By Bill Thomas
From my “DocuBLOG” column
Bill works for USA-ONE Interactive
Ever watch a squirrel burying nuts in the park? The casual observer assumes the squirrel remembers exactly where all his stashes are located — under the bush, in the flower bed, next to the oak tree — and can return to them throughout the cold winter when snow covers the ground. It’s heartwarming, and unfortunately, has little or no basis in reality. Anyone who has seen peanut plants sprouting in their garden knows well that there are faults in a squirrel’s archiving system. He may happen upon a stash, or maybe not. He may go hungry.
It’s like that with some offices too. Staff carefully tuck away important papers in a drawer, on a desktop in plain sight, or deep in the bowels of the file cabinets “where they’re safe.” This is squirrel archiving! And, I hope you aren’t using it in your office.
Squirrel archiving has an electronic variety too. It is practiced every time an office sets up a system of electronic filing that depends entirely upon the employees’ whims. For example, consider all the ways one staff electronically filed their company’s important Carlsen contract and negotiation documents:
Employee #1: Carlsen contract and negotiation
Employee #2: Contract and negotiation — Carlsen
Employee #3: Contracts
Employee #4: Nate Carlsen
Employee #5: Nate and Mary C
That’s just the start. There is no end to the possible variations when you let well-meaning employees each devise their own file names for archiving. You need a pre-planned system and you need to insist that everyone follows it. This is one time it pays to be the office Nazi about something: insist upon absolute universal compliance.
A logical, universally followed system is important for files you use every day. But when you are archiving a file away for long-term storage, how it’s named will make the difference in whether it can be found again or becomes the proverbial peanut growing in your “office garden”, lost, buried and forgotten by the person who squirreled it away in a distant electronic archive or basement file box.
Beyond smart, logical, universal naming conventions, here are a few things to remember about your electronic archiving:
- Make sure your archiving system allows for easily scanning of paper documents into the system.
Why keep anything in a paper form when it will take up less space and be more secure in an electronic archiving system?
- Your archiving system should be able to be accessed off-site by employees who need to retrieve information while working at home or traveling for the company.
- Your archiving system must be able to limit access to sensitive or confidential files. This is particularly important if your company deals with medical files. There are legal restrictions on how to protect certain classes of information. You need to be sure your archiving system honors those laws.
- The archiving system must be easy to use and safe. Store electronic documents either off site or in a secure location within your company. Fire, flood and tornadoes need to figure into your plans when you’re deciding on an archiving system. As unlikely as they seen, they do happen.
If your office is still operating on the squirrel archiving system, it’s time to come out of the woods and into the organized, digital age. Make this the year you take charge of your documents, hopefully before something irreplaceable is figuratively left to grow roots in the flowerbed.
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