Worky spreadsheet question - how to visually explain what I need

[HazelnutRaspberryRoulade]

I’m hoping there’s a brilliant mind here who can help me display what seems to me to be a very complicated project!

I work for a company that has just merged with another company. We both use a piece of software and each have various folders and subfolders that need merging into one account. Our account manager at the software company has to merge all the folders for us, and so needs to know how we want it done. Here is where I’m struggling - we have two accounts, two sets of folder names, and within those lots of subfolders. Not only do I want to combine the folders, but some of the subfolders within those folders need consolidating. So in folder A of company 2 there are subfolders X, Y and Z, but I want to merge them all into one XYZ subfolder before moving folder A into company 1.

Even trying to explain it here seems quite headache inducing, and there are dozens of this type of scenario to convey to our account manager. Does anyone have any experience of this, or any examples of how I can express this to our account manager without several misunderstandings?

So lets just say you have folders containing the following files:

AX - AX1 AX2 AX3
AY - AY1 AY2 AY3
AZ - AZ3 AZ2 AZ3

BX - BX1 BX2 BX3
BY - BY1 BY2 BY3
BZ - BZ1 BZ2 BZ3

Do you want a new folder, A, containing AX1...AZ3, which is then combined with B (BX1...BZ3)?

I'd list the new folder structure you want so:
Folder 1
Subfolders 1a, 1b, 1c,
Folder 2
Subfolders 2a, 2b 2c

Then put them all down the left and in the right hand column list the source folders so
New subfolder 2c = company x folder y and z plus company d folder c

Thanks for attempting to get your head round this Time!

I think it’s sort of what you’re suggesting. I’ll give a very basic example.

Company 1 has

Folder:
fruit

Within that, subfolders:
Apples
Oranges
Grapes

And each of those subfolders contain documents.

Company 2 has

Folder:
Fruit

Subfolders:
Apples
Grapes
Pineapples 2017
Pineapples 2018
Pineapples 2019

So, as well as explaining to them that I want to merge all the matching folders from company 2 into company 1, I also want to show that I need them to combine all the pineapple subfolders into one main pineapple subfolder, and then move that subfolder over into company 1’s account.

Does that help at all? I’m honestly frying my brain trying to get my head round this project!

Oh @museumum that sounds like a good solution. I think I just need to get going and try it, I’ve been staring at this sheet for ages. I’ll see if I can make that work. Thank you!

You have 2 lots of folders, which have subfolders underneath them.

I think you need to start a completely new folder structure for the new merged company , to move both "old" structures into. Then you need to list your mapping of old into new, (for both companies).

You will need to "map" at subfolder level if you want to point the contents of a folder into different "new" folders.

Hope that makes some sort of sense. Did this once before for the shared drive of a health board from preexisting hospital units. It was a big job. Needed to watch for Excel files that were linked to other files. Hopefully you don't have that complication.

Biggest tip of all - speak face to face with the person doing the physical transferring, so they get the sense of what you want. Don't try to explain it all by email!

Oops - this has moved on while I was thinking!

Thanks @ursaminor, I think you’re right that I need to start from scratch.

Your project sounds immense! Luckily mine isn’t quite to that scale, and also luckily there aren’t any excel files involved, except the one I’m trying to conjure up!

How did you display the mapping from the old folders?

Also I think you’re right that I should just speak face to face to get this sorted, it’s quite hard to get a meeting with our account manager but I might push for it...

Got a file with:
Column One - exisiting folder name
Column Two - existing subfolder name
listing them all:

Added two more columns:
Column Three - name of new folder in new structure
Column Four - name of new subfolder in new structure
and populated these myself.

Do this and then get a meeting - it really saves time in the long run to save stupid misunderstandings. Much harder to unravel this once it has been actioned than if you get it crystal clear at the planning stage.

Ok fab, thank you @Ursaminor and everyone, that’s definitely given me a bit more direction and confidence to at least get started. And to speak to my account manager!

Good luck!

Hi OP

I'd probably do something like the attached pic. Good luck!

Wow @goldierocks I love that you went to the trouble of creating an actual spreadsheet! Thank you so much.

I’m currently slowly working my way through all the folders and all of your advice has really been so genuinely helpful