Records Management Taxonomy Topic Template

This document defines a hierarchical classification for records and documents so an organization can file, find, and retain information consistently. It functions as an information architecture for recordkeeping, linking a controlled vocabulary to the file plan retention schedule. By establishing an IA structure and content model oriented around business functions and activities, it improves discovery and findability, supports knowledge management, and enables standardized content retrieval.

The structure organizes Level 1 functions such as Administration, Financial Management, Human Resources, Information Management, Legal, Professional Services, and Sales and Marketing. Beneath these, child-level components describe activities (for example, Accounts Payable, Recruiting, Policies and Procedures, Bids and Proposals). Clear parent-child relationships, topic subtopics, and the granularity of hierarchy create a faceted taxonomy that can later drive faceted navigation, faceted filters, breadcrumbs, and a site map, making navigation structure intuitive.

Effective taxonomy governance and maintenance requires synonym control (preferred term and nonpreferred term), equivalence relationships and mapping, and associative relationships to manage related-term relationships. Teams often validate user needs with card sorting, usability testing, stakeholder review, search logs, and user data to refine facets, search refinements, and search suggestions. Thesauri and ontologies can express a knowledge graph or ontology for connected content and related content across knowledge articles, catalog items, and project deliverables.

Access and visibility can follow taxonomy best practices: taxonomy access control, topic visibility, and topic access tied to available for and can read criteria (for example, managers only). Governance can be codified with an ACL rule and business rule at the topic record level to guide knowledge publishing in an employee center or service portal. Some systems model topic connectivity with fields like a taxonomy_topic field, topic taxonomy field, or m2m_connected_content to maintain content relationships and topic linkage.

For records management, mapping taxonomy topics to a file plan supports disposition instructions, destruction disposition, move disposition instructions, and a record type class (for example, rtc record type class). A content audit and system administration ensure classification precision and automatic classification over time. Teams can extend taxonomy scope to service catalog classification, record producer forms, knowledge categories, knowledge category mapping, and category mapping, improving topic pages and related articles.

Use cases include HR criteria for employee files, onboarding checklists, and safety records; finance documents like budgets and invoices; legal records; marketing assets; and project files and deliverables. This approach scales to an employee center and service catalog items to align user criteria with topic classification mapping.

Proposal Kit can help teams operationalize this framework by providing document assembly to produce governance guides and file plans, automated line-item quoting for related proposals, an AI Writer to build supporting documents, and an extensive template library. Its ease of use accelerates taxonomy building steps and consistent knowledge publishing.

Expanding on the practical rollout, ux practitioners translate the hierarchy into everyday experiences by defining a thesaurus with preferred terms, preferred synonyms, and taxonomy synonyms, then applying equivalence mapping to normalize language across departments. They set clear tagging rules and content tagging standards so each content record has a primary topic and taxonomic category that powers mega menu labels and faceted filters navigation. This improves portal visibility and reduces noise by guiding users to the right place faster, whether they search or browse.

Access and risk controls benefit as well. Teams can document available criteria to align audiences with taxonomy access restrictions, ensuring sensitive materials remain internal while general guidance stays open. These policies protect compliance and also prevent clutter, which keeps search results relevant and increases user trust.

For records management, many organizations map topics directly to a Bentley file plan and use a file plan explorer to review alignment with retention. In systems that support automation, administrators may specify a script include (for example, contentprimarytopicutil) to associate a topic with a content record and maintain the primary topic over time. This approach tightens governance, reduces rework, and simplifies audits.

Proposal Kit helps teams formalize these practices by assembling policy guides, tagging standards, and navigation specifications, and by producing companion documents for governance and maintenance. Its AI Writer can write role-based procedures and training aids, while templates accelerate topic definitions and matrices for equivalence mapping. Together with automated line-item quoting for related implementation proposals, organizations can move from plan to execution with clarity and speed.

To go from a static hierarchy to operational value, organizations should plan a phased rollout that includes a content audit, legacy-to-new crosswalks using equivalence mapping, and incremental content tagging with clear tagging rules. UX practitioners can run pilot releases with a subset of taxonomic category areas, validate task flows in the service portal, and tune the mega menu and breadcrumbs based on observed behavior. A lightweight governance charter should define roles for stewardship, versioning cadence, and approvals so taxonomy changes ship predictably without disrupting recordkeeping tied to the file plan.

Measurement is crucial. Teams track search logs, zero-result queries, search refinements, and click-through on related articles to judge classification precision and content retrieval speed. Portal visibility settings and taxonomy access restrictions can be reviewed with periodic ACL rule audits to confirm topic access aligns with available criteria and any managers-only policies. Where automation exists, scripts include utilities such as contentprimarytopicutil help maintain the primary topic on each content record, while automatic classification rules propose preferred terms and preferred synonyms that authors can accept or override.

Records managers can strengthen alignment by creating a crosswalk from the taxonomy to a Bentley file plan and validating it in a file plan explorer before applying disposition instructions. When retention shifts, a controlled update propagates to the RTC record type class or record type class affected, protecting compliance without breaking navigation. Service teams can extend the same structure to service catalog items and knowledge articles so service catalog classification, knowledge category mapping, and topic pages all reflect the same topic linkage and topic connectivity, enabling consistent faceted filters navigation.

Proposal Kit can accelerate this journey by assembling governance guides, role-based procedures, and training aids from templates, while the AI Writer drafts supporting standards for synonym control and content tagging. Its document assembly helps produce SOWs and policy packs, and automated line-item quoting streamlines proposals for taxonomy implementation and maintenance, helping stakeholders move from design to adoption with clarity.

How to write my Records Management Taxonomy Topic Template document

Taxonomy is the hierarchical structuring of information. It is commonly used to classify living organisms, things and concepts. The example below is based on a records management taxonomy; however, you can replace the line items with anything related to your situation.

The classification of all documents and records using a controlled vocabulary allows the organization to organize content more accurately and consistently as well as to provide benefits for searching content and developing electronic records management systems.

The main reasons for classifying and developing this taxonomy are to:

Provide users an outline for organizing records and documents that are created or received in the course of business operations. Provide a consistent method for locating documents that are created or received. Support the development for a Records Management Program and the implementation of records management policies by creating a user guide to facilitate mapping records management actions to categories in the taxonomy. The classification is created from the inventory worksheets and is to be used as a public facing document and supplement to the File Plan.

This is the taxonomy for recordkeeping that maps to the File Plan's retention schedule. Successful business taxonomy must be designed for intuitive contribution of documents to records repositories, the ability for users to participate in in-place records management, and standardized searching by the end-user.

Classification Structure of Company Name: Level 1 (Function)

• Administration
• Asset and Facility Management
• Financial Management
• Human Resources Management
• Information Management
• Legal Records
• Professional Services
• Sales and Marketing Management

Classification Structure of Company Name: Level 1 - 2 (Function and Activities)

• Administration
• Asset Management
• Board and Board Committee Materials
• Inventory
• Operating Records
• Emergency Documents
• Operations Contracts
• Leases Contracts
• Business Planning
• Policy and Procedures
• Corporate Operations Policies and Procedures
• Insurance Policies
• Security
• Codes
• Surveillance Tapes
• Asset and Facility Management
• Building Equipment
• Buildings
• Grounds and Plant Materials
• Infrastructure
• Office Equipment
• Property
• Vehicles Legal Records
• Financial Management
• Accounts Payable
• Accounts Receivable
• Budget Management
• Charitable Contributions
• Company's Minute Book
• General Accounting Reports and Tax Records
• General Banking Records
• Lists, Registers and Logs
• Procurement
• Bids and Proposals
• Successful
• Failed
• Human Resources Management
• Employee File
• Benefits
• Regulations
• Recruiting
• Personnel On-boarding
• Safety and Health Management
• Information Systems Management
• Application Management
• Manuals
• Software
• Marketing Management
• Design Elements
• Trademark
• Templates
• Logo
• Web Site Design
• Sales Collateral
• Event and Campaigns
• Customer Feedback
• Marketing Standards
• Account Maintenance
• Account Research
• Knowledge About Customers
• Knowledge About Competitors
• Strategic
• Communication
• Bids and Proposals
• Successful
• Failed
• Pricing
• Price List
• Price Work Sheets
• Professional Services
• Project Elements
• Project Files
• Preliminary Plans and Worksheets
• Working Documents
• Final Project Documents
• Deliverables to Client