The most common way a policy management tool fails is not that it lacked a feature, it is that it asked for too much on the first day. Every field is a tax on the person entering documents, and past a threshold entry simply stops, leaving a register that is partly filled and therefore misleading. Six fields are enough to be useful on day one. This page sets out the six and what to add later, in order.
The six: title, owner, version, review date, scope, status
Title says what it is. Owner is a person, not a department. Version distinguishes this one from the last. Review date is when somebody looks again. Scope is who it applies to. Status says whether it is draft, published or retired. Those six answer every question a register is asked in its first year.
Why owner has to be a person
Operations owns it means nobody owns it. The most common finding in a neglected register is a procedure whose owner left, and that is invisible unless the field holds a name. It is also the field that makes a review possible: chasing a department is a task nobody completes.
What to add second, once the register exists
The link to the policy above it, and the attestation. Both are more valuable than they look and both are impossible to populate usefully until the register is complete, which is why they come second. Adding attestation to a half-built register produces signatures against documents nobody has confirmed are current.
What to resist indefinitely
Categories, tags, risk ratings and custom taxonomies. They feel like structure and they are mostly a way to postpone finishing the register. If the overdue list is right and the owners are real, the taxonomy adds very little: on the worked example that overdue list is 14.4 of 48 documents and 36 hours of work.
Questions people ask about policy management tool
What are the six fields?
Title, owner, version, review date, scope and status. Those six answer every question a register is asked in its first year.
Why must the owner be a person?
Because a department cannot be chased. The most common finding in a neglected register is a procedure whose owner left, and only a name shows it.
When should we add attestation?
After the register is complete. Signatures against documents nobody has confirmed are current is evidence of the wrong thing.