in this video i will show you how to properly organize probably the most common thing you own well what could that possibly be i'm not talking about money nor is your clothes or anything like that it's simply your digital files on your computer of which you own at least thousands or even hundreds of thousands or millions so in this video i will not only share the best structure to organize digital files and folders but also very practical examples how to best organize your files at work universi
ty or school and within your private life following these tips will help you to increase your productivity and organization tremendously as well as to limit the time searching for documents because you know everything has its place and can be pulled up whenever required maybe you're not yet fully aware of the amount of data and files you own nowadays so just check the number of pictures on your phone real quick and maybe even the number of files on your computer and you'll realize that you own a
ton a ton of pictures videos documents and any other files or folders to organize all of the files overall there are three major types of file management systems chaotic storage math dumping and hierarchy structures and if you stay until the very end you will not only know what the best practice in digital file managements are but also which crucial aspect you should consider when organizing your files to avoid getting this first as i mentioned there is chaotic storage which is a system from th
e logistics industry so describing that items in a warehouse are always stored whenever there's place for example amazon also uses this method in its warehouses and just stores the same item at random across the entire warehouse that makes the item faster to pick as part of a bigger basket when the orders arrive but only works with multiple items of the same type so might be difficult for organizing your files then there is mass dumping meaning you just have one place where you store all of your
documents or files and by all i mean all this is similar to the email inbox approach for some people where they do not have this folder system but just leave again all of their emails in their inbox without any further grouping apparently this works for some people however by far the most widely spread and popular most effective file management system is the hierarchy structure the hierarchy or tree structure is called like that because it resembles a multi-level hierarchy which might look like
the roots or the branches of a dream question to you if at all which of these three file management systems are you currently using and please let me know in the comments because i'm super curious about that so let's dig into the most popular and effective method the hierarchy structure where your entire file system will be based on different hierarchy levels first you have level 0 l0 with overarching folders covering broader topics then there's level 1 l1 which is the first level below includi
ng sub-topics of level zero then there's level two l2 which is another sub-level with even more granular sub-topics of level one and so on so in theory there is no end to a hierarchical structure but in practice it often boils down to three to five sub-levels so now let's take a closer look at some practical examples of how a hierarchy structure can look like at work university or school and finally in private life at work for example my level 0 usually contains three folders admin projects and
topics or domains and to keep a clean structure make sure to always number the folders in a proper way such that they are ordered based on your preferences and do not just randomly move around depending on date of creation or date of modification therefore i recommend using an ascending two-digit number like zero one zero two zero three and so on so within our admin folder zero one on l0 most likely i would have subfolders like employment documents resume training or learning and development and
so on just general folders here again within each folder use the same two digit number zero one zero two and so on for all of the subfolders within the second folder my projects folder on level zero i always have a level one structure like this project a b is my project number one project cd is project two and project three four or five would again be labeled however the project is called and within each project subfolder i recommend a level two structure that looks like this there's an admin f
older followed by input data then there is a folder for analyses one for meeting documents and maybe another one for final reports by having always the same or at least a very similar structure for my project folders it makes it super easy to find documents even after a very long time let's maybe look at one more level so within the meetings folder within that folder for example you could have a level 3 subfolder for each and every meeting you have especially for work and university or school so
metimes also in private life it definitely makes sense to label each document properly in practice that means not only stating an obvious and clear name but also equally important stating the date of the document for example you could label a meeting presentation as follows 2021 0 5 21 project a b important meeting which is year month date underscore project name underscore title of the meeting and depending on how many changes you make that day or save several different versions of the document
you can add different suffixes such as v1 v2 etc for the version number of that day or sometimes something like vf for final or vs symbolizing that this document was sent out for example to a client next let's take a look at an example from school or university so when i used to go there i had a quite straightforward file management system that i can highly recommend talking about university level zero was my respective degree so i had two folders one for my bachelor degree in international bus
iness and won for my master's degree in international business with a major focus on finance level 1 in both overarching folders included the semesters of the degree however i slightly changed that numbering here so i started with an overall admin folder followed by the individual semesters so my first second third semester and so on and with each semester folder i would then have a level two folders for each course and within that maybe even level three folders for scripts term papers group wor
ks or the like finally let's look at a folder structure that can be used in private life and that is actually similar to my own structure which works really well in my opinion on level 0 you can have overarching categories such as a photo for your finances one for your insurance for housing contracts vacation another one for hobbies and maybe one for self-development and so on obviously you can mix and match the categories based on your own preferences for now let's further take a look at the co
ntracts folder on level one you could have sub photos for each and every contract you have such as your mobile phone your gym or your car releasing before you're now starting to organize your files and folders there's one tip that you should definitely know that for windows there is a maximum file length of 255 characters so the 255 characters are not a maximum for a single file but for the entire file path so the one you can see in the file explorer therefore make sure to stick to short and con
cise folder and file names throughout your file levels otherwise you might run out of characters and are not able to label your files and photos anymore but don't worry you don't miss that point since windows will happily remind you with this and by the way as you might have seen i am a windows user and i use office 365 including all the common office applications the best thing however is that onedrive the cloud storage of microsoft is also included in that package so this allows you to easily
synchronize all your files with your cloud space or even just fully work on your cloud which is what i'm doing that way you make sure that all files are safely stored and still available in case you might encounter any hardware problems so you find a link to microsoft 365 in the description below if you found these tips in that video helpful hit the like button and don't forget to subscribe to the channel also check out this video where i share tips on how to become more detail-oriented on this
one where you will learn how to take effective notes at work or school thanks for watching and see you next time
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Another pro tip - Create a template folder with the tree structure under it. When you create a new project, just duplicate the project template folder and you don't have to go and set up the structure every time. Saves time and means that your folders are consistent.
Just started a university course and found this video extremely helpful. Your accent, manner and smile and professional approach is perfect a new subscriber, thanks
I became an office manager and personal assistant out of the blue with little admin skills from my various jobs over the years. It just fell in my lap from a referral. Now I'm scrambling to fill in the gaps in my skills to run the office on my own and I feel rather incompetent at times. I've been searching for skill-building tools, and yours has been a huge answer to my ask. Hoping I find more on your channel to support my growth with the amazing chiropractor/trainer of mastery for chiropractors across the country that I now support. Thank you so much for this wonderful training!!!
I use to create an alphabetical list of main folders (AB,CD,EF...etc) where each folder has sub-folders with their labels for the main topics (personal, work, projects,personal info etc) .It may look quite simple to you, however is so practical when arrives a moment to search any file, moreover the back-up disk has the same structure, so when an updated is needed, all the repeated files are no copied (unless the "weight" is different) ....Your tutorial gives me a new perspective and fresh ideas....Thank you so much Miss David.
I've been using the Hierarchy Structures since the very first time I worked in an office, and I am very happy to see how my method of naming folders and files is similar to yours. While I don't use sequential numbers for the folders, I also try to apply some level of hierarchy to the files, like: Project_File Type_Date_Version I also wrote a script in VBA to mass read and rename the files, so I don't have to change one by one. Thank you for your content!
This is a very good simple instruction on how to organize data files in a PC. I would add one thing I have done is structure my accounting files along the lines of a balance sheet. 01 - Accounting files (then subfiles)01 Cash, 02 Accounts receivable, 03 other current assets, Property and equipment etc. In an accounting department this is a very useful way to organize files.
Thanks a lot for sharing this. I've always used a hierarchy in my file system to store and find files afterwards, and I've been doing it for more 25 years now. Nonetheless, this video can still ispire me better solutions and an even 'cleaner' approach. Managing and organizing files in a very healthy way has always been a very neglected issue, leaving it all to the personal approach, which sometimes is simply not as efficient as it should be. Keep it up Lea, great work!
I am trying to organise my life , decluttered and deep cleaned my flat, now going through all paperwork and digital organisation is my next goal - this video just randomly popped up - serendipity :) Great video.
Use 00, 10, 20, etc as prefixes for folders as this allows you to number keys to navigate and you can add temporary/special root level folders like 11, 21, etc.
In the 70’s, one of my first jobs was working with filing systems for different companies. The lessons I learned stay with me today when organizing my computer files. It’s close to your hierarchy system but labeling is based on time or place or client name or project name. I am a Realtor now so beyond client files, there are rule or legal changes, advertising or graphics. It’s a lot to track.
Thank you for your file naming protocol. I have used this for the past 10 years and it makes it a breeze to find things and, more importantly, not look at files that are out of date. Also, the attorneys love an organized files structure for discovery.
Someone once talked about a perfect language. They concluded that it would require prefect knowledge from the beginning. The hierarchy system reminds me of that. Finding any file based on content and avoiding duplicates are important. And don't rely on storing something in the cloud, it is nothing but a disk owned by someone else.
Thanks for showing practical advice on this very important topics in life! I'm sure people will have to further modify to fit individual life. But, the message of "there are better ways" is critical. ****** For those who are concerning not able to find the wanted file buried inside the directory tree, Window's File Explorer has a very robust "search" function that can search entire directory tree. So, as long as you name the filename and directory name with needed keywords about files, searching is easy!
I really liked this post. I use the hierarchical method with the same numbering system: 00, 01, 02, etc. I personally find it best not to go beyond three deep. You have a delightful and clear presentation!
Good one! I've long used hierarchical, frequently using 3-digit numerical prefix (e.g. Book Writing projects. Having written over a hundred books, 3 digits required). Also, love the suggestion of yearMonthDay sequence. Helps to keep things properly organized by date, where optimum. And good advice on file path limitations. If folder identity becomes too cryptic, I will add a 0_filename.txt file which sorts to the top with further description of contents. Sometimes this can be in the filename itself, and other times I will add a longer description in the file contents, e.g. 0_Contents.txt -- "Research on local dinosaur species for Pangaea Sister Sites."
5:43 for dates in the filename you better put in the end of the rest part of it. this will differentiate your files with dates. and the sorting algorythm will put identical files with diff dates and/or versions in one place rather than sort them by dates
I use a variation of those structures depending on the requirement or situation. If I am busy working on a specific topic or folder for a few days or more, then I will put a + or - in front of the Folder name. this will then push them to the top of the folder structure and makes it much quicker and easier to find.
That's a good description of these 3 storage styles. Thank you for including the info that long folder names will cause you problems in time. If you include those long folder names, and the long root folder that Teams and Google Drive adds, you will quickly find that you can't save files because of very unhelpful error messages from Windows. Keep the folder names SHORT! Have MORE L0 folders, and keep the sub-folders. In the case of Google Drive (and other object storage systems) performance begins to degrade with more files. So a best practice for Google Shared Drives is to have MORE L0 drives and not nest them so much.
2:44 I try to use a hierarchy structure but it oftentimes ends up being a chaotic or mass dumping structure. Before watching the rest I think I can make a folder for mass dumping as files come in and process them to the right place when I can schedule a time to put the files where they need to be.