What routines, practices, program, apps..etc do you use for filing/retrieval?

[martin]

Our office is swamped with paper documents (originals we generated, originals we received, contracts, copies, faxed correspondence, all sorts of engineering drawings and revisions of all these documents,..etc. The workflow path is not always clear and lots of things end up with me (as pending with no specific deadlines for action) plus I am not familiar with all aspects of our business operations (as they are mostly determined on case by case basis) which is not helping my learning curve (business is not streamlined and very scattered you can say) so it is natural that I sometimes forget how things are related and lose track of things.. I need a way to ease the pain of filing and retrieval, help me be more organized in this environment..

Please share with me any routines, practices and tools you are using to stay organized 

[Atlanta Z3]

We can scan documents to our email from the copier.  I rename the email the subject and if it's something obscure I try to add a few lines to the body of the email as well.  The scanned doc is saved to the project folder with an appropriate name.  Search features to find docs could be in email as a last resort.  I usually use the search feature in my documents.
If something lands on your desk take a minute to ask which project and put a quick sticky note on it until you can find it's proper home.  I also use the small 3x3 post it notes as temporary labels in file folders, helps to keep me organized.  You might keep a small stack of folders with blank stickys already attached on your desk to be able to write the project name on the doc or drawing until you get file as usual.
Another thought if they will let you would be to come in on a Saturday and just go through the files to familiarize yourself with the files and maybe get caught up on organization.  I know it wouldn't be my first choice to work a Saturday either.

[msmarieh]

Are these individual projects with similar types of documents? If so, it might be helpful to come up with an overall file naming/numbering structure. For instance, at an engineering company I worked at it, it might have gone something like this:

XYZ Building
1. Client Correspondence
1.1 Incoming (if broken out separately. though more likely one folder in chron order)
1.2 Outgoing
2. Photographs of Project
3. Request for Bid
4. Proposal
5. Contract
6. Drawings
6.1 Initial Drawings
6.2 Final Drawings
7. Permits
8. Change Orders

So if the projects all follow a similar route, where they are all the same general types of papers, following this structure might help you in organizing them. Those overall numbers would remain the same for every project, so you'd always know if you're looking for the contract, it would always be in Folder 5.

If that is not the case, then likely something like everything being alphabetical by client name would work with subsections per project if they have more than one project.

A bit more detail (nothing confidential of course), would probably help us to be more helpful.

[Atlanta Z3]

I worked for a construction project management firm and we kept the pressboard divided files folders for each project.  Six tabs of which I don't remember the exact titles, but I kept a sheet of labels for each tab and always had a few ready made for the next project.  I know some of the titles were Lease (or land acquisition type), geo physical, accounts payable, bank docs (it was construction for BOA), and a contact list was always the top sheet on the left side.  The same for accounts payable I kept a sheet summarizing all bills for the project with a total (from a spreadsheet)

One other thought is to purchase a labeling device of some type either a p-touch by brother or one of the dymo labelers with software.  Either will make your life so much simpler!

Keep in mind that the previous person's method may not have been the best and if mgmt approves you might not have to keep to their system.  (I usually reorganize the filing system with any company I join.)