In many growing businesses, the latest version of an important file is "probably on someone's laptop", or attached to an email from three weeks ago. That works until a laptop is lost, an employee leaves, or two people edit different copies of the same contract.
What a shared drive solves
- One place for each file, instead of copies scattered across devices and inboxes.
- Access from a laptop, a phone or a browser, from the office or anywhere else.
- Shared folders for teams and projects, with access controlled by the company, not by whoever happens to have the file.
- Files that stay with the company when someone leaves.
Organise before you move
A shared drive inherits the mess you put into it. Before migrating:
- Agree on a top-level structure, for example by department, by client or by project, and keep it shallow.
- Decide naming conventions for files and folders.
- Decide who owns each top-level folder and who can see it.
- Clean up duplicates and obviously obsolete files.
Access and security
- Give access to groups, not individuals, so adding and removing people is one change.
- Keep sensitive folders, such as HR and finance, restricted to the people who need them.
- Turn on multi-factor authentication for every account.
- Remove access as part of every leaver's checklist.
Do not forget backup
A shared drive is not automatically a backup. Deleted or overwritten files, or a compromised account that encrypts synced files, can affect everyone. Keep a separate, versioned backup of the drive.
How IDX helps
IDX Drive Storage gives your team a shared place for files, reachable from a laptop or a phone. For a separate backup copy, IDX Box Storage and our Data Backup service keep versioned backups away from the files your team works on every day.
IDX on digital infrastructure
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