Organising records
Self-assessment
In 2007, The National Archives initiated a new self-assessment performance measurement programme for local authority archive services. The programme is designed to provide a measure of overall service quality in the absence of formal performance indicators for archive services in the Audit Commission's performance indicator set for local government.
How the self-assessment process works
Participation in the self-assessment process is voluntary, but The National Archives expects local authority archives which are places of deposit for public records, or which have subscribed to the Standard for Record Repositories, to make returns. In 2007, 117 out of 125 eligible services participated in the exercise. In 2008, we will be exploring the feasibility of extending the self-assessment process to other categories of publicly-funded archive service.
The self-assessment programme enables authorities to judge the adequacy of their archive service, measured against the public task of such services, as expressed in the Standard for Record Repositories and the Framework of Standards. For the first time, it will enable comparisons to be made between authorities. The information from self-assessment will hopefully be useful to employing authorities, archives professionals and the user community. The programme enables The National Archives to reveal regional and other trends, highlight areas of strength and weakness within the archive sector, and to identify individual services that may need other interventions and support.
The self-assessment programme is based on a comprehensive questionnaire that examines five areas of the work in local authority archive services: Governance and Staffing; Documentation of Collections; Access Services; Preservation and Conservation; and Buildings, Security and Environment.
Each authority receives a percentage score on each of these five areas, and an overall percentage score. The scores on the five areas of activity are then performance banded, with the top 10 per cent of services securing three stars; the bottom 10 per cent no stars; and the remainder being divided equally into one-star and two-star categories.
The performance banding for the overall score takes into account not only the mark achieved, but also the evenness of performance across the five activity areas. A service cannot be placed in a higher performance band if it has any area of disproportionate weakness. To be a three-star service overall, an institution would have both to score an overall mark in the top 10 per cent of recorded scores and have no sectional score below the threshold for three-star performance, which in 2007 was set at 55 per cent. The equivalent thresholds for two-star and one-star performance were 45 per cent and 35 per cent respectively.
Self-Assessment Advisory Panel
The National Archives has established a Self-Assessment Advisory Panel to oversee the self-assessment process, review and moderate the results, and determine appeals against the results. In 2008 the members of the self-assessment panel are:
Nicholas Kingsley, The National Archives (Chairman)
Justin Cavernelis-Frost
Mary Ellis
Catherine Richards
Bruce Jackson
Deborah Jenkins
Andrew Rowley, The National Archives (Secretary)
David Mander OBE
Sarah Chubb
Summaries of panel meetings
If you have any comments or queries about the self-assessment process, please contact Nicholas Kingsley, Head of National Advisory Services nick.kingsley@nationalarchives.gov.uk.
Self-assessment 2006 pilot
A pilot for the self-assessment programme was run in 2006, using data collected in confidence from 116 archive repositories. This provided an opportunity to test the validity and appropriateness of the questions asked, the robustness of the guidance notes, and to give the local authority archives sector the opportunity to comment on the process and contribute their experience to its development. The scoring and performance banding, and the appeals process, were also tested in 2006, but the results were not published as the data was collected in confidence, and as there was potential for data from any poorly drafted questions to be misleading. However a summary of key messages derived from analysis of the pilot data can be seen in the autumn 2006 edition of RecordKeeping
The feedback on the pilot exercise and the comments of the Self-Assessment Advisory Panel on the process were taken into account in drafting the questionnaire and guidance notes for 2008.
Self-assessment 2007
In 2007, 117 archive repositories out of 125 services made returns. The final results of the survey following the completion of the appeals process are available below. We intend to issue a more detailed analysis of the results later in the year. In future years, we expect to also offer trend data, showing whether individual services are improving, which we hope will make the data even more useful.
- Results for 2007 self-assessment survey (Microsoft Excel, 183.00kb)
Self-assessment 2008
In 2008, we have made only modest changes to the questionnaire issued in 2007. We have reviewed, in particular, the questions relating to governance and staffing and the documentation of collections, to check their continuing relevance. We have also adjusted questions in the Access and User Experience section to reflect local govenment agendas. In addition, we have taken into account the feedback received on the 2007 questionnaire, and have adjusted questions and guidance notes slightly to ensure the greatest possible clarity in the questions.
We intend that there will be sufficient continuity from the 2007 questionnaire to offer meaningful trend data when the results for 2008 are published.
In response to comments on the timetable for the 2007 process, we have brought forward the date at which questionnaires are sent out (2 June 2008), and have allowed an extra two weeks for repositories to make returns (1 August 2008).
- Questionnaire (Microsoft Excel, 136.00kb)
- Guidance (Word document, 175.50kb)
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