Is it possible to ensure that a ribbon group is defined before an action is loaded?

Hi all -

I have a ribbon group that I've added which I'd like to use in several places. I declare an action in the ribbon group in the same file in which I declare the ribbon group, and the action appears; however, if I declare another action in another file, it DOESN'T appear, and I can only assume that the reason is that it's being loaded before the ribbon group is defined. Is there any way to define an action in a separate file from the ribbon group and ensure that the ribbon group is declared first?

I suppose it's also possible that this simply can't be done. I've searched through the SDL community Github site and there are no examples of actions being positioned in a custom ribbon group which is defined in a different file.

Thanks in advance.