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Organize your Superhuman Docs workspace

A well-organized, clutter-free workspace makes folders, docs, and content easily discoverable. For you. And your team.

There are many different ways to organize your workspace in Superhuman Docs. In this guide, we will walk through how to use folders and workspace settings to create a system that fits your company’s needs. By following these best practices, you will have a clutter-free workspace. This will make docs and content easy to discover. We are going to walk through each organizational tier, starting at the top with the workspace itself, then working our way through folders and then docs.
What you’ll learn:
  • Best practices for structuring your workspace
  • Tips to reduce time looking for information
  • How to eliminate clutter and duplication of resources
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What you’ll use:
  • Workspace
  • Folders
  • Doc sharing settings
  • Doc locking

Understanding the organization of a Superhuman Docs workspace

 Think of a Superhuman Docs workspace as your company’s digital hard drive that contains your organization’s folders and docs. People in the same workspace can easily collaborate with each other via doc sharing, real-time shared editing space, and commenting within docs. Docs can be connected within the same workspace using features like cross-doc, hyperlink cards, and page embeds.
While you can create multiple workspaces in Superhuman Docs, we recommend keeping the number of workspaces to a minimum (ideally, one). An organization may have multiple workspaces in Superhuman Docs for various reasons, such as:
  • Business segmentation: If a company is composed of multiple entities that operate independently of each other with no possibility of communication or collaboration (think separate brands or subsidiaries operating in different countries).
  • Mergers and Acquisitions: Acquired companies may already have their own Superhuman Docs workspaces that would initially remain independent but possibly be consolidated post-merger.
People can belong to multiple workspaces in Superhuman Docs and can freely navigate between them. It is worth noting that plans are tied to a specific workspace. This means that if a company has two workspaces (Workspace A and Workspace) and Workspace A is on the Team plan but Workspace B is on the free plan, people will only have access to team plan features in Workspace A. When they are in Workspace B, they will only have access to features on the free plan.

Find your schema

 Nothing like some good old self-reflection! Just like Superhuman Docs, your workspace is flexible and designed to flex to the needs of your specific organization. There is no “one size fits all.” The first step in setting up a scalable, easy-to-navigate workspace is determining how your company is structured and adopting that structure in Superhuman Docs via folders. The best way to think about folder organization is to ask: which group of people (department, product line, team, etc.) at your company owns this information? If your company is primarily segmented into departments, then further divided into teams within those departments, you should create a folder system that mirrors this structure. People can belong to multiple folders, and docs can easily be moved from one folder to another. Here are two examples of how you might organize your workspace. Take note of the naming conventions and structure.

Choosing the right folder permissions

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Some features are only available to Team and Enterprise plans.
Assigning custom permissions to folders in your workspace lets you efficiently control who can see what. You can grant view, comment, or edit folder access to individual users, groups, or the entire workspace. The level of access that someone has to a folder also dictates their access level to the docs inside that folder. For instance, if you give someone edit access to a folder, they will automatically have edit access to all docs within that folder. Learn more about how folders work here.
When setting folder permissions, consider:
  1. What types of docs will live here, and who is their audience
  2. Who always needs access by default? Is there anyone who should be explicitly excluded?
  3. Will all docs in this folder share similar access settings, or will permissions vary by doc?

When to use a public folder

 We often refer to folders where access is set to “everyone in the workspace” as “public folders”. If access to a doc does not need to be limited, it should live in a public folder. Public folders and their contents are discoverable in the workspace search and can be freely browsed by all members of your workspace. In folders where all workspace users are granted edit access (as opposed to just view), doc locking can be used to control how users interact with docs. This is a great way to ensure that large edits are made only by the appropriate users, while maintaining interactivity and collaboration where appropriate. Good candidates for public folders: company roadmaps, OKR trackers, onboarding hubs. Learn more about doc locking here.

When to use a private folder

 When folders are shared with a specific subset of users or user groups and NOT with the entire workspace, we call them “private”. If a doc contains sensitive information but should only be accessible to a default group of people, it should be housed in a private folder. Private folders are invite-only, and neither the folder nor its contents will appear in the workspace search for users without access. Just like in public folders, doc locking can be used in private folders to further limit how users with edit access can interact with a doc. Private folders are perfect for housing account plans that contain confidential customer information.

When to use the My Docs folder

 My Docs is your personal workspace. It's the default location for any doc you create and is set to just you by default. Docs here don't show up in workspace search unless you explicitly share them. Permissions are set doc-by-doc, and locking applies here too. My Docs is the right home for 1:1 docs, performance reviews, and anything you're drafting before sharing more widely. If you're on a Pro or Free plan, use My Docs in place of a private folder.
Leveraging folder permissions for easy change management
You may be wondering, why bother setting default doc permissions via folder sharing? Why not manage all permissions on a doc by doc basis? The answer is change management. Modern teams are fluid; members move within organizations, roles change, people are on and off-boarded. When these changes happen, the information that users need access to also changes. Instead of having to add or remove permissions on countless docs, admins can make the needed updates to just a handful of relevant folders.

Create a uniform naming convention

 An additional layer of organization that you can bring to your workspace is creating a uniform naming convention for your docs. Setting a company standard for naming folders and docs can significantly enhance discoverability within your company workspace. By adopting a consistent naming structure (e.g., “Department-Use Case-Date created” or “Team-Use Case”), you can make it easier for others to search for and find relevant documents efficiently. This standardized approach to naming not only promotes clarity and organization but also ensures that documents are easily identifiable and accessible to all team members across your company workspace.

Now what?

 You've got the foundation for a workspace that's easy to navigate and built to scale. Now, go further with Docs AI. You can ask it to summarize a hub, build a tracker, or draft a process doc directly inside your workspace.

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