This procedure describes how our company uses Office 365 to manage our documents and ensure that relevant and up-to-date information is available to the people who need it, where and when they need it. This helps us keep our information organized, traceable, and under control, contributing to efficiency, productivity, and regulatory compliance.
Note that this example needs to be adapted to your company and industry. For instance, a pharmaceutical company will have much stricter requirements regarding document management than a gardener.
Information management
The company’s published and approved information, which is valid and current and available to everyone, shall be published on the intranet.
The material on the intranet precedes all other material you may find within the company.
When we publish a page on the intranet, we distinguish between primary and supporting information.
Primary / supporting information
The primary information should be as concise as possible, covering 80% of what the average visitor might need.
The remaining 20% and other reference/supporting information are published as supporting information by being published in the library, as shown at the bottom of the main page or as links.
The purpose of the primary information is to be a gateway to everything related to the subject area.
Supporting information may be needed to fully understand the primary information, but not all visitors to the area use it. Examples include specific legal texts, accumulated knowledge in the field, forms, or other related material.
When a supporting material is ready for publication, the PDF version of the document is copied to the correct folder under a primary page on the intranet and is then published.
Documents that are subject to audit, such as our QMS documentation, are sent for approval when published on the intranet. The system automatically handles the approval flow based on the type of document, which means that the document must be marked with “type” before it can be sent for approval; otherwise, the system will tell you.
Document templates
We have linked all our current templates in the most common Office 365 tools, such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
When creating a new document:
- Click “File” in the top left corner of the Office 365 tool’s menu and select “New.”
- Click on the tab for your company-specific templates (“Company name,” to the right of the default Office tab) and choose the template based on what you need to do
- Save the document under “Files” in the correct Team, channel, and folder according to our rules for “Naming of documents.”
Example. To produce a quote in Word for a customer, click on the templates under the folder “Business Develop” and select a quote template for the product/service you are going to quote. Make sure to save the quote in the Teams group “Sales” in the channel folder “Quotes.” If a folder for the customer does not already exist, create one and name it with the customer’s full name.
Development of templates
New templates are created from the general template in the respective Office 365 tools.
Take an existing template and save it under the heading Files in Team “Development” and channel “New templates” under “Naming of documents.” Make suggestions for changes in the template and ping the KMA coordinator to the template via Teams.
Other relevant things to describe
The basic principle is that a user should be able to understand how to handle company information by reading about intranet document management.
Supporting information
Examples of things you need to describe:
- Microsoft Teams Structure
- Microsoft Teams life cycle
- Communicating changes when updating information
- Archiving outdated information
- Your folder and file structure
- Rules for naming documents
- Project Management
- Document management in OneDrive
Depending on the company, other specific parts may, of course, be needed, such as
- CAD file management
- InDesign file management
- Process for approval of governing documents
Guide to more efficient working methods
This document management routine gives us a practical guide for working more efficiently, securely, and productively. By following this procedure, we can control information so it is accessible, up-to-date, and in accordance with our company policies, laws, and regulations.