Spring Cleaning Your Electronic Records
by Elizabeth Hansen, Director, University Records Manager
Last week, we kicked off Records and Information Management month. April is a time for Spring Cleaning, and a good time to remind faculty and staff to “clean up” their records.
When I talk with employees about the University Records Retention Schedule and how it applies to their records, the most common responses I hear is “it’s ok, it’s in the cloud” or “we moved everything to the G drive/SharePoint, so we don’t have anything the Retention Schedule applies to anymore.”
These statements are misguided and against University Policy. The University Records Policy states: “The same safeguards and controls over information stored electronically apply as for information created and maintained in paper form. Departments will retain records according to retention schedules developed in conjunction with Records Management staff and approved by legal counsel.”
To put that legal jargon in plain language… electronic records must be kept according to the University Records Retention Schedule the same as hard copy records. This means that records in OneDrive, Outlook, SharePoint and G drive should be reviewed and purged when they have met their required retention, the same as you would paper records in your office or storage.
Tips for cleaning up your electronic records:
- Know the schedule. Familiarize yourself with the University Records Retention Schedule to understand what records you have and how long to keep them.
- Delete drafts once a final version of a report or project has been published or distributed.
- Label completed projects with a destruction date. For example: "Position X Search Documents – dd: 12.31.28" this makes files easy to find and flags when they can be deleted.
- Keep your email inbox clean. Delete vendor emails after reading them. Use folders with the same naming conventions as above to stay organized.
- Use OneDrive for personal drafts, SharePoint or G Drive for departmental records. This ensures continuity when you're out of the office.
- Attend an Email Deletion Party. This one-hour training walks you through strategies for clearing transitory emails with time to practice in real time. Request a session for your department or watch the recording.
Staying on top of your electronic records keeps the University in compliance with federal and state laws, reduces fines exposure, and limits the data at risk in the event of a breach. Less data means less to lose if your account is compromised.
University Records Management staff are available for one-on-one consultations and in-person or virtual training by request. Contact rm@syr.edu with questions or to schedule a session.