The Joint Staff Information Management Division (IMD) is one of two divisions which make up the Joint Staff Secretariat (SJS) of the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

Joint Chiefs of Staff The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) is the body of the most senior uniformed leaders within the United States Department of Defense, which advises the president of the United States, the secretary of defense, the Homeland Security Council and ...

currently located in the

Pentagon In geometry, a pentagon () is any five-sided polygon or 5-gon. The sum of the internal angles in a simple polygon, simple pentagon is 540°. A pentagon may be simple or list of self-intersecting polygons, self-intersecting. A self-intersecting ...

in Arlington, Virginia (USA). The other division is called Actions Division (AD) which manages the daily workflow of the staff. Mission: To support the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by providing

information management Information management (IM) is the appropriate and optimized capture, storage, retrieval, and use of information. It may be personal information management or organizational. Information management for organizations concerns a cycle of organiz ...

services that include Joint Staff and Combatant Command

records management Records management, also known as records and information management, is an organizational function devoted to the information management, management of information in an organization throughout its records life-cycle, life cycle, from the time of ...

policy and oversight; forms, directives, and

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ; , OTAN), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental Transnationalism, transnational military alliance of 32 Member states of NATO, member s ...

document management; staff action research, archiving, and

content management Content management (CM) are a set of processes and technologies that support the collection, managing, and publishing of information in any form or medium. When stored and accessed via computers, this information may be more specifically referre ...

; mandatory and automatic

declassification Declassification is the process of ceasing a protective classification, often under the principle of freedom of information. Procedures for declassification vary by country. Papers may be withheld without being classified as secret, and event ...

and security reviews; and Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request processing. Information Management Division has approximately thirty personnel divided into two branches: the Records, Research and Content Branch (RRCB), and the Declassification Branch (DB). The division chief position is held by a

Department of Defense The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD, or DOD) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government charged with coordinating and supervising the six U.S. armed services: the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Space Force, ...

civil servant The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil service personnel hired rather than elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leadership. A civil service offic ...

of GS-15 pay grade. The division also has a military officer as a deputy with the rank of O-5, but all other personnel are civilians, a mix of federal and contract workers. The SJS falls within the Joint Staff's Directorate of Management (DOM) headed by an officer of two-star

flag rank A flag officer is a commissioned officer in a nation's armed forces senior enough to be entitled to fly a flag to mark the position from which that officer exercises command. Different countries use the term "flag officer" in different ways: * ...

Records, Research and Content Branch

This branch maintains the corporate archive of record of the top five

general officers A general officer is an officer of high rank in the armies, and in some nations' air and space forces, marines or naval infantry. In some usages, the term "general officer" refers to a rank above colonel."general, adj. and n.". OED Online. Ma ...

of the Joint Staff: The

Chairman The chair, also chairman, chairwoman, or chairperson, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the gro ...

(CJCS), the Assistant to the Chairman, the

Vice Chairman The chair, also chairman, chairwoman, or chairperson, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the gro ...

(VCJCS), the Director (DJS), and Vice Director (VDJS). They are referred to collectively as the "Top Five." The VDJS is dual hatted as the Director of Management of the Joint Staff. The records maintained within this archive are available for Action Officers (AOs) on the Joint Staff to conduct research as a part of processing current business actions on the staff. They are also available for the Joint Staff History Office to prepare official historical accounts of the actions of the Joint Staff. An electronic searchable archive of these actions is maintained within internal staff electronic servers for AO convenience, although the actual record copy of all actions is maintained as a paper file. Additionally, this branch is charged by the Department of Defense Chief Information Officer with

oversight responsibility for the offices of the Top Five, all the staff's directorates, and, on behalf of the CJCS, with oversight of the Records Management Program (RMP) of all combatant commands. These commands include: US Central Command (USCENTCOM), US Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM),

US Special Operations Command The United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM or SOCOM) is the unified combatant command charged with overseeing the various special operations component commands of the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Air Force of the United States Ar ...

(USSOCOM), US Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM),

US Strategic Command The United States Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands in the United States Department of Defense. Headquartered at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska, USSTRATCOM is responsible for strategic nuclear de ...

(USSTRATCOM),

United States Pacific Command The United States Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) is the unified combatant command of the United States Armed Forces responsible for the Indo-Pacific, Indo-Pacific region. It is the oldest and largest of the unified combatant commands. Lead ...

(USPACOM),

US European Command The United States European Command (EUCOM) is one of the eleven Unified Combatant Command, unified combatant commands of the United States military, headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany. Its area of focus covers and 51 countries and territori ...

(USEUCOM), and the new US Africa Command (USAFRICOM) which achieved full fledged Unified Combatant Command status in October 2008. Official records of the Joint Staff and combatant commands are managed in accordance with internally developed policy and procedures using a disposition schedule which has been approved by the

Archivist of the United States The archivist of the United States is the head and chief administrator of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) of the United States. The archivist is responsible for the supervision and direction of the National Archives. The ...

—which makes it law, in effect. Records are managed by the Joint Staff or originating combatant command's records officer throughout their lifecycle until the disposition schedule calls for them to be accessioned to the

National Archives and Records Administration The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an independent agency of the United States government within the executive branch, charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It is also task ...

(NARA), at which time NARA assumes physical and legal custody of those records which have been deemed permanent. Also, the Records, Research and Content Branch is responsible for

Enterprise Content Management Enterprise content management (ECM) extends the concept of content management by adding a timeline for each content item and, possibly, enforcing processes for its creation, approval, and distribution. Systems using ECM generally provide a secur ...

policy for the Joint Staff. Finally, the RRC Branch maintains the system of directives for the Joint Staff. It also maintains an official repository of

documents for staff reference.

Declassification Branch

This branch processes

Freedom of Information Act Freedom of Information Act may refer to the following legislations in different jurisdictions which mandate the national government to disclose certain data to the general public upon request: * Freedom of Information Act (United States) of 1966 * F ...

(FOIA) requests and conducts declassification review of Joint Staff records as part of the Automatic Declassification requirements mandated by

Executive Order 12958 Executive Order 12958 created new standards for the process of identifying and protecting classified information, and led to an unprecedented effort to declassify millions of pages from the U.S. diplomatic and national security history. In 1995, ...

as amended. The branch conducts Mandatory Declassification Reviews (MDRs) when required outside of FOIA, as well as Security Reviews of scholarly works with potential Joint Staff classified equities written by DOD members for publication or for educational purposes. Members of the public who wish access to Joint Staff records must make their requests via the DOD's Freedom of Information Office.Department of Defense Freedom of Information Office
This group of government and contract civilians works to insure the public has access to Joint Staff unclassified information as an informed (and supportive) polity is critical for successful democratic government. The Declassification Branch is also bound to protect

classified information Classified information is confidential material that a government deems to be sensitive information which must be protected from unauthorized disclosure that requires special handling and dissemination controls. Access is restricted by law or ...

to protect the security interests of the country and its citizens both at home and abroad, whether they be civilian or military.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Official Joint Chiefs of Staff Home Page (United States)

Official National Archives and Records Administration Web Site (United States)

Content management systems Joint Chiefs of Staff

Records, Research and Content Branch

Declassification Branch

See also

References

External links