There are consequences for tossing something you should have kept. There are consequences for keeping something you should have tossed. To further complicate matters, many industries (law, healthcare, insurance, etc.) set their own legal standards. Most tantalizing are the overlapping, contradictory and ever-changing foreign regulations faced by multinational organizations. Language barriers are only part of the obstacle.
Let’s define the challenges and learn about ways to protect your organization.
What constitutes a record?
Records may be formal or casual, and they can include the drafts and the final versions. Drafts may not have the same value or retention period as a final version, but drafts may capture the evolution of the document. For example, drafts may show changes in thinking or indicate when a certain decision leading up to the final version was made and who made it. After the report is issued and/or the tax return is filed, the next important question is just how long must these business records be retained.
What is a record retention schedule?
Part of the lifecycle of information management, the record retention schedule is an official timetable for the retention and disposition of records. The schedule should include (1) the retention period of records; (2) the record custodian; and (3) the method of disposition of a record if it is not to be permanently maintained.
International Record Retention Regulations
Prepare for confusion. There are no international record management treaties or guidelines. Multinational information policy must integrate the principles of international jurisdiction (universality, nationality, territorial, effect, and protective) into their record retention protocol.
Some Middle Eastern countries administer using both secular and Sharia frameworks, while others may rely more on either Sharia or secular frameworks. Saudi Arabia is based on Sharia law while the UAE, on the other hand, is based more on Western European principles.
Suppose you have a branch office in Africa. Try to ascertain the record retention schedule for employee records in the DRC. Thorough research won’t reveal answers because those answers don’t exist. In these cases, multinational organizations must craft policies without the direction of local laws.
Latin and South American countries differ in their treatment of electronic records. Hard copies are often favored as records while electronic copies treated as supplemental. Furthermore, information disposal, rather than retention, is more critical in many South American these countries.
Asian Pacific countries tend to parallel Western regulations. A key difference is the treatment of accounting records.
Eastern European countries have well-developed record retention laws that stem from the Soviet era. For some documents, expect retention schedules to span 75 years, 100 years, or indefinitely.
Data Privacy
Be careful about restrictions on the cross-border flow of personally identifiable or sensitive information (PII). Data privacy regulations are generally more stringent outside of the United States. France and Germany are two countries that rely on a “front-end” PII policy, while the United States relies on a “back-end” approach.
Whose problem is this, anyway?
Do you think this is only a problem for your legal or accounting teams? Think about this: your Boston-based technical writer composes an electrical testing specification, and then shares that information with your engineering team in Frankfurt, who then shares the document with your manufacturing team in Guangzhou, which countries rules apply?
Risk Mitigation
Don’t hold onto records you don’t need. Your day is sure to end unhappily when you get sued. Plaintiff bars have methods for mining emails that rival Glencore. If your adversary digs deep and wide enough – and they will – their attorneys are bound to find something bad. The disposal of records is equally important as the retention of records.
The problem here is when staff (sometimes inadvertently) horde records in an underground archive. Sometimes people believe they need to hold onto their notes. Perhaps they don’t know the protocol; they don’t understand the protocol, or they don’t care about the protocol. Leaders can do a better job of communicating record retention protocol as a vital part of a foundational strategy. Too often, many employees are left wondering why the protocol pertains to them.
Solutions
From the ovum of adversity is born entrepreneurial innovation. Organizations can choose to go it alone or they can protect their operations with the help of firms that specialize in record retention scheduling and maintenance. Multinational organizations can invest in subscription-based solutions that feature alerts of regulatory changes. For those organizations going it alone, my advice is to approach information lifecycle management monolithically; from the top down, rather than leaving each individual office to its own devices. Break down silos and communicate protocol in language that all departments and staff buy into.
Alphabet Linguistics can help you make sense of foreign regulations, and we can translate your record retention policy into the local languages of the countries in which you conduct business. Again, I recommend a coherent, top-down approach. Professionally translating your policy will ensure a consistent message. Please contact us to discuss your goals and learn more about improving performance and mitigating risk through language.
All materials have been prepared for general information purposes only. The information presented is not legal advice, is not to be acted on as such, may not be current and is subject to change without notice.
Author: Daniel Dugan
Daniel is the founder of Alphabet Linguistics, a Providence-based language translation agency. He writes about language and how people use it to live and work together. When he’s not working or reading, you can often spot him cruising around on his worn-out Peugeot.