Box

Your assistant can search your Box content the way you would, then open the folders around a hit to confirm it found the right thing rather than a similarly named copy. It can also read your recently accessed items, which is usually the faster route when the file is one you touched last week and cannot name. Nothing is moved, renamed, or shared by looking.

What you end up with. The file you meant, with its full folder path and when it was last changed, so you know it is the live copy.

Start with it bringing you the information and you deciding.

Never without. Have it report the full folder path with every result. Box search matches across the whole enterprise where your account has access, and a file name that looks right in a results list is exactly how the wrong copy gets used.

Built on: Search for content / List recently accessed items / List items in folder / Get file information

Collaborations on a file or folder are readable, including the ones still sitting as pending invitations, and so are the shared links attached to an item. Put together, that is the answer to the question that is genuinely hard to get at through the interface: everyone who can currently open this, whether they were invited directly, inherited it from a parent folder, or just have the link.

What you end up with. A list of everyone with access to a file or folder, how they got it, and which shared links are live.

Start with it bringing you the information and you deciding.

Never without. Check the parent folders too. Access in Box is inherited downward, so a file that shows no collaborators of its own can still be open to a dozen people through the folder it sits in.

Built on: List file collaborations / List folder collaborations / List pending collaborations / Get shared link for file

Box lets you attach a metadata template to a file, which is a set of named fields sitting alongside the document rather than buried inside it. The assistant can read which templates your enterprise already has, walk a folder, apply a template to each file, and fill in the fields as it reads each contract. Once the values are on the files, they can be queried with a SQL-like syntax, so renewal date before March stops being a folder you open one file at a time.

What you end up with. The contracts in a folder carrying the same named fields, and a query you can rerun to pull back the ones that match.

Start with it doing the work and checking with you.

Never without. Spot check the extracted values against the document itself before anyone filters on them. A renewal date read off the wrong clause is worse than no date at all, because the query will confidently leave that contract out of the list.

Built on: List all metadata templates for enterprise / Get metadata template by name / List items in folder / List metadata instances on file / Create metadata instance on file / Query files folders by metadata

Box tasks are review or completion items that live on the file itself rather than in a separate tracker. The assistant can list the tasks already on a file, see who each one is assigned to and what state it is in, create a new one, and assign it to the people who need to look. Because the task travels with the document, the answer to who has not responded is on the file rather than in a thread somebody deleted.

What you end up with. A named list of who has signed off, who has not, and what each outstanding assignment is waiting on, with new review tasks assigned where they were missing.

Start with it doing the work and checking with you.

Never without. Have it show you the assignee list before it assigns anything. A task assignment notifies the person and puts your name on the request, so a task pointed at the wrong colleague is a chase they cannot act on and you have to walk back.

Built on: List tasks on file / Get task / List task assignments / Create task / Assign task

Folder creation, copying, renaming and moving are all available, so the assistant can build out your standard project structure and put the starting documents where they belong. Moving and renaming both run through the same update action, which means a move is a real change to where a file lives and not a copy. Ask it to list what it plans to do first and the whole thing stays reviewable.

What you end up with. A project folder built to your usual structure with the starting files copied or moved in, and a list of exactly what it did.

Start with it doing the work and checking with you.

Never without. Have it show the moves before making them. Moving a file out of a shared folder quietly removes it for everyone whose access came through that folder, and they get no notice that it happened.

Built on: Create folder / Copy file / Update file / List items in folder

Your assistant can create a shared link on a file, set what the link allows, and update or remove it later. The part worth being deliberate about is the access setting, because a Box shared link can be scoped to your company, to named collaborators, or to anyone who has the URL. Say which one you want; do not let it choose.

What you end up with. A working link with an access level you chose, and a record of which links are live so you can pull them later.

Start with it doing the work and checking with you.

Never without. State the access level and the expiry in the instruction itself, and read back what was created. An open link stays open and copyable until someone removes it, and there is no way to know afterward who passed it on.

Built on: Add shared link to file / Update shared link on file / Get shared link for file / Remove shared link from file

Box Sign requests can be created, listed, checked and resent. The practical shape is the assistant preparing the request and reading back the signer list and the document before you approve the send, then handling the chasing afterward, since checking who has signed and nudging the ones who have not is the part that actually eats your week. Canceling a live request is also possible and it is not reversible.

What you end up with. A signature request out to the right people, and a running answer to who has signed and who is holding it up.

Start with it doing the work and checking with you.

Never without. Read the document and the signer email addresses yourself before the send. This puts a legally binding agreement in front of a named person, and a request sent to the wrong address cannot be pulled back once they have opened it.

Built on: Create Box Sign Request / List box sign requests / Get box sign request by id / Resend Box Sign Request

Before anything is removed, the assistant can read the retention policies on the enterprise, list the files already sitting under retention, and read the legal hold policies and what they cover. That is the check nobody does. Then it lists the folder, proposes what looks stale, and deletes only what you approved. Deletion normally sends a file to trash and a trashed file can be restored, but your enterprise settings decide that, and it can read the trash back afterward so you can see what actually went.

What you end up with. A list of what is stale and a statement of what is under retention or hold, with only the approved files removed and the trash read back.

Start with it doing the work and checking with you.

Never without. Confirm your enterprise trash setting and approve the file list by hand. Box deletion is only recoverable if your enterprise routes deletes to trash, and where it does not, or where a retention policy has already expired, the file is gone with no undo.

Built on: List retention policies / Get files under retention / List all legal hold policies / List items in folder / Delete file / List trashed items / Restore file