Managing design files within teams

A design filing system for greater collaboration

Do any of these problems sound familiar?

Frankenstein files

Designers can’t find the correct master files, so instead of recreating files based off production, they hack together pages using a combination of screenshots and Sketch components. This problem is perpetuated by other designers who continue adding pieces to the frankenstein.

Knowledge dependency

File names are inconsistent or unintuitive, so designers largely depend on others’ knowledge to locate specific files.

Corrupt Sketch files

Multiple designers opening the same Sketch file create conflicts and corrupt the original. Designers gradually lose trust in the system and duplicate files locally as a precaution.

File organization is unfortunately one of the less exciting problems to tackle as designers, and it’s often neglected until problems arise as teams scale. In my experience, working without established conventions was incredibly frustrating due to teammates misplacing files or duplicating design efforts.

Don’t make the same mistake!