The Missing Report

On Monday morning Ines opened the shared folder and found nothing. The quarterly report, which the team had finished on Friday, had disappeared. She checked the recycle bin, the backup and her emails, but there was no sign of it. The meeting with the directors was at eleven.

“Somebody must have deleted it by mistake,” said Paul. “It can’t have been Dana,” Ines replied. “She left at noon on Friday, before we added the final tables.” Paul shrugged. “Then it could have been the new intern. He had access to the folder.”

The intern, Adrian, went pale when they asked him. “I only moved a few files into a different folder,” he said. “I didn’t delete anything.” Ines took a deep breath. She could have shouted, but it would not have helped. Together they searched the archive and found the report under a long and confusing name.

“I should have saved a copy on my own computer,” Ines admitted. She turned to Adrian. “And you should have told us you were moving the files.” Paul laughed with relief. “We didn’t need to panic, but I’m glad we started looking early.”

The meeting went well in the end. Afterwards the team agreed on a new rule: nobody would rename, move or delete shared files without sending a message to the group. Ines pinned a note to the wall: Save twice. Ask once.