Managing Personnel Records - International Records Management ...

PERSONNEL POLICY
All organisations will also develop personnel policies. For example, organisations
will establish guidelines for hiring or dismissal, for standards of work and so on.
Many of these policies may be interlinked with other organisational policies and
guidelines. These guidelines will usually be codified and consolidated in the form of
a personnel manual or in some cases, standing orders or regulations for use by
personnel officers and to inform staff members of their rights and obligations. They
are issued by an office in the public service with authority to set general personnel
regulations, for example the Public Service Commission, Office of the Head of Civil
Service or Public Service Ministry.
Records Issues
Personnel policy covers a wide range of issues, for example what kinds of behaviour
should be officially encouraged and which discouraged, pay negotiations with trade
unions, revisions to the job and pay grading structures, policies on recruitment and so
on.
Policy records normally consist on position papers and reports on what policies
should be or have been adopted. Unlike the records concerning individual staff
members, these records relate to overall management and so would not be filed in
individual personnel files. Rather, a personnel policy records are normally kept as a
separate series within the agency responsible for personnel management.
RECRUITMENT
The purpose of recruitment is to acquire the best candidate(s) for the job(s). In some
government systems, recruitment for the civil service is handled by a service
commission, which maintains files of recruitment records. This process does not
always apply to recruitment at lower grades, such as for drivers and cleaners, who
tend to be recruited directly by the department or ministry.
Records Issues
The recruitment process generates a number of types of record. Most of these are not
needed after the post is filled. The exceptions may be the application form and
educational certificates, which are required for long periods. Not only could
deliberate untruth by the applicant be grounds for dismissal, even years after
appointment, but the application form provides important source of original source
data about the employee.
MANAGING PERSONNEL RECORDS
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