By Laura Stack, MBA, CSP, The Productivity Pro®

What happened to the paperless office? We generate more paper now than we ever did before the advent of the computer! Even so, a computer's hard disk drive can get just as cluttered as your desktop. With seemingly limitless storage capacity, it's easy to create piles of files on your computer. Fortunately, the following steps will help you file your documents more logically and find them more easily.

1. Use directories and subdirectories. The first step in creating your electronic filing system is to create a structure. Let's say you have a filing cabinet where you store your paper files. If files for different projects were placed all into one main folder, you wouldn't be able to find anything! Microsoft Windows automatically sets up a folder titled "My Documents" where you can save your files. However, if you save your files in this directory, without using subfolders, you will have trouble finding what you need. Just as with paper files, you should save your documents to subfolders, which are also called subdirectories.
2. Set up your filing system. It is important to place all your folders into one main directory. This makes backups easy: You simply burn one directory to a CD. You can use "My Documents" as your main directory, or you can create your own folder. I created a directory called a_laura on my drive C.

   Note  If you put the letter "a" followed by an underscore in front of your name , your directory will always be the first directory in the folder list, making saves faster.

   In your main directory, create subfolders for each of the main categories of documents you save. Don't worry about the type of document (word processing, spreadsheet, database, and so on) that you are filing, just think about its category. For example, I use the following subdirectories:

   a_laura/business
   a_laura/personal
   a_laura/school

   Then in each subdirectory, I create additional folders. In my business directory, I use:

   c://a_laura/business

   • /Articles
   • /Associations
   • /Backups
   • /Book
   • /Clipart
   • /Contracts
   • /Courses
   • /Keynotes
   • /Marketing
   • /Media
   • /Newsletters
   • /Policies
   • /Postcards
   • /Products
   • /Promotional
   • /Templates
   • /Web sites
   Many of those listed folders then have additional subdirectories. Some folders go eight subfolders deep.

3. Save documents in the correct location. Each time I create a document, regardless of the program it was created in, I save it in the appropriate subdirectory. You may have Microsoft Office Word documents, Microsoft Office Excel workbooks, and Microsoft Office PowerPoint presentations all in the same subdirectory. To save a file in the desired subdirectory, click Save As on the File menu, and then navigate to the correct subdirectory in the file window.

   Note  In Word, you can change the default directory to which files are saved. On the Tools menu, click Options, and then click File Locations. In the list, click Documents, and then navigate to your main directory; in this example, a_laura.
   
   
   
   Now when you save documents, the Save As dialog box will automatically default to this directory; you will just need to choose the appropriate subfolder in which to save your document.

4. Create naming conventions for your files. Give your files names that will be easy to identify later. I save contracts in the format YYMMDD CLIENT PROGRAM. I would save a contract under c://a_laura/business/contracts/2003/. All the contracts in that directory would be listed in chronological order. When I first started using computers, they were all DOS-based (now I'm feeling my age). I used to have to name files with eight letters. Thank heavens for Windows! Now we have a 255-character capability for file names, so go ahead and make the name as long as you want!

   Note  The longer the name, the more likely you will be able to find it again if you use a keyword search. Ask yourself, "If I want this file again, what words or phrases would I think of first?"

5. Find what you need. If your directory system hits a snag, don't despair! You can still find that file you created by using the search feature of your operating system. If I'm out of town and John needs to quickly locate a file to send to a client, he can click Search on the Start menu, choose to search all files and folders, select a_laura, and type in any words he thinks would describe the document, and it's there! We also have a printout of my file directory, so he can quickly locate files in Windows Explorer as well.

My colleagues and clients are always amazed when we're on the phone together and they request a piece of information, because I can locate it in seconds. It's easy to create documents and save them, but the big trick is retrieving them again. Using these five steps, you will be able to find the files you want, when you want them, in 30 seconds or less.

About the author   Laura Stack is the president of The Productivity Pro®, Inc., an international consulting firm in Denver, Colorado, that specializes in productivity improvement in high-stress organizations. Laura holds an MBA in Organizational Management (University of Colorado, 1991) and is an expert on integrating advances in business productivity with the retention of key employees. Laura is the author of the best-selling book Leave the Office Earlier (Broadway Books, 2004).