Organisational implications

We need to consider EPMS both

• for the individual
• for the organisation

There are many relevant issues surrounding EPMSs for organisations.

• As suggested initially by academic institutions in America, the organisation, or parts of the organisation, may want to have their own e-portfolio management systems, which can act both as a repository of organisational information and a showcase on the Web. Such systems might have much in common with EPMSs for individuals; or they may even use the same systems.
• Management of organisations requires some kind of management of the organisational competency profile. This suggests that it would make sense for organisational systems to interface with the skill and competency parts of individual EPMSs.
• It might also be useful for any organisational EPMS to interface with the presentational aspect of individual EPMSs, so that readers on the Web can "drill down" to the presentational portfolios of individuals. This could greatly reduce the burden on maintaining "About Us" pages.
• Any repository system could be made to serve both individual and organisational requirements.

However, one issue which keeps on coming up in discussion is that employees will not use an [EPMS]? for personal reflection and development unless:

• they trust that the organisation will not intrude on their privacy
• similarly, that they can effectively control access to their records.

Failing this, employees are likely to see EPMSs as agents of management, and enter there only what they believe the management want to see. This would radically compromise one of the features of e-portfolio systems that is seen as most significant by many writers.

EPMS for the organisation should allow:

• management of personal information as permitted by the individual, and not otherwise
  • managing competences
  • managing employee records
  • recruitment
• managing organisational IPR
  • data belonging to the organisation and accessible by the e-portfolio owner
  • ...