Best Practices for Creating Custom Fields

Custom fields enable you to store your unique business data and determine where and how it is displayed to your users. As a Best Practice, you should add a prefix or suffix to your custom fields for easy identification. Your naming convention should include enough information to identify the creator of the field, enabling users to better understand how to use the field and who to contact for more information.

Example:

Instead of - Citizenship_Status__c
Use -  {SCHOOL ABBREVIATION}_Citizenship_Status__c

• Be sure to populate the Help Text and Description fields when creating custom fields, workflows, processes, etc. This allows other users to understand how the item is used.
• Keep your naming convention across field labels and field API names consistent. For picklist values, keep the label and API name exactly the same. The TargetX features depend on API names, not the labels. So if Application Decision = 'Withdrawn,' but the API name for this picklist value is 'W,' withdrawn apps won't display correctly in the Applicant Dashboard.