Who hasn’t done this: quickly saved a millionth file in My Documents, under a generic name? And who hasn’t desperately scrambled to find it later, especially on days ruled by Murphy’s law? 

This may sound too simple to be true but, believe me, when everything else may be going wrong (hey, it happens) having a better filing system can be the first RIGHT STEP toward brighter business days! 

It’s part of an entrepreneurial mindset that values not only money but also other resources, like time and energy, as successful business fuel. Being efficient with these resources can make the difference between being a small business versus being a growing business.

I have helped my small business clients change a common, two-step approach that does not support healthy management:

• Everything they don’t want they throw into the Bin
• Everything they DO want they toss into My Documents

When a client hires me to develop unique resource etiquette and improve their management style, a very common ‘first step’ is to encourage them to think in terms of umbrella categories.

For filing, this means 

1. Recognizing the different ‘pools’ into which you’ll need to store your information. 
2. Once you have that defined, make separate folders for each ‘pool’.

For example, if you only have one computer or laptop, you may end up with a model like this: 

• Clients    –  put all client-related files here
• Business – store business information here
• Personal – save everything else here

Categorizing is more efficient than just choosing between the Bin or My Documents. Or organizing files by date. 

By switching from “where” or “when” to “what” thinking, you re-channel your energy, time and information in a more profitable manner.

The next step is small but fundamental:

     3. Make use of sub-folders; 

The categories will be your primary folders.  Within each primary folder, you’ll want to create sub-folders – again grouped by category. Let’s expand on last week’s example:

• category: Clients                         
• sub-folder: International 
• sub-folder: Jacques Lavigne 

Inside Jacques’ folder, I could add more sub-folders (e.g. contracts, payroll, website).

My last tip is another simple one.

     4. Choose meaningful file names.

This makes it easy to find documents and avoid opening multiple “wrong” files. This saves you time (a resource), and energy (another resource!) Power and PROFIT can come from managing these resources with the same seriousness as capital.

Newsweek reported that the average American spends 55 minutes a day looking for things they can’t find. 

For any business, but especially small businesses, wasting 55 dollars, 55 calories or 55 minutes A DAY can snowball into serious waste. Those same resources could be INVESTED instead!