Electronic Information Management System

The Vendor is required to provide to submit proposals to provide recommendations and implementation of software and services for an Electronic Information Management System (EIMS) built on SharePoint and OneDrive that will meet the Town's data and records management program requirements.
- This includes supporting all aspects of managing a record through its lifecycle, from creation/receipt to archiving or destruction, ensuring that the Town can administer its services and comply with its legislative obligations effectively and comply with law Electronic records as documentary evidence.
- This also includes providing recommendations and implementation of data governance tools such as Microsoft Purview or similar for Data and Record Classification and management within its lifecycle.
- The project is an initiative to develop, test, and implement a system consisting of software, cloud, hardware, policies, and processes to automate the preparation, organization, tracking, distribution (including sharing), storage, access, and final disposition of electronic documents and records from all sources and in all media.
- Our Retention Schedule is included in our Data and Records Management Policy and supporting documents.
- Electronic records will be captured using the structure and retention periods of the Town’s Data and Records Classification and Data Classification and Handling procedure on SharePoint once an EIMS is acquired. Currently, most electronic records are stored in shared drives on the Town’s network and in some cloud-based stores.
- The solution will provide recommendations, implementation, and training for data governance software, SharePoint, and One Drive to ensure that compliance with our Records Strategy and other aspects of the Data and Records Management Program, is uniform across all departments.
- Physical records (typically paper) are decentralized and are stored in offices or off site at Iron Mountain. In some departments, these have already been captured into the Town’s classification and retention scheme and filed accordingly.
- Electronic records are stored primarily in Town network drives, with a small amount stored in a SharePoint Online (M365) installation. These records are not managed within an existing EIMS.
- Each division organizes these records within its own folder structures, which have developed organically over time rather than following any established procedures.
- This creates an environment where applying formal records management procedures can be challenging since there is very little consistency in how electronic records are created, stored, and accessed across departments. Furthermore, working papers, reference material and transitory records can often share the same folder space as official records.
- This, along with no established formal file naming conventions, increases the ambiguity of what files should fall within the scope of the records management program.
- Centralize Records Management Operations to SharePoint and OneDrive
• The acquisition of consulting services to configure the information management capabilities in four M365 repositories (SharePoint Online, Teams, OneDrive, Exchange Online) as well as migrate our existing files from our network drives after they have been classified. Our EIMS will provide a way to centralize electronic records and apply records procedures and data classifications consistently across all departments.
• Effectively identify official records from other transitory and non-record material.
• Standardize Records Capture/Storage/Access/Disposition.
• Implement specific and consistent application of the Town’s Data and Records Management policies and procedures within SharePoint throughout all departments.
- Implement processes for creating, migrating, sharing (internally and externally), collaborating, and managing electronic records and information, within SharePoint and OneDrive including, but not limited to file naming convention, record and data classification and version control
• Manage all aspects of the data and records management program using the EIMS built on SharePoint and OneDrive.
• Support the automation of business processes such as workflows and approvals.
• Ability to view records within the EIMS independently of other software onsite and in the field.
• Allow for integration with other business systems and applications to ensure records are being captured into the EIMS.
• Consistently capture metadata to support robust search capabilities of EIMS for use by AI and CoPilot.
• Include email and voicemail.
- Automate Compliance with the Town’s Records Classification Scheme and Retention Schedule
• Map content types (minutes, reports, agendas, etc.) to their respective headings within the classification scheme.
• Automatically apply retention terms to classification categories.
• Support proper management of information and security of information assets by applying the Town’s Data and Records Management Policy and Procedures and Standards, including the Retention Schedule.
- Records Classification
• Assign a class code to all documents and records as they are created, added, or uploaded to the EIMS. Users are guided in the classification of records based on information such as the subject, user department/role, location, type of content, etc.
• Users can search or browse information in the Classification Scheme to help them to identify the appropriate classification code for content as it is being added to the EIMS.
• When assigning a classification code, users are presented with information about the retention period and final disposition to verify correct classification codes retention periods.