This article specifically applies to Google Workspace's Google Drive, but the same principles should be applied to Microsoft 365 OneDrive/Sharepoint too.

Essential Rules for all Staff

1. Always ensure you're logged into your Work Google Account, not a Personal account. (help doc coming soon)
2. All document work happens in Shared Drives, which are shared with others.
3. Everyone should avoid creating documents, and especially sharing documents, from their own private "My Drive".

This helps when a user account is deactivated, all files they created or added to Shared Drives remain intact and accessible to others without complicated migrations.

Only the files in a users Google Workspace "My Drive" are at risk of being lost or temporarily inaccessible by others.

Folder & File Structure

If your team works on a per-project or per-client basis where all files for a client should be usable for all staff on that account then a standard project-type layout is recommended:

• Projects Shared (Shared Drive) -> Customer A (Folder) -> Various Documents (Files)

If you have staff that work across the whole client-base then you can share the "Shared Drive" with them directly.

If you only want some staff members on particular clients, then adding their Google Account ID email address to the share settings of each project folder individually is key e.g. Customer A.

Avoid sharing Various Documents individually as the complexity of managing sharing settings for many individual files stacks up quickly.

If you often need to separate out management level documents such as contracts and tenders from the documents that staff work on regularly then two Shared Drives is a better fit.

• Projects Shared (Shared Drive) -> Customer A (Folder) -> Various Documents (Files)
• Management Shared (Shared Drive) -> Customer A (Folder) -> Various Documents (Files)

The "Management Shared" (Shared Drive) can be shared with Directors or sales staff only while the project files are accessible to all under the "Projects Shared" (Shared Drive).

It's usually advisable to have a "Group" level folder within the "Projects Shared" (Shared Drive) which contains cross-client or cross-project files like presentation templates and common marketing assets.

Note: If you cannot use Google Drive's Shared Drives for some technical integration or plan-specific reasons, a similar approach can be taken by setting up a Folder inside a main-account's Google Drive (such as the company owners Google Workspace account), however this folder's sharing and access is now tied to that persons individual Google Workspace account rather than any Google Workspace Admin that can change setting for Shared Drives that are owned by the organisation.

File Structure

Although Google Drive's native document formats such as Google Docs, Sheets, Slides etc do support some level of file versioning or roll-back functionality - it's recommended that when a new large change or update is planned for a file, that you "save a copy" or duplicate the file and edit the new duplicate copy instead of the original.

Files duplicated like this should be "versioned" in their filename by appending a "v1", "v2" etc to the end of the filename.

This filename versioning approach works well since the Project folders or Shared Drive's themselves are shared with staff rather than individual files directly, and it's easy to communicate about changes or change rollbacks.

Note: Technical organisations may appreciate a more nuanced approach with SemVer versioning system.

File Types

There are three main types of files on Google Drive. Native files like Google Docs, Sheets and Slides etc, compatible files and other files.

• Native files open in one of the Google Docs, Sheets or Slides respectively - they can be exported as compatible files types for sharing.
• Compatible files like Microsoft Word (e.g. .docx), LibreOffice/OpenDocument (e.g. .odf) etc files can be uploaded to Google Drive but when opened in Google Docs, they're converted first into a native file then opened. This often results in two files, the original and then a new native file. It's best to delete the original in this case if you no longer need it to prevent version confusion.
• Other files are just stored in Google Drive, taking up storage space and can be shared, some can even be "previewed" on Google Drive but not edited.

Internal Sharing Roles

1. Manager = Full control: add/remove members, delete drive, move files between drives Department heads, IT admin
2. Content Manager = Organise, edit, delete files Senior team leads
3. Contributor = Add and edit content Most team members
4. Commenter = View and annotate only Contractors needing feedback access
5. Viewer = Read-only Stakeholders, auditors

Sharing with Clients

It's often advisable to export Google Drive native docs and other files into a read-only and portable format like PDF before sharing with clients.

You can export a Google Docs as a PDF, add it to a Google Drive folder and share the file directly as a Read-only share with the clients email address.

This is preferred over attaching a PDF to email, which clogs up email storage, and you lose control of the underlying file. If you share a Google Drive share link to a PDF with a client, you can always update the share link settings such as password, expired, access management or easily replace the content in the event of a mistake.

Unless you're directly collaborating with a client on a Google Drive native documents content, you should avoid sharing the original document with a client directly. This often causes versioning issues and accidents.

User Deactivations

When a member of the team moves on from the organisation or no longer needs access to a particular share.

1. Confirm with the user that all active work is in Shared Drives (not siloed "My Drive")
2. Suspend (not delete) the account initially for a 20-day grace period.
3. Check if there are needed files still in "My Drive"; if so, transfer to Shared Drive during the suspension.
4. After 20 days, delete account.

Important: Files already in Shared Drives remain untouched when an account is deleted. Only "My Drive" files are touch to access by others if mismanaged.

This applies to Google Drive data only, not to any Email stored in the Google Account. These would need separate consideration before deletion.