Records Management Practices of Administrative Staffs/Office Frontlines in the Division of Lipa City

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

The creation and proper management of records are central to the success of any organization. As a publicly funded institution operating in a heavily regulated and highly competitive environment, the division is expected to be compliant and to be accountable to an increasing number of external agencies and bodies, and to the public community it serves. The proponents believe that it is essential to the successful conduct of a complex business to create and retain a complete and accurate record -intellectually, commercially, and administratively. The study aimed to assess the records management practices, investigate the problems and challenges, and identify the benefits derived from records management.

METHODS

Descriptive method was used to determine the records management practices, benefits and challenges among the twenty-four (24) administrative staff/office frontlines in the Division of Lipa City. The participants were randomly selected from the three functional divisions namely the office of the Schools Division Superintendent (OSDS), the School Governance and Operations Division (SGOD) and the Curriculum Implementation Division (CID). The main respondents were the administrative staffs/office frontlines in the said division. It further outlined the benefits and challenges of records management.

RESULTS

The findings revealed that SDO Lipa City was practicing both manually and electronically of storing office documents. The majority revealed that the kinds of records management system being practiced were decentralized, and the frequency of phases the division records pass were in a three-life cycle: monitoring, controlling and retrieving records.

DISCUSSIONS

Most respondents believed that the annual training program is a must to ensure quality service and address the problem in the records management practices to improve efficiency and effectiveness in operation. They also strongly agreed that space saving is a benefit they can get from records management. The majority of the respondents revealed that the challenges associated with records management were having a lack of professionally trained records staff/managers, inadequate resources to facilitate records management practices and insufficient space in the division office.