Moving your files into shared cloud storage sounds like a huge job, which is why many businesses keep putting it off. In reality, you can do it in small steps without disrupting anyone.
Step 1: Take stock
Where do your files live now? Check shared drives, laptops, email, USB sticks and any free personal accounts your team may be using. Note what is important, and who needs it.
Step 2: Check what you can store
Identify anything subject to particular legal or contractual rules, such as health records or client confidentiality clauses, and decide where it belongs before moving it.
Step 3: Agree the structure
Sketch your folder layout and naming rules on one page, and get a couple of colleagues to sanity-check it.
Step 4: Start small
Move one team or one active project first. Fixing small problems now is much easier than after you have moved everything.
Step 5: Move the rest in priority order
- Current, frequently used documents first
- Recent records next
- Old archives last, after deleting what you no longer need
Step 6: Close the old route
Once you are happy, make the old location read-only for a while and set a date to retire it. If people can keep saving to both, they will, and you will end up with two filing systems.
Step 7: Keep an independent copy
Keep a backup of your most important records somewhere else, particularly during the move. See our article on why cloud storage is not the same as backup.