A series of regional workshops introducing Archive Service Accreditation to applicants in England, supported by Archives and Records Association. Content is provided by the Archive Service Accreditation partners and can be repurposed to support the scheme and to support developing archive services.

2. Melinda Haunton
Autumn 2013
Archive Service
Accreditation
Introductory Workshops
Introduction to
Archive Service
Accreditation
Melinda Haunton/Jane Shillaker

3. Introduction to Archive Service Accreditation: Aims
• By the end of the session, participants should:
- Understand the role and potential benefits of archive service
accreditation
- Understand the Standard and its structure
- Understand the accreditation programme in outline and know
where more information can be found
- Be familiar with the tools, guidance and support for action
planning available when they begin their own applications
- Feel encouraged to address some of the less familiar elements
of the Standard in their own service
• What this session isn’t:
- Reading out the Standard and the guidance very, very slowly
from start to finish

4. About the scheme
• A UK-wide partnership to develop and deliver accreditation
• Supported by coalition of partners (ACE, ARA, ARCW, NRS,
PRONI, SCA, TNA, Welsh Government)
• Live scheme is maintained by a governing Committee
• Replaces The National Archives Standard for Record Repositories
• Supports ongoing relationships with statutory schemes like
Places of Deposit, Acceptance in Lieu
• Developed through co-creation with the sector and tested
through a pilot with 20 highly varied archive services
• Planning, Performance, Profile, Patronage, Partnerships, People
and Professionalism: what museum accreditation has supported,
according to its applicants
4

5. What has changed and why?
• Change within sector: digital transformation, changes to
established delivery models, integrated heritage/info services
• Localism agenda: importance of co-creation/sector ownership
• New-style national ‘standards’ in place: PAS197, PAS198, PD5454
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
• More flexibility on applicant types: broader eligibility
• Scaled requirements for different types of service
• Broadening understanding of collections and access to include
digital as business as usual
• Greater emphasis on responding to the service’s community –
internal/external – and particular role of service
• Above all, developmental, not a single-point assessment
5

6. Question:
What do you (and your service)
most want to get out of going
through archive service
accreditation?
6

7. Benefits of working with accreditation
• That developmental angle: Archive Service Accreditation is the
process, not just a badge
• Reviewing your operation: taking time to step back and think
• Effective, coherent mission, policies and planning support your
case to core and external funders: a bank of evidence supporting
daily practice and future aspirations
• Requirements scaled to your mission and scope; supporting
quality, professionalism and delivery
• Evidence of external interest in your service: now and in future
• A mark of service quality, recognising the needs of archives
• Peer support and ongoing professional development
• It’s free! Including all support, advice, feedback and advocacy
7

8. Understanding the standard
• Three modules:
- 1. Organisational Health
- 2. Collections
- 3. Stakeholders and their experience
• Requirements under each module:
- 1. Mission, governance, planning and resources (premises,
finance and workforce)
- 2. Collections management approach, policies, plans and
procedures for collections (development, information and care)
- 3. Access and engagement with the service’s identified
community
• Requirements are phrased with outcomes: explaining the why as
well as the what
8

9. Understanding the process
• Eligibility
• Scalability
• Application system (online)
• Guidance and case studies
• Submit responses with supporting documentation
----------------------------------------------------------------------
• Assessment by home nations assessor bodies
• Validation visits in some cases – peer review
• Panels make awards
• Feedback and ongoing development
9

10. Understanding process: 2
10

11. Understanding eligibility
Setting the scope: to be eligible for accreditation, a service must:
- Hold archives
- Of a reasonably significant size
- Give some form of external access to those archives
- Hold some archives which are analogue*
- Have identified workforce to manage archives (including
professional staffing in public sector)
- Have dedicated, secure storage for collections
*To review!
11

12. Understanding scalability
• Gives the scheme its flexibility
• Recognises statutory and institutional drivers/provisions differ
• Sets broad expectations – not an exact science, your service may
cross divisions
• Top level divisions reflect governance:
Local authority
Other public sector
(National)
Private and third sector
• Scaled divisions: 1-2(-3) – mission, scale and scope varies,
particularly in terms of audiences reached
12

13. Understanding how to apply
• Questions
An application form which asks about how the archive service
meets the standard. Largely narrative, following pilot feedback.
• Evidence
Documents uploaded to support application and in some cases
shown at validation visits
• Flexibility
Format-blind in most cases. If it fulfils the function effectively for
your service, the name/format is irrelevant.
13

14. 14

15. Screenshot of application system
15

16. Understanding guidance and support
• Guidance underpins the standard and application form
• Specific guidance for Accreditation, understanding the Standard
and ways you can respond, referencing related standards
• Scaled guidance, reflecting expectations for different types
• Tools and resources: www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/accreditation
• Support available from assessor national bodies – TNA in England
• Wider guidance for service development, from key bodies (TNA,
ARA, DPC, BL)
• Ongoing development: specialist templates and support
• Case studies: building evidence and examples
16

17. Understanding assessment, validation and award
• Assessment by home nations assessor body (SCA/NRS, PRONI,
CyMAL, TNA) with arrangements for national bodies
• Assessment is at (sub-)requirement, not question, level
• Assessment is scaled: at a level appropriate to service’s mission
• A proportion of applications are validated by site visit (minimum
25%, aim higher in practice) which may involve peer review
• Site visits allow verification of sensitive documents and
additional discussion incl with peers
• Assessments → recommendation to Panel
• Panels award accredited or provisionally accredited status (for
set period), or no award
• Scheme is managed by the Committee, who form the Panels
17

18. Thinking about the standard and your service
18

19. Action planning
• Roll out initially 2014-17
• Planning your service’s response in advance is key
• Action planning template available
• Are you clear about why and how you do things?
• What areas are new? What are you close to meeting?
• When developing plans for the coming year(s), what are priority
actions that bring you closer to accreditation?
• What will be useful to your service in future?
• Is there an opportunity for profile-raising?
• When can you (realistically) apply? What factors affect this?
• Remember we’re neither expecting perfection nor imposing
specific documentation
19

20. Lessons from experience in museums
(courtesy of @emmachaplin)
 Museums understand where their regular ways of working fit with the
Standard
 Understand where strengths and weaknesses are and incorporate them into
planning
 There is an understanding throughout the museum about what Accreditation
involves
 The Forward Plan is a key ‘living’ document for the museum
 Staff/volunteers gain confidence and new skills through their work on
Accreditation
Museums forget all about Accreditation in between invitations to submit a
return
There is a mad panic to ‘tick boxes’
One person in the organisation is given all the responsibility for Accreditation
Policies and plans only written to fulfill Accreditation needs and not reviewed
Accreditation is seen as a “necessary evil”
20

21. Moving on: the Modules
21

22. Module 1: Requirement 1.1 Mission statement
• The words ‘purpose’, ‘vision’ and ‘mission’ are applied variously and often
interchangeably within strategic planning vocabulary. Collectively, these
terms should describe, in the broadest expression, why a service or body
exists; what/where it aspires to long term; and how it plans to get there.
• Archives Service Accreditation has chosen to use the word ‘Mission’ to
encapsulate these terms (Museum Accreditation uses the term ‘Statement of
Purpose’ to describe the same thing). For the objectives of Archive Service
Accreditation, ‘Mission’ is defined as: ‘A strategic statement (or series of
connected statements) which defines the purpose and direction of the
Archive Service, in relation to the governing body it serves.’
• Archive Service Accreditation recognises that, in most cases, the archive
service is some way removed from the main business of the organisation it
serves. In these cases, the mission statement may be defined in different
layers and in more than one type of document.
• All stakeholders should be aware of the mission of the archive service and the
mission should direct decision making and activity.
22

23. Community
• “The concept of a community which the archive service is constituted
to serve. In this specific sense the word ‘community’ does not
necessarily refer simply to the population of a political unit or physical
area (e.g. a local authority or town).
• “For many archive services the community will extend beyond the
formal boundaries of its responsible body (government, educational
institution, private or voluntary organisation).
• “The archive will probably serve multiple communities: local, national
and international; different communities of researchers and of other
types of direct and indirect users and of non-users.
• “Different elements of the community may attract different priorities,
types and levels of service. The ‘community’ to be served is defined
through the stated purpose of the archive service.”
23

24. Some points to look for in mission statements
• Link to parent organisation if at archive/dept level
• Link to heritage if higher (if possible)
• Are audiences/community
mentioned/defined/prioritised?
• How is it shared? Does anyone else know it exists?
24

25. Falkirk Community Trust Museums & Archives
The purpose of Falkirk Community Trust
Museums & Archives (hereinafter referred
to as Museums & Archives) is to engage the
public with heritage, by encouraging and
enabling learning and by collecting,
recording, preserving, interpreting and
making accessible the material culture and
archival record of the Falkirk Council area.
25

26. Media Archive of Central England
MACE is an accessible organisation
connecting people with the preserved
moving image heritage of the
Midlands.
26

27. Network Rail Corporate Archive
The Network Rail Corporate Archive
collects and manages records that are
considered by Network Rail to be
worthy of permanent retention
because of their value to the business
and to the nation.
27

28. PRONI
• Vision Statement
“Protecting and Providing Archives for
All”
• Mission Statement
“To identify and preserve NI’s archival
heritage and promote public access to
that heritage”
28

29. Cumbria Archives
29

30. Module 1: Organisational Health
30

31. Take a break
31
http://www.flickr.com/photos/statelibraryqueensland/5141885622/
State Archives of Queensland: Mrs Henrietta Harriet Johnstone pouring tea at her home, Mountain Park

32. Module 3: Stakeholders and their Experiences
32

33. Community
• “The concept of a community which the archive service is constituted
to serve. In this specific sense the word ‘community’ does not
necessarily refer simply to the population of a political unit or physical
area (e.g. a local authority or town).
• “For many archive services the community will extend beyond the
formal boundaries of its responsible body (government, educational
institution, private or voluntary organisation).
• “The archive will probably serve multiple communities: local, national
and international; different communities of researchers and of other
types of direct and indirect users and of non-users.
• “Different elements of the community may attract different priorities,
types and levels of service. The ‘community’ to be served is defined
through the stated purpose of the archive service.”
33

34. Module 3: Stakeholders and their Experiences
Activity:
• User/visitor surveys
• Market research
• Comment/feedback facilities
• Monitoring of website/intranet
users
• Monitoring of social media users
• Use of publicly available statistics
• Focus groups
• Regular user groups
• Open meetings
• Parent body identified priority
audiences
• Business process analysis/
marketing analysis of business
areas
• Work with specialist interest
groups
• Workforce feedback
• Depositor liaison
• Analysis of enquiries
• Departmental/directorate
meetings for relevant areas of
the parent body
• Visitors’ book
• Anything else?
34

35. Module 2: Collections
35

36. Policies, plans, procedures...
• Policies describe the overall intentions and direction of an
organisation or service, as expressed by top management
• Plans are forward looking documents that set out the objectives
of the organisation and identify the actions needed to achieve
those objectives, in line with the organisation’s policies and in
order to deliver its mission. These arise from the policies which
the archive service has outlined. Can be preparatory/strategic.
• Procedures describe a specified way to carry out an activity or a
process (a set of interrelated or interacting activities), in order to
deliver a particular output or outcome.
• They may not be known by those names in your organisation
• They may be multiple documents or a single document may
represent many of these functions
36

37. Module 2: Collections
37

38. Module 2: Collections
Eyes down, ladies and gents...
AKA, it’s not what it’s called, it’s what it does
for you that counts
38
NARA 412-DA-15741 http://www.flickr.com/photos/usnationalarchives/4727573934/

39. Module 2: Collections Management Approach
39
Collections Management approach

40. How to use Archive Service Accreditation
• Developing your application → looking at your available
resource, your stated mission, and how the two can come closer
• Ensuring policies (why we do things), plans (how we will get
there) and procedures (how we deliver) all point in the same
direction
• Feedback on applications leads to action planning for the future
• Successful applications → good news stories and publicity
opportunities
• Unsuccessful applications or not able to apply? → Use that in
advocacy and planning, work with The National Archives and
home nations to develop, use the Standard as a development
framework where helpful
40

41. More information: this is just the start!
• Scheme homepage:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/accreditation
All documentation and guidance specific to the scheme is on this
area of nationalarchives.gov.uk
• You can also find out more supporting information in Developing
Your Archives (
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/archives-sector/developing-you
)
• Case studies on specific areas (
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/archives-sector/case-studies.ht
)
• If you’re interested in developing model policies and plans for
particular sectors, get in touch
41

42. So - when will you apply?
accreditation@
nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk
42