How to Organize Documents on a Computer

Organizing documents on a computer doesn’t need to be complicated. In fact, simpler is better. Think of how you would want your documents organized in a file cabinet and emulate your filing system. It may take some time to get your files organized on your computer, but you’ll never search long for a document if you keep your computer documents well-organized. The exact organizational system needs to make sense to you so that you know exactly where to look for the document you need.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

1. Determine what your broad categories should be, and keep them to a minimum. These are large categories because all of the smaller topics will fit into these categories. For example, you may have the following large categories: Personnel, Vendors, Products and Projects.

2. Create folders for each of your main categories--in this case: Personnel, Vendors, Products and Projects.

3. Create folders within each main category for more specific topics. For example, in the Personnel folder, you could have folders (topics) such as Performance Reviews, Safety Committee and Job Descriptions.

4. Create further folders for subtopics, depending on the level of detail you want. For example, in the Job Descriptions folder in the Personnel folder, you may also want to create folders for subtopics such as Management, Part Time and Seasonal.

5. Organize each folder in this manner, and drop documents into the appropriate places.

6. Remember this rule of thumb: if you have to take more than a moment to search through documents to find a specific document within a folder, chances are you need to continue to organize.