Know what you have
understand important information, systems and repositories.
WesternIM
Practical guidance for municipalities
Bring records & information management, privacy and information security together—around the information your municipality depends on.
No contact information needed to see your initial results.
It is in email, shared drives, Microsoft 365, business applications, paper records and the knowledge employees carry with them. That information supports Council decisions, municipal services, financial management, regulatory requirements and day-to-day operations.
But managing information has become more complicated.
Records and information management, privacy and information security are often handled separately—even though they frequently involve the same information and the same risks.
Modern Information Management (MIM) brings these responsibilities together.
It provides a practical way to understand what information you have, where it is, why you need it, who should have access to it, how it should be protected, how long it should be kept, and what happens when something goes wrong.
The objective is not more administration. It is to make information easier to find, safer to use, simpler to manage and more useful to the municipality.
understand important information, systems and repositories.
reduce searching and dependence on individual employees.
apply appropriate retention and disposition.
identify personal, confidential, sensitive and critical information.
ensure people have appropriate access as roles and responsibilities change.
create a stronger information foundation for Microsoft 365, cloud services, automation and AI.
Start with the issue.
Not the discipline.
You don’t need a major technology project or a large internal team to get started. Begin with what is working, what is uncertain and what deserves attention first.
A familiar place to start
Choose a situation for practical context and a manageable first step. There is no single right place to begin.
Three perspectives. Equal importance.
These responsibilities often involve the same information, systems, people and risks. Modern Information Management brings them together.
Keep the right information and make it easy to find when it is needed.
Explore this topicKnow what personal information you have and use it appropriately.
Explore this topicProtect information from inappropriate access, loss and disruption.
Explore this topicWhy bring them together?
An old shared drive can be difficult to search, hold unnecessary personal information and have outdated permissions. These are different aspects of the same environment.
Identify official records, improve findability and apply approved retention requirements.
Understand what personal information exists and whether it still needs to be retained.
Review who has access and whether that access still reflects a current need.
Your Municipal Information Check
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Finding information, retention, personal information, access and incident readiness.
Records & information, privacy, information security and working together.
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Records & Information Management
Every municipal activity creates information.
Council decisions, agreements, permits, financial transactions, correspondence, infrastructure records, employee information, policies, email and countless other records document what the municipality has done and why.
Over time, that information can become scattered across shared drives, Microsoft 365, email, business applications, individual folders, cloud services and paper files.
The challenge is not simply storing records. It is making sure the municipality can find the right information, trust it, protect it, keep it for as long as required, and appropriately dispose of it when it is no longer needed.
Modern Information Management applies practical records and information management principles to the way employees actually work.
Employees may know that a document exists but not where it was saved. Experienced staff often become the organization's unofficial search system because they remember where information is kept.
Time spent searching is time unavailable for municipal services. Dependence on individual employees also creates problems when someone is absent, changes positions or retires.
Ask employees where they look first for common information and what they regularly have difficulty finding. This can quickly identify repositories, folders or business processes that deserve attention.
Shared drives tend to grow rather than shrink. Microsoft 365 can add Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive to the information environment without necessarily replacing existing repositories.
Information can become spread across multiple locations, with different departments developing their own structures and practices.
More storage does not necessarily mean better information management. Multiple repositories can create duplication, inconsistent access, uncertainty over the official record and increasing search effort.
Identify the municipality's major information repositories and what each is intended to contain. You do not need to inventory every file to begin understanding the environment.
A single document may exist in email, on a shared drive, in Teams, in OneDrive and in a business application. Employees may also keep working copies for convenience.
When several versions exist, employees may not know which one is current, complete or authoritative. This can affect decisions, information requests, retention and disposition.
For several important types of municipal records, identify where the official record should be kept and who is responsible for it.
Keeping everything can seem safer than deleting anything.
As a result, municipalities can accumulate years of duplicate, obsolete and unnecessary information along with records that must legitimately be retained.
Keeping information longer than required can increase search effort, storage, privacy exposure and the amount of information requiring security protection. Disposing of information too soon creates a different set of risks.
Confirm that the municipality has an approved retention schedule and determine whether it reflects the information actually being created today. Then identify one manageable area where authorized disposition can be applied.
Employees use email to make arrangements, provide approvals, communicate with residents, exchange documents and sometimes make or document important business decisions.
Those records can remain in individual mailboxes.
An employee's mailbox should not become the only location for important municipal information. Records can become difficult for others to find, manage and retain appropriately.
Identify the types of email that constitute important municipal records and establish a simple, practical method for keeping those records in an appropriate municipal location.
Long-serving employees often know where information is located, why decisions were made, how unusual situations are handled and which records are important.
Some of that knowledge may never have been documented.
Retirement, resignation or reassignment can result in the loss of both information and organizational knowledge. Remaining employees may spend considerable time reconstructing what the departing employee knew.
Include information ownership and knowledge transfer in employee departure and role-change procedures. Identify important files, responsibilities, recurring activities and information known primarily by that employee.
Consider a department that has accumulated many years of information on a shared drive.
What are the official records? How should they be organized? How long must they be retained? What can appropriately be disposed of?
Which records contain personal information? Why is that information still being retained? Are there unnecessary copies?
Who can access the information? Does everyone with access still need it? Which information requires greater protection?
MIM considers these questions together.
That means a shared-drive cleanup, for example, does not have to be viewed simply as a records project. Done properly, it can simultaneously improve findability, reduce unnecessary information, identify sensitive information and reduce the amount of information requiring protection.
A municipal administrator does not need to be a records management specialist to identify where improvements may be useful.
Consider:
Can employees usually find the information they need?
Do we know where important municipal information is kept?
Do employees know where official records should be stored?
Can we distinguish official records from duplicates, drafts and convenience copies?
Do employees know how long information must be kept?
Are records appropriately disposed of when retention requirements have been met?
Are important email records managed outside individual mailboxes where appropriate?
When someone leaves, do we know what information and organizational knowledge needs to be retained?
If some answers are “No,” “Sometimes,” or “I'm not sure,” that does not by itself mean the municipality has a records management problem. It identifies an area worth understanding more clearly.
You do not need to reorganize every file or replace existing technology to improve records and information management.
Start with manageable actions:
Know where information is — identify major repositories, systems and physical record locations.
Know what matters — identify important municipal records and authoritative information sources.
Make information easier to find — improve structures, naming and search practices where employees experience the greatest difficulty.
Clarify where records belong — reduce uncertainty about official records, working copies, email and duplicate information.
Know what must be kept — connect municipal information to practical retention requirements.
Dispose of what no longer needs to be kept — use authorized, documented disposition rather than simply keeping everything.
Protect organizational knowledge — include information and knowledge transfer when employees change roles or leave.
You can introduce improvements one department, repository or business process at a time.
MIM connects Records & Information Management + Privacy + Information Security around a common understanding of municipal information.
Instead of beginning by moving files or purchasing another system, begin with some basic questions:
What information do we have? →
Where is it? →
Who is responsible for it? →
Who needs access? →
How sensitive or important is it? →
How long must it be kept? →
What can appropriately be disposed of?
Once those questions are understood, technology decisions become easier.
The municipality can make better use of existing shared drives, Microsoft 365 and business applications—and make more informed decisions about migration, automation, search and AI.
AI can help municipalities search, summarize, classify and work with information, but AI does not automatically solve poor information management.
If the underlying information is duplicated, outdated, poorly organized or unreliable, those problems can affect AI's usefulness as well.
Trusted information provides a stronger foundation for trusted AI.
This does not mean everything must be perfectly organized before AI can be used. It means municipalities should understand the quality and limitations of the information being used and apply appropriate human oversight.
Privacy
Municipalities collect and use personal information every day.
It may be contained in property and taxation records, utility accounts, permits, complaints, recreation programs, employee files, applications, enforcement activities, correspondence, email and many other municipal services.
Privacy becomes difficult when a municipality doesn't have a clear picture of what personal information it holds, where it is located, why it is needed, who can access it, or how long it should be kept.
Modern Information Management approaches privacy as part of managing information throughout its lifecycle—not simply as something to address when a privacy issue occurs.
Personal information may be spread across business systems, shared drives, Microsoft 365, email, paper files and third-party services.
It is difficult to protect personal information, respond to requests or manage a privacy incident if you don't know what information exists or where it resides.
Identify the municipality's major information repositories and document the types of personal information held in each. Start at the system or repository level—you do not need to inventory every document.
Forms, applications and established processes can continue collecting personal information long after the original business need has changed.
Collecting or retaining unnecessary personal information creates additional information to manage and protect and can increase the impact of a privacy or security incident.
Review several commonly used forms and processes. For each piece of personal information collected, ask: Why do we need this? How do we use it? How long do we need to keep it?
Employees need information to do their jobs, but responsibilities change. Staff transfer, employees leave, contractors are engaged, and access can accumulate over time.
Someone may retain access to personal information after the business need for that access has ended.
Select one system or repository containing significant personal information and review who currently has access. Confirm that each person's access reflects their present responsibilities.
Municipalities increasingly depend on software providers, cloud services, consultants, contractors and other organizations.
Using an outside provider does not eliminate the municipality's need to understand how it handles its information. Questions can arise about access, storage, security, retention, return or destruction of information, and what happens if an incident occurs.
Identify service providers that receive, store or can access municipal personal information. Document what information they can access, why they need it and where it is stored.
A new application, online service or business process can change what personal information is collected, where it goes, who can access it and how it is used.
Privacy concerns identified after implementation can be harder and more expensive to correct.
Add a simple privacy review to the municipality's process for introducing or significantly changing systems, services and business processes. Ask privacy, information management and security questions before implementation rather than afterward.
An email can be sent to the wrong recipient. A document can be shared incorrectly. A device can be lost. An account can be compromised.
The first few actions following an incident can affect the municipality's ability to contain the problem, understand what happened and respond appropriately.
Make sure employees know what constitutes a possible privacy incident, who to contact immediately and what they should—and should not—do when one occurs.
A privacy issue often reveals an information management or security issue as well.
For example, suppose a shared drive contains personal information from many years ago.
Privacy asks: Do we still have a valid reason to hold this personal information?
Information Management asks: Has the information reached the end of its required retention period?
Security asks: Who currently has access to it, and is that access appropriate?
MIM considers all three questions together.
That can be more practical than independently reviewing privacy, records and security controls against the same information.
A municipal administrator does not need to be a privacy specialist to start identifying opportunities for improvement. Consider:
Do we know what personal information we hold?
Do we know where it is located?
Do we know why we collect and retain it?
Can we determine who has access to it?
Do we know which outside organizations can access it?
Is privacy considered when we change systems or services?
Do employees know what to do when something goes wrong?
If some answers are “No,” “Sometimes,” or “I'm not sure,” that does not by itself mean the municipality has a privacy compliance problem. It identifies an area worth understanding more clearly.
You don't need to rebuild your privacy program to get started. A municipality can begin with a manageable set of actions:
Know what you have — identify major sources of personal information.
Know where it is — identify the systems, repositories and outside services holding it.
Know why you have it — connect collection and retention to a legitimate municipal purpose and applicable requirements.
Know who has access — review employees, contractors and service providers.
Know how long you need it — connect privacy with records retention and authorized disposition.
Know what to do when something goes wrong — establish clear incident reporting and response responsibilities.
These steps create a foundation that can then support more detailed privacy work where it is actually needed.
MIM brings together Privacy + Information Security + Records & Information Management around the information itself.
Instead of beginning with three separate programs, start by understanding:
What information do we have? →
Why do we have it? →
Where is it? →
Who can access it? →
How should it be protected? →
How long should we keep it? →
What happens when it is no longer required?
That common understanding can support stronger privacy practices while also improving information management and security.
Information Security
Municipalities depend on information to deliver services, make decisions, collect revenue, manage infrastructure, communicate with residents and maintain day-to-day operations.
Some information is public.
Some is confidential or personal.
Some is essential to keeping municipal operations running.
Protecting all of that information requires more than cybersecurity technology.
A municipality needs to know what important and sensitive information it has, where it is located, who can access it, and what would happen if it were lost, compromised or unavailable.
Modern Information Management connects information security with privacy and records and information management so that security decisions are based on a better understanding of the information being protected.
Municipal information is spread across business systems, shared drives, Microsoft 365, email, employee devices, paper records and external services.
Not all information has the same sensitivity or importance.
Without knowing which information is personal, confidential, sensitive, critical or public, it is difficult to determine whether appropriate protection is being applied.
Identify the municipality's most important information and the repositories where it is maintained. Start with information that is sensitive, essential to operations or would cause significant problems if it were unavailable.
Access permissions can accumulate over time as employees change positions, responsibilities evolve, temporary access is granted, and outside service providers are engaged.
People may retain access to information they no longer need. Excessive access can increase both privacy and security exposure.
Choose one important system or repository and review who currently has access. Confirm that access reflects current responsibilities and legitimate business requirements.
Employees retire, resign, transfer departments or take on new responsibilities. Municipalities understandably focus on payroll, equipment and system accounts during these transitions.
Information can receive less attention.
A departing employee may leave important information in personal folders, email or other locations. At the same time, permissions associated with previous responsibilities may remain active.
Include information ownership, knowledge transfer and access permissions in employee departure and role-change procedures.
Municipalities rely on managed IT providers, software vendors, cloud services, consultants, contractors and other organizations.
Some may store municipal information. Others may have administrative or remote access to systems containing it.
The municipality needs a clear understanding of which organizations can access its information, what they can access, why they need access and what protections apply.
Create a basic list of outside organizations with access to municipal systems or information. For each one, identify what they can access, why they need access, and whether that access is still required.
Backup is important, but information availability involves more than having another copy.
A cyber incident, system failure, accidental deletion or service outage could prevent employees from accessing information required for municipal operations.
Critical information may need to be restored quickly enough to maintain essential services. The municipality should understand what information is most important and how long operations can reasonably continue without it.
Identify several information sources that are essential to municipal operations and confirm whether they are backed up, how they would be restored, who is responsible and whether recovery has been tested.
An employee may click a suspicious link, send information to the wrong person, lose a device, discover unusual system activity or suddenly be unable to access files.
Technology can identify some incidents, but employees are often the first people to notice something unusual.
Delays in reporting can increase the impact of an information security or privacy incident.
Give employees simple instructions covering what to report, who to contact and what immediate actions they should—or should not—take.
Consider a shared drive containing thousands of old municipal files.
Security asks: Who has access, and are the files adequately protected?
Privacy asks: Which files contain personal information, and is that information appropriately protected?
Information Management asks: Which files are official records, which are duplicates, and what no longer needs to be retained?
Keeping unnecessary information indefinitely can create security and information management problems.
If you can dispose of information appropriately, there is less to search, manage, protect and potentially expose during an incident.
MIM considers these responsibilities together.
A municipal administrator does not need to be a cybersecurity specialist to start identifying information security issues.
Consider:
Do we know which municipal information is sensitive or critical?
Do we know where that information is located?
Can we determine who currently has access to it?
Is access reviewed when employees change positions or leave?
Do we know which outside organizations can access municipal information?
Do we know which information must be available for essential municipal operations?
Are backup and recovery arrangements appropriate for that information?
Do employees know what to do if they suspect something has gone wrong?
If some answers are “No,” “Sometimes,” or “I'm not sure,” that does not by itself mean the municipality has a cybersecurity problem. It identifies an area where greater understanding may be worthwhile.
A municipality does not need to begin with a major security project. Start with the information that matters most:
Know what needs protection — identify sensitive, confidential and operationally critical information.
Know where it is — identify the systems, repositories and services where important information resides.
Know who has access — review employee, contractor and service-provider permissions.
Remove access when it is no longer required — include permissions in staff departure and role-change procedures.
Know what must remain available — identify information required to maintain important municipal services.
Know how you would recover it — confirm backup, recovery and responsibilities for critical information.
Know what to do when something goes wrong — give employees clear reporting and response instructions.
These steps complement the municipality's existing cybersecurity technology and IT services rather than replacing them.
MIM brings together Information Security + Privacy + Records & Information Management around the information itself.
The starting questions become:
What information do we have? →
How important or sensitive is it? →
Where is it? → Who should have access? →
How should it be protected? →
How long should we keep it? →
How quickly would we need it back?
This is particularly valuable where a municipality uses an outside IT or managed service provider.
The IT provider may manage networks, devices, accounts, backups and technical security controls. MIM helps the municipality address the complementary business questions:
What information are those controls protecting?
How important is it?
Who should have access to it?
How long should it exist?
What privacy requirements apply?
Both are needed for effective information security.
Working together
Many municipal information problems do not fit neatly into Records & Information Management, Privacy, or Information Security.
The same document, email, database or shared folder can create responsibilities in all three areas.
For example:
Records & Information Management considers what information needs to be kept, where it belongs, how it can be found and when it can be disposed of.
Privacy considers whether personal information is being appropriately collected, used, shared, retained and protected.
Information Security considers how information is protected, who should have access to it and how its confidentiality, integrity and availability are maintained.
Traditionally, these responsibilities may be handled separately.
Modern Information Management (MIM) looks at them together—starting with the information and the business need rather than the professional discipline.
At first, this may look like an information management problem.
What are the official records? Are there duplicates and outdated files? What must be retained? What can appropriately be disposed of?
Which files contain personal information? Do we still need that information? Are unnecessary copies increasing privacy exposure?
Who has access to these files? Does everyone still need that access? Is sensitive information appropriately protected?
Rather than conducting three separate reviews of the same shared drive, look at the information once and consider retention, privacy and security together.
The result can be less information to manage, improved search, more appropriate access and reduced information risk.
This may initially seem like an HR or IT issue.
But consider the information involved.
Where are the employee's important records? Are municipal records stored in email, personal folders or OneDrive? Who becomes responsible for them?
Did the employee have access to personal information? Are copies stored somewhere they should not be?
What systems and information can the employee access? When should that access change or end?
Include records, knowledge transfer, privacy and access in one employee departure or role-change process.
This helps preserve municipal knowledge while reducing the risk of lost records or inappropriate continued access.
The initial discussion may focus primarily on functionality, price and technology.
There are broader information questions.
What records will the system create or store? How will they be classified, retained, retrieved and eventually disposed of?
Will the system contain personal information? Why is it being collected? Where will it be stored? Will the provider have access?
How will the information be protected? Who will have access? What happens if the system becomes unavailable or the provider experiences an incident?
Ask the records, privacy and security questions before the system is implemented.
A short, integrated review early in the project can identify issues when they are easier to address.
Finding responsive information can involve much more than searching.
Where is the relevant information? Can it be found efficiently? Has it been managed according to applicable retention requirements?
Does the information contain personal information or other information requiring review before release?
How can responsive information be collected, reviewed and shared without unnecessarily exposing other sensitive information?
Good information organization, appropriate privacy practices and secure handling all contribute to a more efficient and defensible response.
The work required to respond to an information request often reflects the quality of the municipality's everyday information practices.
A document is emailed to the wrong person. An account is compromised. Files disappear. Information is unexpectedly made public.
Is it a privacy incident, security incident or records issue?
It may be all three.
What information was involved? Where did it originate? Is there another authoritative copy? How should information about the incident itself be documented?
Was personal information involved? What information was exposed, about whom, and what response may be required?
How did the incident occur? Can it be contained? What systems, accounts or information may be affected?
A coordinated response helps establish what happened, what information was affected, what needs protection or recovery, and what should happen next.
This may seem like a new technology issue, but many of the underlying questions are familiar.
What information is being provided to AI? Are AI-generated outputs municipal records? Where should useful outputs be retained?
Could prompts, uploaded documents or AI outputs contain personal information? Is that use appropriate?
Is the AI service approved? What happens to information submitted to it? What information should employees never enter into an unapproved service?
Rather than developing AI rules independently, connect AI use to the municipality's existing responsibilities for information, privacy and security.
Good information practices provide a stronger foundation for responsible AI.
Although the three disciplines have different responsibilities and expertise, they repeatedly need answers to many of the same questions:
What information do we have?
Where is it?
Why do we have it?
Who is responsible for it?
Who should have access to it?
How sensitive or important is it?
How should it be protected?
How long should it be kept?
What happens when it is no longer required?
What happens if something goes wrong?
These common questions are at the centre of Modern Information Management.
MIM does not mean that records management, privacy and information security become one function.
Each discipline has distinct responsibilities and requires appropriate expertise.
The opportunity is to coordinate where their responsibilities overlap.
Instead of:
Three disciplines → three separate reviews → three sets of priorities
MIM encourages:
One municipal information environment → shared understanding → coordinated priorities → specialized action where required
This is particularly useful for smaller municipalities where the same administrators may already be coordinating several of these responsibilities and specialist resources are limited.
You don't need to decide whether something is a privacy problem, security problem or records management problem before asking for help.
Start with what you are experiencing:
“We can't find things.”
“We don't know what we can delete.”
“We're not sure who has access.”
“We have years of information to clean up.”
“We're moving information to Microsoft 365.”
“An employee with years of knowledge is retiring.”
“We're concerned about personal information.”
“Staff are starting to use AI.”
From there, determine which information management, privacy and security considerations actually apply.
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WesternIM · Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
Based in Canada. Serving organizations around the world.
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