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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Information Supervisor

💰 $60,000 - $95,000

Information ManagementRecords ManagementSupervisionData GovernanceDocument Control

🎯 Role Definition

We are seeking an experienced Information Supervisor to lead the day-to-day operations of our records and information management program. The Information Supervisor is responsible for supervising a small team of records and information technicians, enforcing information governance policies, managing physical and digital records lifecycles, and ensuring regulatory compliance across the organization. This role blends team leadership, process design, vendor oversight, and hands-on administration of enterprise content management (ECM) systems to deliver secure, searchable, and compliant information services.

Key SEO terms: Information Supervisor, records management, information governance, document control, data protection, archiving, information lifecycle, EDRM, SharePoint, records retention.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Records Coordinator / Records Analyst
  • Document Control Specialist
  • Information Management Technician

Advancement To:

  • Records Manager / Information Manager
  • Information Governance Lead
  • Director of Information Services / Head of Records & Information Management

Lateral Moves:

  • Compliance Officer (records/privacy focus)
  • Business Process Improvement Analyst (document workflows)

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Supervise, coach, and evaluate a team of records specialists and information clerks to achieve service level agreements (SLAs) for retrieval, retention, disposition, and access to both physical and digital records across enterprise systems.
  • Develop, implement, and continuously refine records retention schedules, disposition workflows, and lifecycle policies in alignment with legal requirements, corporate policy, and industry best practices (including retention schedule updates and audit trails).
  • Maintain and enforce information governance standards, including metadata strategies, taxonomy development, and classification schemes to improve searchability, discovery, and consistent tagging across ECM platforms.
  • Manage legal hold processes and coordinate with Legal and Compliance teams to preserve relevant records during litigation, regulatory inquiries, and investigations, ensuring chain-of-custody and defensible preservation.
  • Oversee daily operation and administration of document management and EDRM systems (for example SharePoint, OpenText, FileBound, Documentum, or Laserfiche), including user access provisioning, folder architecture governance, and version control policies.
  • Lead large-scale digitization, scanning, and migration projects for legacy physical records and disparate electronic repositories, coordinating project plans, quality control, OCR accuracy checks, and vendor deliverables.
  • Design, document, and train staff on standard operating procedures (SOPs) for intake, indexing, retrieval, and destruction of records, ensuring consistent application across distributed business units.
  • Conduct routine audits and quality assurance reviews to measure records accuracy, metadata completeness, retention compliance, and system use; prepare audit reports and corrective action plans.
  • Serve as primary point of contact for external vendors providing offsite storage, document destruction, shredding, and digitization services; negotiate SLAs, manage service-level performance, and oversee chain-of-custody logistics.
  • Implement and monitor access controls, role-based permissions, and record-level security to protect sensitive data and meet privacy regulations (GDPR, CCPA, HIPAA, or local equivalents).
  • Coordinate with IT on integrations, backups, disaster recovery, and retention hold mechanics to maintain data integrity, availability, and recoverability across information systems.
  • Produce operational metrics, KPI dashboards, and executive reports on records volumes, disposition activity, request backlog, and program health using reporting tools (Power BI, Tableau, or built-in ECM reporting).
  • Respond to internal and external information requests including FOIA/Privacy/Data Subject Access Requests within defined timeframes, ensuring proper redaction, legal review, and secure delivery.
  • Lead cross-functional initiatives to streamline business processes by implementing automated workflows, records tagging rules, and content lifecycle policies that reduce manual touchpoints and risk.
  • Manage departmental budgeting, forecasting, procurement, and cost allocation for records services, including vendor contracts, storage fees, and scanning projects.
  • Drive continuous improvement through root cause analysis of recurring information incidents (misfiled records, retention errors) and implement corrective process or technical solutions.
  • Coordinate secure destruction and disposition of records per schedule, maintain destruction logs, certificates of destruction, and ensure regulatory documentation is retained as required.
  • Maintain current knowledge of industry trends, case law, and regulatory changes affecting information management; update policies and provide guidance to senior leadership on compliance risk.
  • Deliver user training programs and change management communications to increase adoption of ECM tools, improve records hygiene, and reduce retrieval times across the organization.
  • Act as escalation point for complex retrieval or security incidents and coordinate remediation actions with Legal, Security, and IT teams to preserve evidence and minimize business impact.
  • Establish and monitor SLAs for internal customers, ensure timely fulfillment of records requests, and create recovery/continuity plans for records operations during business disruptions.
  • Analyze and recommend technologies and process enhancements for content classification, AI-assisted tagging, and automated retention to improve scalability and reduce operational cost.
  • Ensure accurate indexing and metadata mapping during migrations and system upgrades to preserve searchability and compliance across consolidated repositories.
  • Facilitate regular governance meetings with stakeholders to review retention policy exceptions, high-risk content, and strategic roadmap for information architecture evolution.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory data analysis.
  • Contribute to the organization's data strategy and roadmap.
  • Collaborate with business units to translate data needs into engineering requirements.
  • Participate in sprint planning and agile ceremonies within the data engineering team.
  • Provide backup support for reception of client records and help coordinate special projects such as audits or system upgrades.
  • Assist in vendor onboarding documentation and initial onboarding training for new records staff.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Records Management: proven experience developing and enforcing retention schedules, disposition processes, and records lifecycle management.
  • Information Governance: expertise in policy development, taxonomy, metadata standards, and data governance practices for structured and unstructured content.
  • Document Management Systems (DMS/ECM): hands-on administration and configuration experience with SharePoint, OpenText, Documentum, Laserfiche, or similar platforms.
  • Electronic Discovery (eDiscovery) & Legal Hold: practical knowledge of preservation, legal hold workflow management, and defensible collection processes.
  • Data Privacy & Compliance: working knowledge of GDPR, CCPA, HIPAA, FOIA, and industry-specific privacy/regulatory requirements.
  • Digital Imaging & OCR: experience managing large-scale scanning projects, OCR verification, image QC, and conversion of physical archives to digital formats.
  • Records & Information Management Software: familiarity with enterprise RIM tools such as Iron Mountain Connect, RecordPoint, Alfresco, or proprietary RMIS solutions.
  • Access Controls & Security: experience implementing role-based permissions, encryption at rest/in transit, and secure disposal methods.
  • Reporting & Analytics: ability to produce KPI dashboards and operational reports using Power BI, Tableau, Excel (pivot tables), or native DMS reporting tools.
  • Project Management: demonstrated skill in planning and executing projects, vendor coordination, budget tracking, and milestone management (PMP or Agile familiarity desirable).
  • Metadata & Taxonomy Design: ability to define controlled vocabularies, metadata fields, and classification rules for consistent content tagging.
  • Systems Integration & APIs: basic competencies in integrating ECM with HR, CRM, or ERP systems and familiarity with REST APIs or middleware.
  • Records Audit & Compliance Testing: experience conducting audits, documenting findings, and implementing remediation plans.
  • Vendor & Contract Management: negotiating SLAs, managing vendor performance, and overseeing third-party custody of records.

Soft Skills

  • Strong leadership and people management skills with proven ability to develop and motivate technical and operations teams.
  • Clear, client-focused communication style for interacting with internal stakeholders, legal counsel, IT, and external vendors.
  • Excellent organizational skills and meticulous attention to detail when managing retention schedules, legal holds, and disposition.
  • Strategic thinking and problem-solving skills to balance risk, compliance, and operational efficiency.
  • Change management and training capability to drive adoption of new systems, policies, and workflows.
  • Stakeholder management and negotiation skills to align cross-functional priorities and manage competing demands.
  • Analytical mindset with the ability to interpret operational metrics and translate them into process improvements.
  • Time management and prioritization skills to manage high-volume requests and backlog while supervising staff.
  • Resilience and adaptability to operate effectively during audits, litigation holds, or rapid system changes.
  • Customer service orientation with a strong sense of urgency for records retrieval and user satisfaction.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor's degree in Information Science, Library Science, Records and Information Management, Business Administration, Computer Science, or related field.

Preferred Education:

  • Master's degree in Information Management, Library & Information Science (MLIS), or MBA preferred.
  • Professional certifications such as Certified Records Manager (CRM), Information Governance Professional (IGP), ARMA certifications, CIPP (privacy), CDIA+, or PMP are highly desirable.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Records & Information Management
  • Library & Information Science
  • Information Technology / Computer Science
  • Business Administration / Management
  • Legal Studies (compliance focus)

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range:

  • 5+ years in records, document control, or information management roles with increasing responsibility.

Preferred:

  • 7+ years of progressive experience in enterprise records management, including at least 2 years supervising staff.
  • Experience with enterprise ECM/DMS, large-scale digitization and migration projects, legal hold/eDiscovery processes, and records retention schedule design.
  • Prior exposure to regulatory environments and cross-functional program leadership with measurable improvements in compliance and operational metrics.
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