Managing Personnel Records - International Records Management ...

TRENDS IN PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT
Increasingly governments across the world are under political and financial pressures
to downsize the range and scope of their activities through privatisation, market
testing, devolution and other means. In addition, they may be required by legislation
or pressed by trade unions to offer
? equal opportunities to female employees
? flexible working practices such as job sharing, flexible working hours and
maternity and paternity leave.
In recent years, there has been a widespread trend to devolve responsibilities for
personnel management from the central ministries to individual agencies, which may
have considerable flexibility in defining their own objectives, job descriptions, levels
of remuneration and other conditions of employment within parameters defined by the
centre. They may also choose to contract out certain jobs to the private sector.
In recent years, there has been a trend to downsize
government and devolve responsibilities for personnel
management from central ministries to individual agencies.
These changes require the introduction of a range of contracts of employment, such as
term contracts operated for specific periods. Rights, entitlements and terms and
conditions may be negotiated with individuals. Salary, performance goals and
benefits may be negotiable. Accurate record keeping is essential to track such nonstandard
agreements and to provide the evidence necessary to protect the rights of
both employer and employee. In some countries many of these records are filed with
personnel records.
These trends are particularly significant for countries with limited resources, such as
those carrying significant international debts; these countries may have been pressed
to reduce the size of the public service in return for financial assistance from the
international community. In some cases this reduction is achieved by a freeze on
recruitment, but more often it involves making staff redundant (also known as
‘retrenchment’ or ‘downsizing’).
This staff reduction process has often highlighted weaknesses in the statistical
information available about staff; as a result, many countries have developed
specialised databases or computerised personnel management systems to try to
manage their personnel information more effectively. However, experience has
shown that where the paper personnel records are disorganised or incomplete, the
success of computerised systems has been limited. In most cases the paper personal
files are the only source of reliable data for the new computerised systems; well-kept
paper personnel records are essential to the success of the systems. Accurate
personnel records are needed to calculate the terminal benefits of staff who have been
retrenched. Overall, the policy of cutting the size of the civil service has increased,
not reduced, the need for efficient records management.
MANAGING PERSONNEL RECORDS
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