At our company there's this tradition where all documents get sent through email and archived in folders by date. No Google Drive, no Dropbox. I get that it's inconvenient and outdated, but how do I change this without annoying the management? Is there a way to gently suggest an alternative?
Try approaching it not as "let's change everything," but as "let's make things easier for ourselves." For example, you could suggest a pilot project for one department or one type of documents - that way the risk is minimal and management will be more willing to agree. The key is to show concrete results: less time searching for files, easier version recovery, faster access to what people need. If your company has older employees, pick a service with the simplest interface possible (Google Drive is usually simpler than complex systems) and offer to run a short training session. And also - clarify whether there might be specific reasons they're not using cloud storage: security requirements, company local servers, contracts with clients. If you approach it with an understanding of "why things are this way now," it'll be easier to negotiate the transition.
Talk to management about the search problem. When you're spending a month looking for a client's email from March, it eats up so much time - just be straight with them that managing documents through email is freezing you up. Suggest trying cloud storage or a wiki using a concrete example: maybe you have one project or department where files are flying back and forth every day? The transition will only be painful for a week, but then management will see real time savings. After that, the rest will follow.
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