ISO 15489 Records Management for Office Administrators Training Course

Course overview

Office administrators frequently control the first point of creation, receipt, filing, retrieval and disposal of organisational records, yet inconsistent naming, personal drives, unmanaged email and unclear retention decisions can create operational delays and compliance exposure. This course equips participants to apply ISO 15489 principles to the everyday records handled by administrative teams: correspondence, meeting papers, contracts, invoices, HR documents, reports and digital working files. It helps staff distinguish records from transitory information and build filing practices that remain reliable when people, systems or responsibilities change.

Participants learn how ISO 15489 defines authentic, reliable, usable and integral records; how to analyse business activities before designing a classification structure; and how to apply retention, disposal, access and metadata controls. They practise developing file plans, naming conventions, metadata fields, record capture rules and retrieval procedures for paper, shared-drive, email and Microsoft 365 environments. The course also addresses records ownership, access permissions, version control, legal holds, audit trails and the administrator's role in escalating high-risk records issues.

Teaching combines instructor explanation of the standard with worked examples, document-review exercises, group classification workshops and realistic office-administration cases. Participants leave with an ISO 15489-aligned Records Management Implementation Pack containing a draft business classification scheme, file-naming convention, core metadata model, retention and disposal register, and records-handling procedure adapted to their own office context. The course is suited to administrators who need practical control methods as well as managers seeking consistent, defensible recordkeeping across their teams.

Course objectives

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

• Apply ISO 15489 principles to assess whether office information should be captured as an organisational record
• Create a business classification scheme that links office records to functions, activities and transactions
• Design a controlled file-naming convention for shared drives, email folders and collaborative workspaces
• Define core metadata fields that support record identification, retrieval, access control and disposition
• Develop retention and disposal rules using business, legal, regulatory and operational requirements
• Implement record capture procedures for email, meeting papers, correspondence and digital documents
• Conduct a records risk assessment covering loss, unauthorised access, duplication and incomplete audit trails
• Produce an ISO 15489-aligned Records Management Implementation Pack for an administrative function

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• Office Administrators — who create, receive, file and retrieve high volumes of business records
• Executive Assistants — who manage executive correspondence, board papers, meeting records and confidential files
• Administrative Managers — who need consistent filing, retention and access practices across support teams
• Records Clerks — who maintain physical and digital record repositories and respond to retrieval requests
• Facilities and Operations Coordinators — who hold contracts, compliance documents, maintenance records and supplier files
• Team Leaders — who need to establish practical records controls within departmental shared drives and Microsoft 365 workspaces

Requirements and prerequisites

This is a foundation-to-intermediate course and does not require prior ISO 15489 training or records-management certification. Participants should be comfortable using everyday office applications, navigating shared folders, creating and saving documents, and handling email attachments. Familiarity with their organisation's document types, approval routes and existing filing locations will help them apply the exercises directly. A laptop is useful for live online delivery and recommended for classroom participants who wish to work on their own examples. No legal qualification, archival training, specialist records software or prior knowledge of retention scheduling is required; complete beginners should expect a structured introduction to the terminology and methods.

Training methodology

The instructor uses short, standard-led teaching segments followed by practical records-management work. Participants examine sample office documents, decide which items require capture, classify records against business activities, and test retrieval through a shared-drive and email scenario. Small groups build a file plan, metadata set and retention logic for a realistic administrative department, then review each other's controls against ISO 15489 criteria. Daily exercises feed into an individual implementation pack. The final session uses application planning to identify owners, priority record series, controls and first actions for workplace adoption.

Course outline

Day 1: ISO 15489 foundations and records scope

• Purpose, structure and key principles of ISO 15489-1
• Characteristics of authentic, reliable, integral and usable records
• Distinguishing records, documents, information assets and transitory material
• Records lifecycle and records continuum concepts
• Business context analysis for administrative records
• Roles, accountabilities and records ownership
• Records risks in paper files, email, shared drives and cloud workspaces

Workshop: Participants map the records created and received by a typical office administration process and identify capture failures, ownership gaps and high-risk record types.

Day 2: Classification, file plans and controlled capture

• Function-activity-transaction classification method
• Developing a business classification scheme
• Designing file plans for administrative record series
• File-naming conventions and controlled vocabulary
• Record capture points in business workflows
• Email capture rules and mailbox management
• Version control, duplicate management and authoritative copies

Workshop: Participants build a draft classification scheme, file plan and naming convention for correspondence, meetings, supplier administration and office operations.

Day 3: Metadata, retrieval and access controls

• ISO 23081 metadata principles for records
• Mandatory, optional and system-generated metadata fields
• Metadata values for title, creator, date, status and classification
• Search, indexing and retrieval requirements
• Access classification and need-to-know permissions
• Confidentiality controls for HR, executive and commercial records
• Audit trails, change histories and access logging

Workshop: Participants define a core metadata model and retrieval test for a set of confidential office records, including access rules and search criteria.

Day 4: Retention, disposal and risk management

• Retention triggers and event-based retention periods
• Legal, regulatory, operational and historical value assessment
• Retention schedule structure and disposal authorities
• Secure destruction, transfer and permanent preservation options
• Disposal holds for litigation, audit and investigation
• Records risk assessment methodology
• Monitoring controls through compliance checks and exception logs

Workshop: Participants create a retention and disposal register for selected office record series and apply a disposal hold to a simulated investigation scenario.

Day 5: Implementation and operational governance

• Records management policy and procedure components
• Embedding controls in office administration workflows
• Microsoft SharePoint document library configuration considerations
• Microsoft Purview retention label and retention policy concepts
• Staff guidance, training messages and quick-reference tools
• Records compliance measures and internal review cycles
• Implementation roadmap, ownership and change management

Workshop: Participants complete and present an ISO 15489-aligned Records Management Implementation Pack with priorities, accountable owners, controls and a 90-day action plan.

Tools & standards covered

ISO 15489-1:2016, ISO 23081-1:2017, Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft Purview

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