Challenge:

In my company, we have a network drive that many people have access too.

In a particular folder lies a word document, which is a management report. 6 people have access to this file and update this one file.

My company uses office 365

Issue is, if someone is using the file, another person may try to open it to make their changes, but the previous persons changes are lost.

Required Solution:

We need a way so anyone can open this same file, At the Same time, make their own changes, and when they save the file, the other persons changes are Not lost.

There could be 6 people working on the same file concurrently in different sections of the document. If one of the six people who save their file, I dont want the other peoples work to be lost, just because they did not save their work. When they save their work, then the person who save their work before, their changes should still be present.

Can experts here provide some of the best options for me to consider to eliminate this version control issue that we are having.

We dont want to loose other peoples work, at the same time it would be valuable to have multiple people working on the same document at the same time.

If there is a way to also see who saved their work last, that would be great to have as well, so we know who out of the 6 people have worked on the document and who is still pending.

We look forward to your solutions

Tyrese

I have not done this so can only provide a couple of guesses.
You should be able to do this on OneDrive.


This will perhaps work with SharePoint as well.
It will not work on a network drive otherwise.


Otherwise, have one document container that brings in other documents using IncludeText fields.



Base all of them on the same template using the same styles. Do all formatting using styles.

Set any automatic numbering in that template up according to the steps here:
How to create numbered headings or outline numbering in Ribbon Versions of Word by Shauna Kelly



Do not even think about using the Master Documents "Feature."

See: https://support.office.com/en-us/art...D-F3D5372C27F4

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

While that article is for Mac versions, the same applies to Office 365 on Windows computers.
https://support.office.com/en-us/art...0-8586492a1f1d

For something Windows-specific, see: https://support.office.com/en-us/art...A-782D26F564A4

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]