ARMA GARP Records Governance Implementation Training Course

Course overview

Records governance often fails not because policies are absent, but because accountabilities, retention decisions, metadata, systems and disposal controls do not work together. Organisations face duplicated information, inconsistent classification, uncontrolled shared drives, legal exposure from over-retention, and an inability to demonstrate that records have been protected or disposed of defensibly. This course gives records and information professionals a practical route from the ARMA Generally Accepted Recordkeeping Principles (GARP) to an operating governance framework that can be applied across business units, repositories and record types.

Participants examine all eight GARP principles—Accountability, Transparency, Integrity, Protection, Compliance, Availability, Retention and Disposition—and translate them into controls, ownership models and measurable requirements. They learn to assess current-state maturity, map records risks, define governance roles, develop a records classification and retention approach, specify metadata and audit requirements, and design disposal workflows. The programme also addresses the application of ISO 15489-1, defensible disposition, privacy and legal-hold dependencies, and governance considerations for Microsoft 365 content.

Teaching combines instructor-led explanation with structured workshops, realistic records-governance cases and peer review. Participants work through a simulated organisation with fragmented repositories and conflicting retention needs, then build a GARP-aligned implementation pack. They leave with a maturity assessment, risk register, RACI model, governance roadmap, control matrix and 90-day implementation plan that can be adapted for their own organisation. A certificate is awarded on completion.

The course is suited to professionals establishing, repairing or scaling a records governance programme, as well as managers responsible for proving that records controls support regulatory, operational and legal obligations.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Assess records governance maturity against the eight ARMA GARP principles
• Map recordkeeping risks, controls and evidence requirements in a governance risk register
• Define governance accountabilities using a records management RACI matrix
• Develop a functional classification structure and retention schedule decision framework
• Specify metadata, audit trail and access-control requirements for managed records
• Design a defensible disposition workflow including review, approval, hold and destruction controls
• Evaluate Microsoft Purview Records Management configurations against governance requirements
• Produce a phased GARP implementation roadmap with measures, owners and 90-day actions

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• Records Managers — who must establish accountable, auditable controls across records repositories
• Information Governance Managers — who need to connect policy, risk, privacy and operational ownership
• Knowledge and Information Managers — who are rationalising shared information environments and retention practices
• Compliance and Risk Officers — who need evidence that recordkeeping controls are defined and monitored
• Legal Operations and eDiscovery Professionals — who depend on reliable retention, legal-hold and disposition processes
• Microsoft 365 or Content Management Administrators — who configure platforms to meet approved records requirements

Requirements and prerequisites

This is a foundation-to-intermediate course and does not require prior ARMA certification or specialist software administration skills. Participants should have a working understanding of how their organisation creates, stores and retrieves business information, plus familiarity with at least one repository such as Microsoft 365, SharePoint, a document management system or network drives. Experience with records policies, retention schedules, privacy, audit or compliance is useful but not essential. Complete beginners should expect to learn core records governance terminology before applying it in structured implementation exercises. A laptop is recommended for template-based workshop activities.

Training methodology

The instructor introduces each GARP principle through short teaching sessions, then participants apply it to a running case involving shared drives, Microsoft 365 content, regulated records and litigation risk. Workshops use maturity-scoring sheets, RACI templates, control matrices, retention decision trees and implementation-roadmap canvases. Small groups test competing governance choices, including who approves disposal and how legal holds interrupt deletion. Facilitated reviews connect outputs to ISO 15489-1 and operational realities. The final session is an application-planning workshop in which each participant tailors a 90-day action plan to their own organisation.

Course outline

Day 1: GARP foundations and records governance diagnosis

• Purpose and structure of the ARMA Generally Accepted Recordkeeping Principles
• Accountability principle and executive sponsorship responsibilities
• Transparency principle and documented recordkeeping processes
• Integrity principle for authentic, reliable and complete records
• Records governance scope across physical, digital and cloud repositories
• ISO 15489-1 concepts of records, metadata and business context
• GARP maturity assessment models and evidence collection methods

Workshop: Participants complete a GARP maturity assessment for a simulated organisation and identify its five highest-priority governance gaps.

Day 2: Accountability, risk and control design

• Records governance operating models and decision rights
• RACI matrix design for policy, classification, retention and disposal
• Records risk identification using likelihood and impact criteria
• Control mapping from GARP principles to operational requirements
• Policy hierarchy, standards, procedures and work instructions
• Stakeholder mapping across legal, privacy, security, IT and business teams
• Governance measures, control testing and management reporting

Workshop: Participants create a records governance RACI and risk-control register for a cross-functional information environment.

Day 3: Classification, retention and access controls

• Functional business classification schemes and file plan structures
• Retention schedule design using business, legal and regulatory triggers
• Event-based retention rules and disposition review dates
• Metadata requirements for classification, retention and retrieval
• Availability principle and search, retrieval and continuity requirements
• Protection principle for access control, confidentiality and sensitive records
• Microsoft Purview Records Management labels, retention labels and record declarations

Workshop: Participants design a classification and retention decision model for finance, HR and customer-service records.

Day 4: Disposition, legal holds and defensible evidence

• Disposition principle and the business case for authorised destruction
• Disposition workflow stages from eligibility to destruction confirmation
• Legal holds, investigations and disposal suspension procedures
• Compliance principle and obligations registers
• Audit trails, chain of custody and disposition evidence
• Managing exceptions, orphaned content and legacy repositories
• Vendor, cloud service and third-party records governance requirements

Workshop: Participants run a defensible disposition case, producing a hold-aware approval workflow and destruction evidence checklist.

Day 5: Implementation planning and governance assurance

• Prioritising GARP gaps using risk, effort and business-value criteria
• Target operating model for enterprise records governance
• Implementation workstreams for policy, process, technology and change
• Microsoft 365 records governance deployment considerations
• Training, communications and adoption planning for business users
• Key performance indicators for retention, disposition and control compliance
• Ninety-day action plans and executive governance reporting

Workshop: Participants assemble and present a GARP-aligned implementation pack containing a roadmap, measures, owners and 90-day actions.

Tools & standards covered

ARMA Generally Accepted Recordkeeping Principles (GARP), ISO 15489-1:2016, Microsoft Purview Records Management, ISO 16175-1:2020

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions