Google Drive is an incredibly powerful tool for storing, sharing, and collaborating on files. But if you’re not careful, it can quickly become a disorganized mess. Let’s dive into some essential tips to help you with managing Google Drive and maximize its potential.
1) Review Your Google Drive Settings
Google Drive has lots of new features and design. Click on the settings cog in the upper right of Google Drive to select “Settings.”
Select "My Drive" as your start page
This is a personal choice, do you want when you go to drive.google.com show “My Drive” or “Home”. What is Home? It is Google Drives GUESS as to what files you want. Personally, I do not want this. You can not organize Home. You can not have any control over Home. Hard pass for me.
Enable Workspaces for Managing Google Drive
In my EDU account there is an option for “Workspaces.” Note this is not an option in my free Gmail account. Unlike “Home” where you have no control over the docs presented to you, Workspaces provides you complete control.
Open PDF's in a New Tab
This is a personal preference, but I don’t want to view my PDF’s in Drive. It covers up my other files. I still want access to my Drive and to read the PDF.
Are You Fully Committing to Google Drive?
All in on Google Drive? Checkbox “Convert uploads” so that any Microsoft files are turned automatically into Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides. If you’re not ready to fully commit and you want a backup of your Microsoft files, leave the checkbox unchecked. The Micosoft files will be saved in Drive in it’s original format. If you want to to convert them to Google Docs, open the file and use the File menu to “Copy to…” This will have 2 files in your Drive, one in the original Microsoft format. The other in the Google format.
Set Offline Access
You can access your Google Drive files when you are offline. You can create new Docs, Sheets, and Slides when you are offline. Checkbox to enable offline access.
Doc to Slides
Quickly turn your Google Doc text into Google Slides
Created by AliceKeeler – Collects NO user data.
2) Utilize Workspaces
Workspaces allow you to have complete control over what files you see when you are managing Google Drive. You can have up to 25 files in a workspace list.
Start with Workspace
Suggestion to get into the habit of going to Workspace each day when you open your Google Drive as your first action. Have files you want to follow up on? Create a Workspace instead of a folder. Working on a project? Instead of leaving open 10 tabs, organize each of these files into a Workspace.
3 Dots on the File
Add a file you are working on to a Workspace board by using the 3 dots. Select “Organize” and “Add to workspace.”
3) Utilize Advanced Filters
DO NOT dig down into folders. Stop it. It is inefficient. What Google Does really well is search. Use the Workspace boards to customize the view of documents you are currently working with. Everything else, search for it. There is a search bar at the top of the Google Drive window. When type in a key phrase, it will search the title, the body, and use OCR to search the images in the files.
Filter the Search
If a basic search isn’t quickly bringing up exactly what you are thinking, click on the icon in the right side of the search bar. This pops up “Advanced search.” This is your Google Drive bestie. Rarely should you be using Google Drive without it. One nice thing Drive has added are quick options for Advanced search. You will see these options when utilizing Drive.
- Did you remember the file was a presentation? Click file type from the first drop down.
- Owner is me is a big one for me. Helps filter out other people’s stuff. NOT owned by me allows me to create my own custom “Shared with me” filter that I can control.
- Keywords in the file, no matter where they are located, can help you quickly get to an “untitled document’ you still need to use.
- Restrict your search to the title of the document.
- Don’t want to search all of My Drive? Filter down the selection of where to search.
- Files you deleted are permanently deleted after 30 days, before then… you can try to find those deleted files in the trash.
- Anything you have a 1% chance of ever touching again… star it. Filter all of your searches for starred files. This ensures your results are always meaningful and not random things people have shared with you.
- Narrow down the date it was last modified if you know it was edited recently.
- If you are looking for documents that were submitted for approval, narrow down your search to these documents.
- When trying to find a file, it is not uncommon for me to think about the person I shared it with. Narrow down results to only documents you have shared with a particular individual.
- In a Google Doc if you @ at mention someone you have the option to assign the comment as a task. Look for comments that need to be addressed by filtering for the follow ups.
3) Avoid Sharing Documents
Have more control over your document sharing by NOT sharing documents. Instead, share the folder Documents in a folder inherit the sharing permissions of the folder. Focusing on folder sharing instead of document sharing makes it significantly easier to add or remove someone from a collection of files.
4) Embrace Shortcuts
Google changed how files are organized in Google Drive. Instead of organizing your files in multiple folders, you add a shortcut. As the document owner, you choose how and where you want to organize your file. Do not worry about other people. How does it make sense for you?
Right click on a file, or use the 3 dots, to “Organize.” Use the option to “Add a shortcut.” This will allow you to choose other folders you want the file or folder to appear in. This provides access to the file without disrupting your filing system.
Tip: Create a subfolder in a folder and share the subfolder with selected individuals. Add shortcuts to the files from the main folder to provide access to the files. Delete the entire subfolder when you want to remove access to the files for the group.
Deleting a shortcut does NOT delete the file.
“Shared with me” is a FILTER not a folder. Immediately organize shared files with a shortcut, or add to a Workspace.
Shared with me is not a file location!
5) Only 3 Folders in My Drive and No Files
Your Google Drive is stressing you out because there are so many folders and files and it feels overwhelming to organize all of them.
DO NOT LET MY DRIVE BE YOUR FILE LOCATION.
You can DRAG files from Google Drive to the left side folders. If you have too many folders, this can be overwhelming. Have a maximum of 3-5 folders in My Drive. These are your 3-5 big categories. Make subfolders in the folders.
One of the folder is your “My Files” that you just drag EVERYTHING into. All your folders. All your files. Just drag them in there. This way when you go to “My Drive” you don’t see a sea of documents. If there are documents in there… don’t think, just drag them into “My Files.” (I call my folder “Hot Mess”). Keep your My Drive CLEAN all the time.
When you use a file, organize it. When the file is open, there is a folder icon next to the document name. Sort your files into your folders, this might be with a shortcut. Get into the habit of using that folder icon from within the document. Not sure where to put it? Just add it to your “Hot Mess”/”My Files” folder.
Temporarily, add a shortcut to a folder to My Drive. A folder I am currently working on organizing files into. I will add a shortcut to My Drive so it shows up on the left hand side. Making it easy to drag files from my “Hot Mess” folder to a desired location. Delete the shortcut when you’re not actively using it to organize.
Do NOT Open Folders
SEARCH SEARCH SEARCH. Use the advanced search at the top of your Google Drive to find files. Try to avoid digging down in to those subfolders you created.
6) Use the Detail Pane
Click the i in a circle icon at the top right of Google Drive. This will allow you to view when the file was created, who it is shared with, when it was last edited.
Use the Description Box
At the very bottom of the Details pane is a description box. When searching Google Drive, the description is also searched. This is a good place to add distinct hashtags to help you find files. You can also leave a descriptive note about the file to help others who the file is shared with.
