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Sandy Baker reported: <<We want to implement a review process for 60
documents: Ask the owner of the document to verify that either the
information is current or it can be deleted or updated. What are the
benefits to doing the review process twice a year at the same time vs
getting the document reviewed 6 months from the last approval/review...>>
The advantages of scheduling are that it's a no-brainer: every year, you do
the same thing at the same time. The disadvantages are a lack of
flexibility, the fact that not everyone will be available at precisely
6-month intervals, and the fact that some information may become obsolete
long before 6 months have passed whereas other information need never be
changed (the former would be reviewed too infrequently; the latter too
frequently). It can also result in time crunches when 60 documents all have
to be reviewed at once.
A more flexible and probably more efficient approach is to ask authors when
they first submit a document how long it is likely to remain valid, then
schedule a review a month or so before that "expiry date". Sometimes the
expiry date is obvious, as is the case for a conference announcement on a
Web site; sometimes it's less obvious, as in the case of a document
responding to an evolving standard. In every case, though, the author can
give you a strong idea of how frequently the document needs to be revised,
and you should use that as the basis for your review schedule.
--Geoff Hart, geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
Forest Engineering Research Institute of Canada
580 boul. St-Jean
Pointe-Claire, Que., H9R 3J9 Canada
"Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the
earth's surface relative to other matter; second, telling other people to do
so. The first is unpleasant and ill-paid; the second is pleasant and highly
paid."--Bertrand Russell
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