Documents and Records

I received a note the other day from a guy in the U.K. He wanted to know if he had to have two different procedures, or would his current single procedure suffice. I wrote back:

You should really have two different procedures, but only one is permissible.

Documents and records are two different things and employ two different systems for control. (Remember, a system is a group of processes all working together to achieve a common objective.)

Documents tell us what to do; records tell us what we did. Documents are before the action and records are after.

Document control is

1. Write the information down (paper or electronic)
2. Peer review for accuracy
3. Management approve for perfection [smile]
4. Distribute the approved information to the users
5. Suggest changes based on use
6. Go back to step one

Record control is

1. Capture what was done (paper or electronic)
2. Send the information to storage
3. Keep the stored information is good condition
4. Throw away old information no longer useful

You see? Two different systems with different steps (processes)!