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Professors – Organize Your Hard Drive

6th February, 2009 - Posted by Meggin - No Comments

In this day and age, if our computers are not working well, it causes a significant decline in our productivity. Consider these suggestions for getting your hard drive organized.

1. Put all your MS Office documents (+ other applications) within the same folders, i.e., regardless of whether they are Word, PowerPoint, or Excel documents that relate to a certain project, keep the documents together. For many years, I had PowerPoint presentations in their own file, Word documents in their own file, etc. Finally, I realized that for any one class, project, or grant, I had Excel spreadsheets, Word docs, presentations, etc. that all went together. Redo your hard drive with this in mind. When you open the folder related to one grant (article, book, or class), all of the various documents are there. If you only want to look at one type, you can sort on that type.
2. Use EasyReach software, Google Desktop, or some other hard drive search tool. Personally, I use Easy Reach and I couldn’t do without it. It allows me to search every single item on my hard drive and find the document, email, or whatever else I was looking for. Mac users have a great search tool and one of the features of Vista is a better search tool than previous operating systems…but just make sure you have SOMETHING that works. It needs to be a function that has indexed your entire hard drive (just like Google indexes the web) to allow for fast searching.
3. Use an outline concept for the folders on your hard drive. Start with broad categories and move down to specific categories and folders. When I was a professor, I had three main areas that were my top level categories: Teaching, Research, and Service. Sound familiar? Then, within those broad categories, I had subfolders for individual courses, research projects, and external service. This is sensible for a number of reasons, including when it comes time for your annual review and/or P & T packets.
4. Rename documents with current dates if they are the type likely to be revised. It doesn’t help to put the word "final" at the end, believe me. There is no FINAL with documents. My assistant and I use not only the date but our initials at the end so we know who was the last person to attend to the document. For example, a letter might have the letter name MEMc 10-10-09 and it would indicate that I was the last person who made changes. It takes a few seconds of extra time, but it’s worth it.
5. Consider deleting all but the most recent item when you complete a revision. Or, if you don’t delete, at least create a folder within each folder that says ~OLD (the tilde sends the folder to the top of the list). Move earlier versions into this folder. This cleans up a cluttered folder.
6. Create "history" (or "old") folders within other folders, so you still have access to documents, but they aren’t cluttering up your screen when you are looking for something. As mentioned above, if you put a symbol, such as a tilde ~ in front of the word ‘history’ or ‘old’ then it moves it to the top of the folder list.
7. Be vigilant about the digital decluttering. Put a note in your planner once a quarter to clean out the folders on your hard drive.

Just try the tips above that make sense for you and your situation. Choose one and try that out, then choose another one that works.

I invite you to access a multitude of other timely tips to support your overall productivity as a professor. Just go to…

**Top Ten Productivity Tips    http://www.TopTenProductivityTips.com

**Articles for Professors    http://www.ArticlesforProfessors.com

…and see what’s there for you to use at no cost.

(c) 2009 by Meggin McIntosh, Ph.D., "The Ph.D. of Productivity"(tm). A former professor, now working through her company, Emphasis on Excellence, Inc., Meggin McIntosh changes what people know, feel, dream, and do. Sound interesting? It is!