Lorson Resources Limited (LRL) is a Record and Information Management consulting and services company. We are dedicated to working with our clients to ensure that the systems deployed within their environments facilitate availability of strategic information assets regardless of the medium of storage-since its unavailability renders it valueless.

Organisations produce, use and store a great number of documents in their daily course of operations. The information contained in these documents reflects the transactions that constitute the substance and activities of the business. There is a constant throughput of information that is generated electronically or on paper in a structured and unstructured format. The ability to manage this information responsibly, regardless of its medium of storage or format, and suitably convert it will facilitate the mission-critical functions and significantly impact the business's structural integrity, profitability and long-term viability.

Generally, an organisation's focus is to implement cost-effective information technologies with little attention given to the consideration of what constitutes their records, its life cycle or the content of electronic records. Perhaps because most projects were driven by the need to automate a business function executed by the IT Department and managed by people who often came from technical IT backgrounds with no traditional conceptual record management experience or interest.

However, that focus is changing rapidly. The evolution and increasing affordability of information technology have changed how both public and private-sector organisations manage their information assets. Several recent high profile cases (Enron and Andersen) of illegal records destruction have alerted executive managers about the need for effective and efficient information management and to their accountability in this area. Organisations are consequently now duty bound to give more than a cursory glance to this area of their business hitherto considered mere minutiae.

Lorson Resources Limited is in its twelfth year of operation. We were initially formed to provide IT Consulting and Services in the area of Document Management (DM). However, over years it was evident that the whole discipline of Records and Information Management, of which DM is a subset, was not given the relevant priority within organisations. Then the emergence of the Freedom of Information Act of Trinidad & Tobago; the heightened awareness about the dangers of not having an established corporate records management policy or programme and ensuring its associated compliance has encouraged LRL to concentrate on establishing that area as a service. We have been steadfastly working with a varied cross-section of organisations to differentiate ourselves from simply document management but concentrate on playing a vital role in helping our clients develop a comprehensive record and information management (RIM) strategy. LRL believes that these efforts will not only mitigate risks, but will also contribute directly and indirectly to an organisation's bottom line.