1. ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS KEEPING AND MANAGEMENTBY
Rev. Prof. Obiora Cyril Nwosu-CLN; (Archivist)
The University Librarian
Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka

2. Introduction
Records as official or administrative memory of any establishment, be it higher institution, government agency or organization, need to be properly kept and managed.
As records increase in volume, they become more complex.
Lack of proper records keeping and management is a significant factor contributing to administrative inefficiency.

3. Introduction
Records keeping and their proper management, therefore, is not only legitimate, it is essential.
Records, are, therefore, both an organizational resource and an organizational asset.
As a resource, records provide information, as an asset, they provide documentation.

4. Administration
The process or act of planning, organizing and running an organization, business, institution or government of a country.

5. Administrators
The persons whose job is to manage and organize the public or business affairs of an organization or an institution.

6. Administrators
do the administrative jobs of planning and organizing the work of an institution, organisation or a company.

7. Records
All the documents regardless of the physical forms, characteristics or media created, received, maintained and used by any public or private organization or an individual in pursuance of legal obligations or in connection with the transactions of proper business, of which they form a part or provide evidence of such transaction

8. Records
are preserved or are appropriate for preservation by that organization or institution or its legitimate successor, as evidence of its functions, policies, decision, procedures, operations or other activities because of the values of the information contained therein.

9. The Problem
The pioneering efforts of Late Professor Dike and the National Archives of Nigeria to improve records keeping and management in Nigeria notwithstanding, there are still the widespread disgust on the methods of records keeping and management in Nigeria.

10. The Problem
Some vital records still get lost, misplaced, misfiled or dislocated. There are always reports of documents missing or misplaced while moving from one action point to the other, when the final action has not been taken.

11. The Problem
There is, therefore, problem in records creation, distribution, keeping, control and management.

12. The Problem
The concern of this paper is to provide an insight for proper administrative records keeping and management.

13. CREATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS
External:
those records which are received by an organization from an outside body or an individual.
Internal:
those records which are created internally by one or more of the departmental personnel.

14. Four Persons involved in Record Creation
In our various organizations, four persons can easily be identified as having definite responsibilities in records creation.
The person who creates or originates the records.
The processor or user.
The office worker who prepares the record (Secretary etc.).
The records management personnel.

15. CONTROL OF ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS CREATION
Three (3) types of control are given to records:
Pre – Control:
takes place before work is performed.
Concurrent Control:
takes place as work is being performed.
Feedback Control:
concentrates on past performance.

16. Pre-Control
Pre – Control takes place before work is performed. For example, a policy may be established that allows only key personnel to issue directives. Another form of pre – control is the establishment of a uniform records system.

17. Concurrent Control
Concurrent Control takes place as work is being performed.
Records must be charged out and followed up to the action point.
This procedure is not new to those who work in any functional registry.

18. Feedback Control
Feedback control concentrates on evaluating whether records actually fulfil the purpose of their creation.

19. DETERMINING THE VALUE OF DOCUMENTS TO BE CLASSIFIED AS RECORDS
Not all documents are records. For any document to be classified as a record, it must have certain value(s). The major values of records are:
Administrative value.
Fiscal/financial value.
Legal value.
Research, Historical or Archival value.

20. RECORDS LIFE CYCLE
Records have life cycle. Records pass through three stages/phases in their life cycle. The three phases are:
Current/Active phase.
Semi-Current/Semi-Active phase.
Non-Current/Non-Active /Dormant/Archives phase

21. CATEGORIES OF RECORDS
Public, that is, government records are not the only category of records of interest. There are other categories of records. Every establishment, be it government, business, religious or private, generate records for its administration – the administrative records. Records therefore have been categorized as follows:

22. CATEGORIES OF RECORDS Government / Public Records Business Records
Religious Records
Geographic/Geoinformatic /Location Records
Family / Private / Individual Records

23. CODE/FILE CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM
Records are created and filed using acceptable and uniform document / file classification system. The classification system may be numeric or alpha- numeric. E.g. NAU/LB/TETF/VOL1/001 The file classification system helps in making for easy location and retrieval of records /documents for future use.

24. KEY AREAS OF NEED FOR THE APPLICATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES AND PROFESSIONAL STANDARD BEST PRACTICES
All units of an organisation generate and keep records.
All units or arms are, therefore, important.
In all, the Registry of course is focal point of administrative records keeping and management, being the administrative arm of an organisation and the engine-hub of records creation, control and management.

25. KEY AREAS OF NEED FOR THE APPLICATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES AND PROFESSIONAL STANDARD BEST PRACTICES
The registry as the custodian of all the personnel, students and all the administrative records of an institution should have a properly organised and very effective records management programme for timely and easy access to records.
The registry is not the only division concerned with records creation and management.
The Bursary, Stores, Audit, Works etc equally generate, keep and manage records.

26. KEY AREAS OF NEED FOR THE APPLICATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES AND PROFESSIONAL STANDARD BEST PRACTICES
There is need for diligent and comprehensive compilation of inventories of an institution’s assets and liabilities with the application of standard international professional best practices in records keeping and management.

27. ARRANGEMENT AND DESCRIPTION OF RECORDS
Archivists’ work on some facts about records. The facts are:
The entire records group emanates from a single agency.
The records group has an original order.
The records group is a true reflection of the agency operations
It is a unique records groups.
The records are interdependent

28. Levels of Arrangement in an Ideal Archival Institution
There are at least five levels of arrangement in an ideal archival institution. They are:
Arrangement at the depository level. Egs: Education, Finance etc. are different divisions/depositories.
Arrangement at the records group and sub-group levels: The records from each organisation are consider as records group.
Arrangement at the series level
Arrangement at the filing unit level.
Arrangement at the document level.

29. COMPUTER AND ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS KEEPING
Computers are now mainly used in records production, keeping and management.
Records/Archives automation is now in vogue and this has reduced the usually near unmanageable bulk of records en-massed in offices.
Assigning metadata/keywords to records has made access to administrative records very easy.
With Internet connectivity to automated records of administrative offices, real time access to records is now possible.

30. CONCLUSION
There is near zero implementation of the records management programme in Nigeria. Administrators have this challenge to fight for the implementation and when this is achieved, administrative records keeping and management will be very effective in organisations in Nigeria.

31. CONCLUSION
Administrators, Records Managers, Archivists and all those involved in records creation, handling, keeping and management must without compromise be computer literate and totally Information and Communication Technology(ICT) compliant.

32. CONCLUSION
Automated Records Management System with adequate database management application software, such as Oracle, is what is in vogue. This is the current trend in records management.

33. Thank You