Ms. Diane Bertrand

While participating in a recent, well attended BPM training in Barbados, I had the opportunity to talk with Ms. Diane Bertrand of the Spirit Group, host of the training session and an AIIM training partner focused on bringing education and technology advancement to the Caribbean market.

Diane Bertrand, Principal Consultant and Chief Executive Officer of Trinidad and Tobago-based company, The Spirit Group.
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Diane Bertrand, Principal Consultant and Chief Executive Officer of Trinidad and Tobago-based company, The Spirit Group, says governments and the private sector now realise that this has changed with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. The business record is now regarded as being as or more important than the document, she said in an interview.She added it is hoped that companies will see the need to implement processes which will result in attention being paid to the entire life cycle of a record, while governments will lead the charge in compliance, through legislation. Companies are now acknowledging that a record is any evidence of business activity.They are realising that a record and a document are not necessarily the same thing.While a record can be a document, not all documents are records, Bertrand remarked.

With the importance on the record and its life cycle, certification in Electronic Records Management (ERM) as a step up from Electronic Document Management (EDM) has taken on priority.In the first of a series of Caribbean training workshops, The Spirit Group Ltd., ILLUMINAT and AIIM International, are facilitating a workshop on Electronic Records Management.This workshop is scheduled for March 13 to 16 at the Accra Beach Hotel.
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Participants from the business and private sectors are given the opportunity to gain an accreditation called the ERM Master or ERM2, an emerging global certification and industry standard established by AIIM and endorsed by the international ECM vendor and industry fraternity. We want all of the business and government sectors in Barbados to attend because there is great value in understanding how to approach Electronic Records Management projects and their implementation and developing processes, rules and guidelines to ensure compliance and also business sustainability for the future, Bertrand said.

Diane Bertrand completes training at Proforma Corporation20-Jun-02

Diane Bertrand, Principal Consultant and CEO of the Spirit Group Ltd (TSG) has recently completed training at Proforma Corporation, Michigan in the following:

Diane Bertrand completes training at Proforma Corporation

Diane Bertrand, Principal Consultant and CEO of the Spirit Group Ltd (TSG) has recently completed training at Proforma Corporation, Michigan in the following:

This was the advice of consultant and chief executive officer of the Spirit Group, Diane Bertrand, at a pre-conference workshop on e-commerce Tuesday at Sherbourne Centre.After addressing the more than 100 people who showed up for the event, Bertrand told the Daily Nation that while the verbal commitment from governments to get into high gear towards making use of the new medium was good, they needed to "walk the talk" and do so quickly in order to keep up with the rest of the world.Using a New Zealand case study as part of her presentation, she explained the country's government had decided to "champion" the cause of e-commerce."Governments, and not the businesses, need to take a lead role.The New Zealand government realised they needed to drive this initiative from the front and not the back," she said.According to Bertrand, if infrastructure, in terms of technology, education, and financing, was properly developed, the region could have a "serious impact" in the e-commerce regime."What we have is a people who are full of creativity and who are very bright.When the necessary infrastructure is in place, the sky will be the limit, the universe will be the limit," she said.Informing public Bertrand explained that educating the man on the street to embrace this new medium was also tantamount to ensuring that the region exploited it to the fullest.

Speakers included Diane Bertrand of the Spirit Group and SHARP Electronics representatives Don Crier and Greg Nash.