technology are retained, these records are discoverable in court cases. An attorney cannot tell the judge that they have, or that they and or their client no longer have the hardware or software to access records stored on a large floppy disk, for instance. The judge can tell the attorney that, well, you have the records on that storage device, you're now going to have to either find an existing piece of hardware and or software to access the data or build the hardware and or software from scratch. This is not a position that any attorney and their client would like to be presented with in a court case. If a record needs to be retained in its on obsolete hardware or software to prevent the obsolescence of hardware, software and media, I've got a little scratchy throat, so I'll have to drink water throughout. Records must be migrated over to new versions of hardware and software, or the old hardware and software must be retained. Finally, in the past, records were often very unorganized. With the start and forget it philosophy, records were randomly thrown into offsite storage boxes and sent into what was then the black hole of offsite storage. Maybe there might have been some tracking of the client matter name stored in that box, or maybe tracking of the tracking that only indicated when it went to storage, but eventually these unorganized boxes and offsite storage are going to have to be dealt with and that is going to be at a great expense to the law firm as records management moves from the past to the now on the evolutionary journey. This brings us to where records management is now within the legal environment. Now, how records management was handled in the past was discovered to be inefficient and costly. It was determined that the approach of keep everything, start and forget it and or throw everything away flew in the face of the very core of the practice of law. You may know this, retention policy is a set of guidelines that a company follows to determine how long it should keep its records, both physical and electronic. These guidelines are determined by legal and regulatory requirements. On the legal field, records management is governed by the federal rules of civil procedures. I'll expand on that rules to 26 through 37 if you want to look it up under title title five. And that deals with depositions and discovery and it guides the discovery process in the federal court and state courts have similar similar versions of the federal rules. And under discovery rules, if you have a record in your possession, it is discoverable. Sorry, I take a drink. Electronic discovery or e discovery is any process in which electronic data is sought, located, secured and searched with the intention of using it as evidence in a similar criminal case. The process of taking legal action is called litigation litigation, approximately 20 to 50% of the costs incurred for a case will go to the discovery costs. Litigation is very paper intensive. In my discovery, the cost, it's estimated in the U.S. alone that the cost each year for e discovery is around $44.64 billion. Again, if you have a record in your possession, it is discoverable. Now, spoliation of evidence is a term that's used during the process of discovery and spoliation of evidence occurs when a document that is required for discovery is destroyed or altered significantly. Think about business with a shredding machine, destroying records that doesn't do wouldn't paint them in a good light. So if a person negligently or intentionally withholds or destroys relative relevant information that's required in illegal action, then they are they are liable for spoliation of evidence. And an individual can be found liable for spoliation event. Evidence can be fined huge amounts of money and imprisoned for up to 20 years. So all parties have a duty to preserve information whenever it can be reasonably anticipated that an action will be filed. If you think if a lawyer thinks something is going to be filed, he can't suddenly get rid of the information before the case is filed. In a law firm, the law firm has a responsibility to protect their client by properly managing the client's records during the entire lifecycle of the client's records within their case file. And we now paper and electronic records manage must be managed in the same manner at the end of the life cycle stage of disposition. If the paper records are stored, I mean they're destroyed, then so must the electronic records. We now have to have a working relationship with ID, I T in order to accomplish the goal of managing both paper and electronic records, a records manager must have a good working relationship with I T. The two departments was must work in conjunction with each other and not as separate entities. My analogy is that you cannot have a bicycle bill for two in which the riders are positioned to go in opposite directions. And of course, the past flows directly into the now and the backlog of old files has to be dealt with to bring all records into compliance with the firm's retention policy. This is an arduous process. And as Patricia said in the beginning, I, in my previous employment, I was a records manager on a national law firm, and it took me 10 years to bring all of those offices into complete compliance with the retention process. And that was in regards to the physical records. At the time I left the firm, I had developed with the I T a procedure to handle the disposition of the electronic records. Unfortunately, because of my career change and move across the across the country from Minnesota to Colorado, I was not there to get to see that process fully implemented. Now, in my current position, I am dealing with the backlog of old files and following the guidelines set out in the firm's retention policy regarding the notification of clients of eligibility of their files for disposition. That entails a lot of research to locate current addresses and steps to follow in attempts to reach clients before destruction can take place. Now, the now and the future are both occupying the same step on the ladder of this evolution because the now and the future impact and influence each other. It is on this cusp between where we are now and what will happen moving forward in the future that has me so excited about records management in the legal environment. I have been through the past, I'm dealing with the now and seeing the results and efforts and the forward thinking by both those that are in the records management field and the attorneys that we support coming to fruition as we move toward the future. Which in the future, I have seen, I've experienced a great transition in partner support, appreciation and placement of value for proper records management in a law firm. When you show to the partners in upper management that the system you have in place works throughout the entire life cycle of a record, you garner the support you need for managing a successful program. No longer is records management in a law firm thought of as simply filing. When records management is handled in a professional service oriented manner that provides value to the attorneys in the law firm, the leadership of the records team become of great value to the executive players and they want and encourage involvement by records professionals. Technology and how records are created in storage is constantly improving improving, developing and expanding. With those rapid changes, there will be a constant involvement with records management personnel to keep up on the emerging trends and the value and impact to records management. Cyber security, we're all affected by it. In the illegal environment, records management is not only impacted by the cyber security needs of the law firm, but also the demands and requirements of their clients. At Baker Hostetler, where I currently work, our cyber security requirements are constantly evolving due to requirements placed upon the information security team by our clients. For instance, we cannot access our personal email accounts on our office computers. Non-firm flash drives are not allowed and will not work when inserted. Confidential information sent in emails must be sent encrypted. Client materials that are stored to a external device, such as a thumb drive, must be encrypted with the code sent separately when sending those electronic records to clients. We can't have email rules set up to automatically forward emails to an outside email account and all time capers and staff are required to take updated security training on an annual basis. I'm going to divert slightly from in illegal environment, but this is a really important cyber security story. This happened very recently, where a cyber security event took place at the Colorado Department of Transportation, where my husband works. And what I'm going to share with you is not proprietary information, as this event was reported in the local and national news. What happened was somewhere between the evening of February 20th and the morning of February 21, the Colorado Department of Transportation, I'll refer to it as CDOT, was attacked by Sam Sam Rampson there. The cyber attack was discovered on the morning of February 21, and the cyber attackers demanded payment and bitcoins to release the data. CDOT refused to pay the ransom, so when the fight cyber attack was discovered, CDOT immediately shut down its network, took control of at least 2,000 computers that were known to be affected, and employees had a resort to using pen and paper to do their work. Many agencies became involved in the efforts to resolve and remove the ransomware such as the FBI, Homeland Security, National Guard, Colorado Office of Information Technology, and outside ransomware specialists. Now in their efforts to remove the ransomware, the team would think that they had a resolution when the virus would recreate itself in another version, they were back to square one. It took three weeks of round-the-clock work to successfully start the process of bringing both the network and computers back online, and CDOT is still actively working on final resolution on this state, which is one month after the cyber attack occurred. So, paper law office, is it possible? Well, with the cyber threats being experienced in increasing regularity, I do not see an entirely paper office in the near future. All businesses, law firms included, will need to have a disaster recovery plan in place for many different scenarios, national disasters such as flood, hurricane, tornado, earthquake, fires, or cyber attacks, and the records will need to be accessible quickly to ensure that the immediate business needs can be met. An incident related directly to the cyber attack on the Colorado Department of Transportation will bring home the disaster recovery plan. Shortly before the cyber attack, all personnel were given their paper files containing their emergency contact information, and were told keep, destroy, do what you want with it because that information was now available electronically. But when CDOT had to be taken off the network following the cyber attack, they no longer had access to those employee records. Should an employee have had an emergency incident during their work day, there would have been no ability to access the employee's personnel information to notify their emergency contact. Records management, as I said, exists in all fields of business, but how is it unique in the legal environment in a law firm setting? Well, there are two very distinct sides to records management in a law firm. The first is the front office. The front office is in the area in which the lawyers and their team do their work representing their clients. Now, client records are handled differently based on different practice areas of law. A law firm may handle only one practice area, a combination of related practice areas, or a multitude of practice areas. I'm going to touch on a few practice areas and the retention requirements for those practice areas. My pointer, estate planning. In estate planning, original documents must be retained until they are no longer needed, which would be when the client is deceased and the probate process is completed. Client finance records, they're going to need to be held in accordance to rules and regulations for tax purposes, for example. Intellectual property, patents, trademarks, and copyrights should be retained for 10 years after expiration date. Real estate documents, real estate transaction records must be retained for 10 years. In criminal law, one thought is that as long as the client is alive, the records must be retained if they were not returned to the client at end of representation. And finally, I'll touch on personal injury cases. If the injured party is a minor, the records must be maintained until the child reaches the age and majority. In addition to the different practice areas within the legal environment, the clients that are represented within a particular practice area will come from many different industries. The records created in the management of a client's file will be influenced and regulated by compliance with the rules and regulations for that industry, industry standards, and in coordination with the client's retention policy. Now, individual clients are people, not corporations, and they'll come to a law firm for assistance with the state planning, divorce representation, DUI representation, criminal action representation, and personal injury representation are some examples. Now, a pharmaceutical client will come to the law firm for representation with retention needs for compliance with rules and regulations dictated by the Food and Drug Administration, the FDA. Now, utility companies will come to you with needs for compliance with rules and regulations dictated by public utilities commissions. Oil and gas companies will have records management requirements governed by the Department of the Interior on the federal level as well as state agency regulations and the mining industry is regulated by U.S. Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency. Corporate clients, a few examples of what corporate clients may come to a law firm with for a need for assistance would be with the formation of the corporation, representation as a defendant and a product's liability matters, and possibly personnel matters. Corporate clients would include manufacturers, construction companies, accounting firms, banks, other law firms are some examples. Health care clients can be hospitals, clinics and doctors who need representation in medical malpractice cases, assistance with personnel matters. And the law firm that represents the health care industry must understand the complex legal and regulatory issues for that industry. In addition, the type of law firm based on size and geographical locations will dictate how management of the records are handled within the law firm based on the laws and regulations for the location of the law firm. Now, a solo law firm is a law firm based in which only one attorney has set up shop as a private practice. A local law firm would consist of only one location such as an office in downtown Denver that has more than one attorney. A regional law firm would consist of more than one office location concentrated in a regional geographical location such as offices located throughout a city, throughout a state or closely adjoining states. National law firm would have offices throughout the United States and generally has one corporate office that handles management of the law firm, firm wide. And they would have to follow the rules and regulations such as employment laws, PTO, overtime, etc. for each state that they have an office location. And an international law firm will have offices that encompass location in more than one country. In this type of law firm, the rules and regulations for maintaining records will be subject to the rules and regulations for each country in which there is an office location. As I previously stated, there are two sides to records management in a law firm and the second side is the back office. That's the business side. In the back office, the management of records will be dictated by the rules and regulations for retention. For instance, in human resources, personnel records, and they must be retained for seven years after termination, which is when the employee leaves employment. Another area, accounting, those would be needed to be retained, the records for rules and regulations under federal and state guidelines. Plus, all of the back office records will be required to comply with the firm's retention policy concerning these back office records. Now, in records management, records management is dictated by the records and information life cycle. Something I'm sure you've all seen, but we'll just touch on it quickly. The records creation, use and distribution, storage and maintenance, retention and destruction, and archival presentation. Now, within a law firm, there are three basic stages that laws that files go through. The active stage, the green stage, the inactive stage, yellow stage, kind of using a stop sign, stop lights, and disposition, the stop stage. The first area in the stage is when the file is active. This is the stage on the records management lifestyle cycle of records creation and use and distribution. Now, in active file management, in a law firm, there are a number of different stages that a file goes to once the client comes to the firm. First would be, has to go through intake services. And this is a process of setting up the client file by conducting credit report checks to ensure the ability to pay the legal fees. A retainer fee is often required and that is received and processed, put into a trust, assignment of the client matter number, and then dissemination of that client matter number to the proper software programs, such as elite for accounting purposes, a document management program, and a records management program. Another process that must be done is a conflicts check. And this is a method used by law firms using either a database or a software program to ensure that a conflict of interest does not occur with an existing client and a potential new client. Then there's a client engagement letter prepared. One moment. And the client engagement letter defines the relationship between the client and the lawyer and law firm. And it's important on the records management side to include in this client engagement letter the terms of retention of the client's file upon completion of the case and or end of representation, including the terms of retention at the outset of the case ensures that the client understands and agrees to the law firm's retention policy as it relates to client files. Files created, clients on board, and now you have to manage the physical and electronic records. And the management of these records expands beyond the responsibility of the records department. All parties that create and use records for a case are responsible for the proper labeling and identification and storage of the records in the document management system and records management program. In the legal environment you'll have to deal with ethical walls. And these are kind of like they're invisible walls set up in which certain client files will be accessible to only the designated attorneys and support staff for that case. And also you'll deal with legal holds in which records cannot be put through disposition process while the legal hold is in place. When a file is in the active stage it's generally kept on site in either a centralized filing location system where the file is held in the records department and the handling of filing is done by the records department personnel or in a decentralized filing system where the file is held at a location outside of the records department such as in an attorney's office a paralegals office or at a secretarial workstation and there the upkeep of the file will be handled by the legal secretary legal assistant records department personnel or a combination of those people. Now the second area of the records management in a law firm is when the file is inactive and this is the stage on the records management life cycle of storage and maintenance. Now in inactive file management a case will conclude and that a case can conclude for a variety of reasons for instance the legal action is finalized by the court such as a settlement in a personal injury case or a divorce decree is awarded work is completed for contract preparation such as a prenuptial agreement an adoption is finalized and a state planning process ends following the death and probate process for the client. Another reason the case would conclude is that the attorney is withdraws as representing the client in illegal action. So in a case concludes the file begins the process of file closing and there are a number of steps that are involved in the file closing process that occur outside of the records department the final payment of fees do are collected from the client by the accounting department and the balance of funds held in the trust account from the retainer fees collected at the onset of the case are returned to the client client matter number is closed out by accounting and intake services. When a case concludes an end of representation letter may be sent to the client advising them that the representation of the client has ended and requesting that the client advise as to how they want their file to be handled. One option made available to the client in that letter would be to have the client request that the file be returned to them. A section second option in that end of representation letter would be for the client file to be retained by the law firm and it's really important that language be included in that end of representation letter that should the client wish that the law firm retain the file that once the end of the retention period is reached the file will be destroyed without further notification to the client. Now if a client file is to be retained through the retention period the client file is now prepared for and sent to offsite storage. This takes us to the third stage in which the file goes into which is the disposition stage. This is the stage on the records management life cycle of retention and destruction or archival preservation. In the disposition stage first and foremost disposition must be in compliance with retention policy. Following the policy involves adherence by both the attorney and the records department to ensure protection of the client and the firm. When a client has reached the end of the retention period unless language was provided to the client in the client engagement letter or end of representation letter that's to the contrary the client will be notified of the eligibility of their file for disposition by how I do it as a letter is sent to the client via certified mail return receipt requested and in that led disposition eligibility letter sent to the client a deadline is included in which the client has that period of time to contact the law firm should they want their file returned and the date that that deadline begins its countdown is will be the date of delivery of the notification of disposition eligibility letter to the client as indicated on their return receipt requested that is sent back to the law firm. Now depending upon which scenario occurs from that disposition eligibility level letter whether the client requests the file whether the response period expires say they had 30 days to respond or the letter you sent to the client was returned as undeliverable and you cannot locate a current address for the client then the file won't go through the appropriate disposition process of returning file or destroying. Now in a law firm as in any business there may be internal records that are that need to be kept and these are vital records historical records or of a particular business need that has importance that must be retained and those would be held in archival status. Now a good rule of thumb for practice it for any law firm especially when representing corporate clients and having a lot of their client records for a litigation case is to return all client files at the conclusion of the legal action for that case. Doing so ensures that you're not going to be retaining those files for a period that extends beyond the requirements of your client's retention policy. Now an exception to this practice would be if the law firm has been appointed as the document repository for a client and with the document repository all discovery requests for records held by a corporation will be handled by the law firm instead of directly by the client. What is the most difficult part of records management in the legal environment? Compliance with the rec tension policy. You have to overcome the mindset of you can't get rid of these files I might need them in the future. This is a very difficult mindset to overcome but it must be done because the client files belong to the client and not to the attorney and or the law firm. And there will be a struggle with what the attorney wants and disposition and compliance with the retention policy. Now can this struggle be resolved and the goal accomplished? It can. With, it can be accomplished with the use of these tools. A retention policy has to be created so that it'll be required to be followed. If guidelines and requirements are set that do not allow for deviation and retaining records beyond the period allowed it will be effective. This eliminates the I might need it in the future possibility from the equation. Including retention policy letter and the client engagement letter provides a client with the information that they need at the onset of engaging the attorney in the law firm in representing of what the firm's retention policy will be in regards to the client's files. The client will know what to expect and that expectation must be followed. Getting support from partnership and the executive team is crucial in being successful in compliance with retention policy. When upper management supports and follows the retention policy they expect that it will be supported and followed by all. Providing the records manager with the authority to follow the retention policy processes and procedures is crucial in making compliance a success. With this authority the records management will be allowed to complete the tasks as required. It's surprising when a records manager is provided with this authority they proceed accordingly with following the retention policy requirements and disposition and then are asked in the future by an attorney where some old files are located. The records manager informs that attorney that the records have been destroyed in accordance with the retention policy and the attorney has to accept the following of the policy even though they thought that they might just need those records in the future. As I stated before IT and records need to work as a team for the same end goal. There should never be a division in these paper records belong to one side and electronic records to the other side. Working together for the common goal is critical in ensuring that both paper and electronic records retention and disposition are handled in accordance with the retention policy. Now I want to share with you on compliance and how I've got compliance in a previous law firm is the box 13 story. And this example is as I said is the importance of adhering to the policy and garnering top down support. This is a box 13 story and the presentation of the story was required attendance firm wide because of its importance. Now what took place was that a client of the firm was ordered through discovery to produce documents. In response to that discovery request the client responded that they no longer had those records in their possession because the records have been destroyed in accordance with their retention policy. Well they were required to ensure that there were no records held by a third party. So law firm where I worked that had handled them previously in representing a case was asked to ensure that the records had in fact been destroyed. Well according to law firm's records the records for that file had been destroyed in accordance with the retention policy. But to ensure that this process was completed a search was conducted of the storage area in which the file records boxes had been held prior to destruction. Unfortunately this result the search resulted into the discovery of box 13 and it was actually box 13 was its number aside. It was tucked away in a corner because it had somehow become separated from the remainder of the file when it when it was destroyed. Now the records in that box were discoverable and had to be be produced by the client in that particular lawsuit. Having box 13 and the contents available required for discovery production put the client and the law firm at risk. Okay. Now that was my introduction to records management within the legal environment and I hope it inspires you to explore the opportunities available to you working at a law firm after you obtain your MARA degree. This I have a list here of various departments within a law firm in which you might consider when looking searching for employment. Of course obvious is the records department. But within the records of departments you may it may be connected or may be separate but are indexing of pleadings and docking calendaring of due dates with the court. Intake services and conflicts checks. Conflicts checks can be a department in itself in a very large law firm or it can be part of the records department and library and research are other areas in which your degree could bring you to working in a law firm. Also IT to close out what is the most valuable advice that I can provide you in your upcoming career path. Promote yourself. I encourage each and every one of you to be your own best supporter. Don't be afraid to sell yourself. When you find employment look for employment for opportunities for advancement and promote those to your employer. Promote why there is need for such a program. Supporting materials and most importantly why you were the individual to take on that program and position. And now we'll open it up for questions and answers. If you have any questions you may see a raise your hand icon that you can use if not just unmute your mic and ask a question. Okay I have one. You use paper it seems quite extensively because of the client matters perhaps but I was wondering if you used any barcoding or FID coding for paper files. Oh yes I should have touched on that. All of our files the file folders are barcoded and assigned to a client matter number. Each client has a number assigned and then they have a subsequent matter number for each and they're all barcoded everything's barcoded. So we scan things in out so we know where they are. So you have like a check-in check-out? Yes so that's all for my work it's all done through the records department. The they check everything in and out pick up delivery. Very interesting presentation I really enjoyed it I see Lisa you have any your hand raised. Yeah thanks so much Pat and Kaye what a wonderful presentation. Thank you so much and great advice to promote yourself. Oh yeah I really love your box 13 story and I really your cyber security story about ransomware is so present and current and thank you for sharing for sharing that story and when you talked about your the relationship between records management and IT and you actually at one point talked about the bikes I was like I could visualize that so thank you very very much for that but my question is and if you don't have the answer that's okay but do you often get the question and I'm interesting it's interesting that I want to speak to a legal you know person in the legal profession about this do you often get the question about can I scan my records and my paper records and destroy the physical destroy them after and rely on the scan copies of my fish as is my official corporate record and I believe you touched upon the federal rules of civil perpedure and I think they're my yes and and those you are an electronic record is admissible in court you don't have to produce the actual physical anymore and so do you have a lot of clients wanting to do that like scan and do digitization and rely and I know a lot of records are born digital this this this day and age so it's not even a it's it's not even an issue but just that that movement from paper to electronic in that digitization you have a lot of clients wanting to do that and does your firm do that in the legal in the legal world just if you could say a little bit about that it's a very very slow process in the legal field paper still rules and especially after you know with all of these cyber attacks and stuff these these records have to be available for production and with original signatures and stuff so some of these things I don't I don't see it going quite as quickly maybe in a legal field then it would be in some other corporations because we represent so many different clients and I'm not seeing that hearing that there's a lot requesting that we where I work they want all of their records electronic okay great advice thank you you're welcome I see two other questions so I'll just go in order as I see them on my screen Stephanie do you have a question yes hi Pat thank you for your presentation I wanted to have I have a couple questions first one in case of the the cyber attack and you said the must have backup records in place you necessarily wouldn't a lot of cases would have paper and and digital some have digital only but a lot have paper obviously because of what you just said regarding signatures and original paperwork so in that case would you like I know that electronic records as well as paper records can be destroyed you called it soil is soilization I believe oh spoliation spoliation thank you yeah so I was wondering if there was maybe a separate place like warehouse or yeah that's kind of this the golden rule under a disaster recovery plan is you those critical documents that you have to have for the continuation of business they need to be kept in two different locations that won't be affected by the same disaster okay okay great thank you and my other question was regarding document preservation programs because of all the new technology and firms will be changing technology programs on a I you know I think on a pretty rapid basis how would you suggest to prepare myself and other students and well I'm preparing to get ready you know to interview for the this type of work as far as learning the programs being familiar with different programs the programs that are being used now and possibly in the future you know one organization is called I know the acronym is A I I M and that deals I think it's American well they have a certification with them and that deals with all of the different electronic records and a lot of people get that certification so there's staying more up on the emerging technology okay and also you know when you're studying for your CRM if you do that I don't know how familiar everybody is with the CRM program to get your certification for that that's like the gold standard in records management it's a it's a long process and it has a very long part on technology okay and I read 28 books just to pass that one part of the exam well so and and again when you're looking for employment sell yourself right don't be afraid to say I may not know that right now but I will learn it right okay okay thank you thank you I'll uh I'll look into that okay A I I M A I I M and I I'll give you my contact information at the end and if you need further information as to some of these organizations and groups that I would suggest you look at I'll send that to you excellent thank you okay the organization is in and yeah they do have a number of classes that are really good and I speak to a number of records managers that look to their classes to make sure they're up to date on the technology that's good recommendation Kay I don't know that you know but our students now when they graduate from our Mara program actually have credit for passing parts one through five of the ICRM exam oh that's awesome isn't that awesome that just started last year so they can immediately become a certified records analyst or they can apply for part six and take the case study so yeah part part five was brutal for me I I think that went five times and when I finally passed that they allowed me to sit for part six the next week and I passed six on one try so case studies you're so good at that because the practical experience you have right right which is what you're talking about I see Tammy has her hand raised so I think we'll take one more question here Tammy would you like to ask your question sure thank you Dr. Franks um hey my question is around um retention schedules that are based on regulations and um local laws what are your recommendations in terms of keeping the retention schedules current as those um laws and regulations change over time well you know the retention policies have to be reviewed on a continual basis and if you're aware that a rule has changed and affects those and you would if you're working at a corporation that like pharmaceutical you're going to be very aware of what those records are I mean those those regulations are so you can constantly be updating your retention policy in the legal environment we represent so many other clients and that's why I can't stress enough to return the client file to them at the end of representation because then we're not holding on to files that um should have been destroyed based on what the clients requirements were we kind of know that while we're we're working on it but if you're keeping records of theirs for 10 years after because that's what our retention policy and maybe theirs is seven they get rid of it and we still have it yeah from so in in um in in my primary role today I'm working in the banking industry and I work for a global bank so um as you can imagine we have multiple types of records as well as you know they're in different countries with different regulations and even just within the United States it's a challenge because you know we're subject to we're subject to everything it seems like but there's no neat little box to put it in it's uh you've got yeah yeah so I was just curious if you had um you know any recommendations because it does seem that you know I mean it's it's a continuous and ongoing effort to keep those schedules current and tight to you know as changes happen and that's part of the records management field unfortunately you have to be constantly on top of that because it's evolving all the time and it's not a it's not a stagnant field we're coming to the end of our presentation so what I do is like to thank you Kay very much this was excellent it was so informative I appreciate your sharing all of your knowledge with us tonight well thank you it was an absolute pleasure sorry my voice was so scratchy but I was practicing beforehand and I kind of strain my throat and you have your email address I see there so may you just contact you with questions yep and that's my work phone number I'm more than happy to talk to people love to do it oh thank you very much okay thank you Kay okay thank you everybody for your time