Published by The Acuff Group

Version 1.0 written September, 2009

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Copyright © 2009 The Acuff Group

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creating this document and we real y hope you find value in it. We make it available online for free and

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We hope this white paper is useful to you and your organization. We will do our best to keep the

document up to date and we’d love to hear your comments and feedback. If you see any errors, feel

that important topics are missing, or would just like to connect online please feel free to contact us:

Primary contact:

Noble Acuff

Email:

contact@acuffgroup.com

Website:

http://www.acuffgroup.com

LinkedIn:

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We look forward to hearing from you!

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The picture on the cover of the report was generously licensed under Creative Commons by John A Ward and can be found at:

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The latest version of this document will always be available online at:

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Table of Contents

Introduction......................................................................................................................................... 1

Why SharePoint? ................................................................................................................................. 2

What is it?.....................................................................................................................................................................................2

How is it different?........................................................................................................................................................................4

Why should organizations care?...................................................................................................................................................5

Where is it going? .........................................................................................................................................................................5

Why not SharePoint? ....................................................................................................................................................................6

Initial Business Considerations............................................................................................................. 7

Paradigm Shifts.............................................................................................................................................................................7

Building a business case..............................................................................................................................................................11

Return on investment (ROI) ........................................................................................................................................................12

Measuring success ......................................................................................................................................................................13

Technology Platform for the Non-‐Technical ....................................................................................... 15

Technical readiness.....................................................................................................................................................................15

Deployment.................................................................................................................................................................................17

Operation & Administration .......................................................................................................................................................20

Organizational Change Management ................................................................................................. 22

Sponsorship.................................................................................................................................................................................22

Readiness ....................................................................................................................................................................................22

Communications .........................................................................................................................................................................23

Training.......................................................................................................................................................................................23

Support .......................................................................................................................................................................................24

End-‐user adoption.......................................................................................................................................................................24

Governance ....................................................................................................................................... 25

What’s meant by governance? ...................................................................................................................................................25

Governance document................................................................................................................................................................26

Striking the right balance............................................................................................................................................................29

Roadmap ........................................................................................................................................... 30

Try it out – today! .......................................................................................................................................................................30

Limited pilot deployment ............................................................................................................................................................30

Divisional deployment.................................................................................................................................................................30

Enterprise-‐wide deployment.......................................................................................................................................................31

Adoption lifecycle........................................................................................................................................................................31

Concluding Thoughts ......................................................................................................................... 32

Appendix: Useful Resources............................................................................................................... 33

A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Introduction

A great deal has been written about the technical aspects of SharePoint. While this body of knowledge is

critical y important to the SharePoint ecosystem, the non-‐technical aspects of deploying and

maintaining the platform in large organizations are somewhat underrepresented in the literature. This

white paper was written to help address this gap; our goal in writing it was to provide insights, advice,

best practices, and real-‐world experience to help organizations understand and address these non-‐

technical issues.

The intended audience for this white paper includes executives and managers who have been tasked

with deploying and maintaining SharePoint in their organizations. Technical professionals may also be

interested in the content but will not find any code snippets, configuration settings, etc. A nominal

background in SharePoint (just from an end-‐user perspective) wil be helpful to the reader but isn’t

strictly required. However, if you have not already done so we would encourage you to spend an hour or

two reviewing a SharePoint demo or trying out a hosted site. Microsoft has a number of online

resources that may be helpful:

A flash-‐based demo is available here:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-‐us/sharepointserver/HA101672721033.aspx

Desktop training materials are available here:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-‐us/sharepointserver/HA102488011033.aspx?pid=CL100796281033

A 180-‐day trial version is available here:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2E6E5A9C-‐EBF6-‐4F7F-‐8467--F4DE6BD6B831&displaylang=en

We hope this paper is useful to you and your organization. We will do our best to keep the document up

to date and we’d love to hear your comments and feedback. If you see any errors, feel that important

topics are missing, or would just like to connect online please feel free to contact us:

Primary contact:

Noble Acuff

Email:

contact@acuffgroup.com

Website:

http://www.acuffgroup.com

LinkedIn:

http://www.linkedin.com/in/nobleacuff

The latest version of this document wil always be available online at: http://www.acuffgroup.com

Please check the web site to make sure you’ve got the latest version!

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Why SharePoint?

This section of the document provides an overview of the SharePoint platform for people who may not

be familiar with it. If you’re already a SharePoint user, or if you have some familiarity with the product,

feel free to skip forward to the next section on business considerations.

• SharePoint is a server-‐based product that users work with in a browser

• There are different editions with different capabilities

• SharePoint can be used to build a very robust intranet with no custom development

• SharePoint brings a wealth of new features and empowers users to manage content

• SharePoint can help make users and organizations more efficient

• The platform has been heavily invested in by Microsoft and its partners

What is it?

The term “SharePoint” encompasses a family of enterprise server products from Microsoft. There are

several editions of SharePoint, from the free Windows SharePoint Services (aka “WSS”) al the way up to

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Enterprise Edition (aka “MOSS”). There are a number of

differences between the various editions of the product which Microsoft outlines here:

http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/product/details/Pages/default.aspx

1

In this white paper we’re going to focus on Office SharePoint Server Standard Edition and Enterprise

Edition as these are the versions most commonly deployed by medium-‐ and large-‐size organizations.

1 From Microsoft’s SharePoint site at http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/product/details/Pages/default.aspx

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Much of the commentary may also apply to WSS and SharePoint Server for Internet Sites, but general y

speaking when we refer to “SharePoint” we’re talking about the Standard or Enterprise edition.

With that out of the way, what is SharePoint? The shortest, simplest explanation is that SharePoint is a

“web portal in a box.” While that may not be entirely technical y accurate it’s a reasonable starting point

for the uninitiated. So what do we mean by this? SharePoint, once installed and configured, allows an

organization to quickly create (often internal) web portals with a few simple clicks. These sites can

include features such as:

• Document libraries

• Wikis

• Blogs

• Business intelligence tools

• Shared calendars

• Issue logs

• Task lists

• Announcements

• Custom lists

• Point-‐and-‐click workflow solutions

• RSS feeds

• Email alerts

• And much, much more…

Screenshot of options on SharePoint’s “Create” screen

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SharePoint can be used as an internet-‐facing web content management platform; it can also be used

just for enterprise search, as a custom application platform, or as a document management system.

When users are new to SharePoint there can be quite a bit of confusion about what it is, largely due to

the wide variety of features in the product as wel as the variety of ways different organizations use it.

For better or worse, the best way to understand what SharePoint is and how your organization might

benefit is to use it. If you skipped the introduction, go back and look at the links provided there; if you

invest a couple of hours with the demos and training material you’ll have a much better understanding

of what SharePoint is. Your IT staff can deploy a single, stand-‐alone SharePoint server in an afternoon

that can be used to try out the system.

How is it different?

So the obvious question is: “How is SharePoint any different than what we’ve had in the past?” Another

short, simple answer: you don’t have to rely on your web developers, web editors, or content specialists

to start getting data into SharePoint. Further, by using complementary tools like InfoPath and

SharePoint Designer very compelling business applications can be created without writing custom .Net

code.

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Corporate intranets have been around for years now; since the late 1990’s most large organizations

have had some sort of intranet in place. Unfortunately most of these intranets have not delivered on

their initial promise, often due to one or more of the fol owing reasons:

• End users can’t directly add or modify content on the site

• Search doesn’t work very well

• Content changes have to go through a slow publication process

• Making changes to the intranet requires expensive developer time

• Adding new features entails writing new web applications from scratch

• The site doesn’t integrate wel with other systems or applications

• Applying heterogeneous security permissions to different content is difficult

• They are more of a one-‐way publishing model than a two-‐way conversation

As a result, intranets have been useful for publishing certain types of information that don’t change

frequently (e.g. company holiday schedules, policies and procedures, contact information, executive

announcements) but have not been as useful for more dynamic content and collaboration. Additionally,

information on first-‐generation intranet sites tends to get out of date and pages become “stale” as the

people who own the information are not the same ones who can update the pages.

Enter SharePoint. SharePoint sites allow end users to add content simply by pointing and clicking in a

familiar web interface. This means that business users can maintain libraries of files, share calendars,

create web content, col aborate in wikis, publish blogs, and administer web sites without ever having to

request a developer’s time. With some basic training, users become as comfortable with SharePoint as

they are with file shares, email, Outlook Public Folders, etc. In addition, SharePoint can be extended for

use as an enterprise search platform (it can search file shares, other sites, public folders, etc.) and to

create col aborative work spaces. Users can interact with the product through the browser, of course,

and also directly through MS Office 2007 applications2.

Why should organizations care?

Organizations should care about SharePoint because it can help make them more efficient. Users spend

too much time searching for information, re-‐creating content, organizing data, and emailing each other.

SharePoint can help alleviate this information inefficiency by providing users with a new paradigm for

col aborating and interacting. However, proper planning, change management, and governance are

needed to help ensure the efficiency gains -‐-‐ thus the need for white papers like this! Also, with the

growing interest in Web 2.0 technologies, SharePoint gives organizations a great way to deploy a wide

range of these tools in one consolidated platform that integrates wel with their existing systems.

Where is it going?

SharePoint has been an incredibly popular platform for medium-‐ and large-‐size organizations that run

Microsoft applications. As this is written (September 2009) the current version is SharePoint 2007 and

2 MS Office 2003 also interoperates with SharePoint 2007 but the functionality is limitied

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SharePoint 2010 is expected in the near future. All indications are that the application will become even

more widely adopted than it is today, and Microsoft and their partners are making very large

investments in the platform. As a result, organizations should not be concerned that the product is going

away any time in the foreseeable future.

Other collaboration platforms have gained acceptance in many organizations, including a variety of wiki-‐

based systems, IBM Lotus/Domino solutions, and other enterprise portals. However, given the near

ubiquity of Microsoft Office and the broad deployments of Active Directory, SQL Server, Microsoft

Exchange, etc. it is likely that SharePoint wil continue to maintain and grow its market share.

Why not SharePoint?

While SharePoint offers a great deal to a wide variety of organizations it’s not for everyone. Here are

some reasons why your organization might not want to deploy it:

• SharePoint is complex and requires skil ed administrators (and developers, if you’re customizing)

to maintain it. If your organization is smal , or already pressed for IT support, you might consider

a hosted option or a simpler internal solution. If you’re deploying it internally you may wish to

start with a smal WSS site before deploying the Enterprise edition.

• SharePoint is entirely based on the Microsoft technology stack. If you work for an organization

whose IT operations are largely based on Unix, Linux, Oracle, Java, NDS, mainframe systems, etc.

the cost of deployment and ongoing operations may be higher due to training costs, inability to

leverage existing licensed platforms (e.g. SQL Server, System Center Data Protection Manager),

and possibilities for redundant systems.

• SharePoint can be expensive, especially if you intend to use it on the internet for a potentially

unlimited number of users. If you’re on a tight budget or if you’re considering SharePoint as

your internet solution, you’ll want to balance the cost with what your organization needs.

That said, we highly recommend taking a look at the trial software and possibly signing up for a hosted

SharePoint site so you can get a feel for the application’s capabilities.

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Initial Business Considerations

This section of the document outlines the important business considerations that need to be weighed as

part of a SharePoint initiative.

• SharePoint allows users to work differently

• Document libraries replace file shares and offer versioning, check-‐out, custom meta-‐data

• Enterprise search allows users to search across the enterprise

• Users can generate and manage online web content

• SharePoint bring a number of Web 2.0 features in one platform

• Mobility features are built in

• A business case and ROI should be prepared at the beginning of the initiative

• Success criteria should be measurable

Paradigm Shifts

SharePoint brings with it a number of paradigm shifts; while this is largely a good thing it’s important to

understand that this has impacts on people and existing processes and wil require an investment in

organizational change management (see that section below for details). Some of the biggest changes

that SharePoint brings are listed here.

Document management

In most organizations, documents are stored on users’ local machines and shared fileservers. This model

has served us wel for years now, but has a number of shortcomings. A few organizations have dedicated

document management solutions in place (e.g. Documentum, FileNet) but these tend to be very

complex and are often chal enging for end users. SharePoint offers a very balanced approach to

document management via one of its most widely used features: Document Libraries.

Document Libraries are like online file shares, but with important improvements:

• Versioning: with versioning turned on, each time a document is edited and saved a new version

is created. This al ows users to revert to older versions if a mistake was discovered, as wel as

comparing changes between versions and seeing who updated the document and when.

• Check-‐in/out: this allows users to “check out” documents so that no one else can modify them.

Other users can read the documents or save local copies, but cannot modify a file while it’s

checked out to someone else.

• Flexible metadata: metadata (i.e. “data about data”) can be added to document libraries very

easily. Fileservers usually capture basic metadata, like the modified date or who created the file,

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but SharePoint al ows users to create arbitrary metadata columns, like “department” or “client”

or “project phase” which become searchable and sort-‐able.3

• Flexible views: users can create views of lists and libraries that are sorted, filtered, and grouped

by metadata elements. In simple terms, this helps us get away from the old tree-‐based model of

file folders and into a more flexible data-‐driven approach.

• Information management policies: the organization can specify retention periods for content,

making it possible to automatical y delete content after a specified period of time.

So why is this important for the executive or manager to consider?

• As users move al of this content off the file servers and into SharePoint you need your IT team

to articulate the changing costs of storage; sometimes this cost goes up and sometimes it goes

down depending on your existing infrastructure

• Your users are going to need training to understand how to work in the new world of

SharePoint. Otherwise they wil simply recreate the fileserver structure on your portal, missing

the benefits and eliminating a potential efficiency gain.

• This feature makes it much easier for teams to col aborate on projects and for users to find the

information they’re looking for. This increased internal efficiency should factor into your ROI

Example: one Document Library with multiple views configured

3 Note that metadata can be required or optional; by specifying required metadata fields you can substantially

improve your organization’s ability to track compliance-‐related data across the enterprise’s content.

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Enterprise search

Enterprise search is one of the most interesting developments in recent years. Until recently, most

organizations had no way of searching content on their internal networks. Users’ data existed on

fileservers, in public folders, on intranets, etc. but very little of it was searchable. While we’ve al grown

used to the ability to search the web, there was no good solution for searching content internal to an

organization. With the proliferation of storage and user-‐generated content the need for internal search

grows greater and greater each year.

SharePoint has a robust internal search engine that crawls and indexes the content on the SharePoint

site; this is taken for granted in an enterprise portal application. Fortunately, however, it is easy to

“point” SharePoint’s search engine at other content and have that crawled and indexed as wel . For

example, SharePoint can search fileservers, Exchange Public Folders, corporate web sites, and more.

This allows organizations to deploy an enterprise search platform “for free” as a consequence of

deploying SharePoint.

So why is this important for the executive or manager to consider?

• Search makes it much easier to find things; this efficiency gain can factor into your ROI

calculations

• Search tends to surface content that people didn’t realize was there. At least one of your users

wil try searching for “layoff coming” or “CEO’s salary.” You’l want your security team to make

sure permissions are correctly configured on the file servers before you start making them

searchable

• SharePoint’s search capabilities mean you don’t need to invest in a separate search tool (e.g. the

Google Search Appliance)

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

User-‐generated web content

While many organizations have had intranets for the past decade, most have not had the capability to

allow end users to update pages on the intranet. Control is general y centralized within a web team, who

are responsible for editing and publishing content. This model changes with SharePoint; users are able

to easily create content and make it available online. In fact, everything that gets posted to SharePoint

becomes an online asset, whether it’s a downloadable file, web page content, a calendar entry, or an

announcement. This pushes the responsibility for content updates “down” to the users who own and

understand the content, making the intranet much more relevant and current. An important note on

this topic: approval workflows can optional y be assigned to content, which ensures that appropriate

reviews occur before sensitive content is published to a site.

So why is this important for the executive or manager to consider?

• You may not need as many people supporting the web content as you did before; the intranet

editors’ jobs may end up being delegated to the end users who own the content in the first

place

• Users and their managers need to be aware of compliance rules, regulations, corporate policies,

etc. that impact shared web content

• You may want to set up content approval processes so information is reviewed before it is

published to the entire organization

“Web 2.0 in a Box”

“Web 2.0” has become a popular buzz-‐word online and many IT executives have been asked to start

deploying these new tools internal y. This can create chal enges, though, as many of the tools were

never built to be used internal y by organizations; most do not support corporate standards such as

Active Directory, and most do not interoperate wel out-‐of-‐the-‐box.

SharePoint offers a wide variety of Web 2.0 technologies in a single, cohesive package that integrates

easily into typical corporate (or large organization) environments. Such features include:

• Blogs

• Wikis

• Social networking

• Personal sites

• User-‐generated content

While many might argue that SharePoint is not a Web 2.0 platform, many large organizations wil get the

features they need along with the security, control, and integration they expect from an enterprise

platform.

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

So why is this important for the executive or manager to consider?

• SharePoint gives you a single, simple answer to the many voices calling for “more Web 2.0”

• It’s much easier to deploy and maintain a single system that it is to deploy and maintain multiple

disparate systems

• You may be able to consolidate functions and eliminate existing platforms; if so this should be

captured in your ROI calculations.

Mobility

Mobile access to data and mobile applications are becoming more and more important to end users and

organizations with dispersed teams. SharePoint offers out-‐of-‐the-‐box mobile views of content that are

suitable for use on Blackberries, Windows mobile devices, etc.

So why is this important for the executive or manager to consider?

• SharePoint can make it easier to mobilize your data; this may allow you to avoid other parallel

project initiatives and related costs

• Mobile data must be secured; it’s important to consider what information should be al owed

onto mobile devices and how those devices should be configured

Building a business case

Before embarking on a SharePoint deployment initiative, organizations should carefully consider the

pros, cons, and costs and incorporate these into a coherent business case. Without a wel -‐constructed

business case it can be difficult for project teams to articulate their goals and measuring success

becomes almost impossible. Given the time and expense most large organizations go through when

deploying a new enterprise platform, spending the time up front to develop a business case is wel

worth it.

Don’t do “technology for technology’s sake”

A word of caution, especial y for the technologists who may be reading this: don’t fal into the trap of

doing technology for technology’s sake. There are many organizations whose IT departments talked

them into a SharePoint deployment, only to discover (after spending a lot of time and money) that there

was no real business justification for the initiative and now the end users are confused about what

SharePoint is and why they should use it. Don’t let this happen to your organization. Have clearly

defined reasons for deploying SharePoint and be sure the stakeholders and project team are completely

clear on what those are.

Specific goals

Identifying “SMART” goals is a great way to ensure you’re identifying real value in the business case.

SMART goals are:

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• Specific: the goal must be as specific as possible (e.g. deploy an enterprise search platform

that’s capable of searching our existing file servers)

• Measurable: it must be measurable / quantifiable (e.g. reduce the amount of time it takes to

get new information on the website by 50%)

• Attainable: it has to be something that can reasonably be accomplished (e.g. migrate 3

departments onto SharePoint over the next 90 days)

• Relevant: it has to be relevant to the organization and its larger strategies (e.g. eliminate $250K

in redundant systems in support of the $2M cost reduction initiative)

• Time-‐bounded: each goal should have a reasonable deadline (e.g. complete the first project

phase within 180 days of the kick-‐off meeting)

Return on investment (ROI)

Developing ROIs for internal technology projects can be challenging but if it is something your

organization is capable of it will make a much stronger business case. While it’s impossible for us to

know what your investments or returns wil be, here are some of the major factors that should be

included in most organizations’ ROI calculations:

Investment: Technology

Deploying SharePoint wil require an investment in technology. Here are the major expense items that

usual y appear:

• Software costs

o SharePoint licenses: cost varies based on edition

o SQL Server licenses: many organizations are already sufficiently licensed

o Windows Server licenses: for the servers that will run SharePoint

o Office 2007 licenses: if you’re upgrading the desktops to stay in sync

• Hardware costs

o Server hardware: for the SharePoint farm(s) and potentially for new SQL Server

instances. [ Note: most organizations wil want separate production and development

environments, and many also have testing and staging environments. Be sure to account

for al of these]

o Storage costs: to cover the costs of expanding RAID arrays, the SAN infrastructure, etc.

Many mid-‐ to large-‐size organizations have complex storage architectures that wil need

to change to accommodate SharePoint content.

o WAN network hardware, if you need to increase the bandwidth to remote sites this

may require upgrading WAN hardware

• Other infrastructure costs

o Bandwidth upgrades: remote sites may require additional bandwidth to accommodate

SharePoint traffic

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o Per-‐server licensed solutions: monitoring solutions, anti-‐virus packages, reporting tools,

etc. that require per-‐server licensing may need to be upgraded for the additional servers

Investment: Project Costs

One of the largest up-‐front costs for any type of enterprise deployment like this is the initial project

effort. A detailed work breakdown structure must be developed that accurately depicts the work

effort of the project team. A typical SharePoint deployment program for a large organization can have

as many as a dozen core team members and many more ancillary participants over the life of the

initiative.

Capturing the costs of these investments as part of the business case wil present an accurate view of

the real costs involved in deploying SharePoint.

Investment: People

Simply investing in the technology and deploying it won’t lead to a truly successful implementation. An

investment is also going to be required for the various roles involved in SharePoint:

• SharePoint administrator(s) wil need to be trained or hired

• SharePoint developer(s) will need to be trained or hired, if you plan to customize

• Help Desk personnel will require training

• Web designers may need to be trained or hired if you’re going to brand the site

• Training materials wil need to be purchased or developed; if you have an internal training team

the instructors wil need to be trained and prepare course materials

• End users wil need training

Expected returns

Like many other internal productivity platforms, capturing the expected returns from a SharePoint

initiative can be difficult. The easiest items to capture are the following:

• Cost savings through platform consolidation

• Cost avoidance by eliminating multiple system deployments to achieve the same functionality

However, it’s not unreasonable to address the fol owing types of returns, although in many cases the

cost of measuring them can outweigh the potential savings:

• Less time spent searching for content

• Less time spent managing email

• Less time spent marshal ing content through approval processes to get online

• Automated workflows replacing manual or paper processes

Measuring success

Like any other enterprise initiative, it is important to measure the success of your SharePoint

deployment. Each organization’s goals are different, but al organizations can benefit from identifying

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

clear, quantifiable goals that can be measured over time to ensure the SharePoint initiative is achieving

its goals.

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Technology Platform for the Non-‐Technical

This section of the document describes the technology platform and introduces important technical

considerations. We have attempted to present this information using as much non-‐technical language as

possible without being vague or inaccurate.

• Technical readiness is a prerequisite for a successful deployment

• Human resources and technology resources should be in place from the beginning

• Consider enterprise architecture, infrastructure, and customization

• Platform migrations can be a primary driver of SharePoint initiatives

• Plan for operation and administration resources

• Ensure SharePoint is governed by a change management process

Technical readiness

Organizations need to be in a state of technical readiness when launching a SharePoint initiative. This

means that resources, both human and technological, are in place and prepared for the new platform to

be introduced.

Human resources in Information Technology

The fol owing IT roles should be established as part of the SharePoint initiative; a single person may

certainly fulfil more than one role, but it is important that each of these roles is represented.

Roles

Responsibilities

Business Owner / Sponsor

This person is usually an executive-‐level sponsor with budgetary

authority to pay for the initial project. Usually represents the

business and is primarily interested in the ROI potential of the

platform.

Technical Sponsor

This person is usually an executive-‐level technology manager

who manages the technical teams that wil deploy and maintain

SharePoint

SharePoint Administrator(s)

The SharePoint Administrator wil be responsible for the day-‐to-‐

day administration of the platform, as wel as al system

upgrades, major configuration changes, etc.

Backup / Storage Administrator This is the person who is already responsible for enterprise

backups, and often storage management (in most large

organizations this usual y a team rather than an individual). It is

important to involve this person intimately, as backup/restore

operations are both critical to the enterprise and chal engingly

complex

Site Col ection Administrator(s) These are the people who will administer the various high-‐level

col ections of sites once the platform is deployed. In corporate

environments, each division may have one or more site

col ections specific to their users and data; the Site Col ection

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Administrator(s) would manage the system at this level and

report to the SharePoint Administrator for technical purposes.

Site Administrator(s)

Site Administrators are often members of business

departments and/or teams; usual y these are “power-‐users”

who are interested in taking on administrative duties for their

department’s SharePoint site(s)

SharePoint Developer(s)

The SharePoint Developer(s) wil write custom .Net code to

enhance and modify the base SharePoint platform. While many

organizations choose to create custom-‐code solutions for their

SharePoint portals, there are strong arguments to be made for

limiting customization.

Help Desk Resource(s)

End users wil rely on the Help Desk and desk-‐side support

resources, so this team needs to be involved in the SharePoint

project and properly trained and prepared

Technical Trainer(s)

The training team (or your training vendor) wil need to create

and/or deliver training materials to the end user community.

They should be involved in the project as soon as the basic use

cases and end-‐user audiences are identified.

Please note that for the majority of the roles listed above it is a very good idea to identify one or more

backup resources to provide coverage for vacations, employee turnover, and cross-‐training purposes.

Technology resources

The fol owing technology resources should already exist in your organization prior to deploying

SharePoint. While it’s certainly possible to deploy these technologies as part of a SharePoint initiative,

the scope and complexity of the project can quickly become overwhelming for the IT resources if too

much is attempted at once.

• LAN / WAN infrastructure: a robust Local Area Network (LAN) and Wide Area Network (WAN) is

a foundational element of the SharePoint infrastructure

• Storage infrastructure: a scalable, dependable storage infrastructure (e.g. SAN) should be in

place and is also a foundational element of the SharePoint infrastructure (not required for

smal er environments or smal er deployments)

• Enterprise backup solution: as data moves into SharePoint it is imperative that the system is

backed up on a very frequent basis (at least daily). Microsoft offers a product cal ed Data

Protection Manager that’s best-‐of-‐breed for SharePoint backups and other enterprise systems

• SQL Server: this is Microsoft’s enterprise database platform. Most organizations wil want to

deploy this in a clustered configuration (i.e. more than one server) to help ensure SharePoint is

always available.

• Active Directory (AD): this is Microsoft’s directory service and is what you interact with when

you log into your PC in the morning. SharePoint uses Active Directory to determine who a user is

and what he or she can access.

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• Exchange Server: this is Microsoft’s enterprise email platform. There are a variety of ways

SharePoint interoperates with email, calendars, and Public Folders, so having Exchange in place

first is helpful.

• Disaster recovery (RD) solution: having a DR site in place is also a very important consideration

in case your organization experiences a major data-‐loss event. If SharePoint is going to be widely

used in the organization it should be represented in the DR environment

Deployment

In planning for a SharePoint deployment the following technology areas should be addressed up front.

Enterprise Architecture Considerations

Most large organizations have one or more people, if not an entire team, that focus on “enterprise

architecture”, or how all the various components of IT in the enterprise fit together. Since SharePoint

can quickly become a central application for users’ daily work, the enterprise architect(s) need to be

involved from the beginning of the project to ensure SharePoint is deployed in a manner consistent with

the established technical standards and policies.

Infrastructure

The discussion of SharePoint and infrastructure can get quite complex and is beyond the scope of this

document. However, the following are areas that will need to be addressed as part of the SharePoint

deployment:

• Server resources: whether physical or virtual, SharePoint will require a multi-‐server setup for

each farm environment your organization deploys. A very common scenario is a 4-‐server

configuration connected to a clustered database. If your organization maintains separate

development, test, staging, and production environments you’l need to plan for 16 servers plus

the database instances.

• Storage resources: many medium-‐ to large-‐size organizations have centralized their data

storage on Storage Area Networks (SANs). Storage resources, i.e. hard disk space, tends to be

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expensive and in high demand. A projection of the initial storage requirements, plus an estimate

of storage growth over the next 12-‐18 months should be completed and provided to the storage

team. Additionally, the enterprise backup team will need to ensure sufficient space exists in the

backup infrastructure to handle SharePoint data.

• Network resources: if all the users will be located on the same Local Area Network (LAN), i.e.

everyone is in the same location, the installed network hardware should be sufficient to handle

the traffic and no major changes should be seen. However, if remote offices migrate from using

local fileservers (i.e. servers co-‐located in the remote offices) to a centralized SharePoint

platform the Wide Area Network (WAN) traffic may increase dramatically. Plan for bandwidth

and network hardware resources accordingly.

A high-‐level comprehensive infrastructure design should be completed towards the beginning of the

initiative for budgetary purposes if nothing else.

Custom Applications

SharePoint is based on Microsoft’s popular .Net framework and is completely customizable and

extensible. Many organizations employ .Net developers to build custom solutions and extensions to the

core product. However, we find it’s often best for organizations to start with an out-‐of-‐the-‐box

implementation first and then consider customization. When thinking about customizations you should

consider the following4:

• Upgrades: when the time comes to upgrade the platform to the next version, all of the out-‐of-‐

the-‐box functionality and content (should) migrate seamlessly. This is not necessarily so for

custom solutions, so good documentation and planning needs to accompany the

customizations.

• Maintenance: the core product is wel supported by Microsoft; the experts in Premiere Support

can help you resolve issues, but they are going to have a harder time helping you fix problems

with custom solutions. Your developers wil need to be prepared to support and maintain the

customizations for the life of the portal.

• Complexity: SharePoint is already a complex platform and offers an amazing amount of

functionality out-‐of-‐the-‐box. Customizing wil add to this complexity and should be managed

appropriately.

• Cost: most core features can be enabled and configured with a few clicks of the mouse. Custom

solutions, however, can be expensive to develop. Consider whether or not custom features are

truly required or are more of a “nice to have.”

We highly recommend that organizations who are new to SharePoint tread very lightly when it comes to

developing custom .Net solutions. Live with the product for a while and see what you can do with the

4 Note: these considerations generally apply to any customization effort, so SharePoint itself is not much different

in this regard

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core features plus SharePoint Designer. You’ll be surprised how many workable solutions you can devise

that don’t require customization.

Content development & migration

Unsurprisingly, content is at the heart of any SharePoint implementation. Without it the portal is simply

an empty shell that won’t do anyone much good. When planning your SharePoint roadmap, consider the

fol owing:

• What existing content is going to migrate into SharePoint?

• What type of content is it? Web based, file based, or something else?

• Who owns the content and what wil their role be in migrating it?

• Who should have access to the content and at what levels (read/edit/admin/etc.)?

• Does new content need to be developed specifical y for the SharePoint portal?

• Who wil create the content, approve it, publish it, and maintain it?

• How wil you confirm migrated content is deleted from the old locations?

The place to start is identifying major content areas and assigning ownership of it. Get your content

owners involved in the project at an early stage so they can start their planning process and you’l end

up with better content, faster.

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Platform migration and consolidation

In some organizations, platform migrations (e.g. from Lotus Notes / Domino to Microsoft Exchange and

SharePoint) or platform consolidations are primary drivers for their SharePoint initiative. If your

organization is in this situation you should be able to demonstrate cost savings in your business case,

but you’l want to consider the following:

• Not al content is going to move “cleanly” from one system to another. Lotus Notes databases,

for example, are based on a different conceptual model than SharePoint lists and libraries. The

migration is possible, but it’s not as easy as copying and pasting or running a simple utility.

• Content should be reviewed for relevance before it gets moved. Why spend the time and money

moving content if it’s out of date or inaccurate?

• Communications wil need to be closely coordinated between the SharePoint team, the

information owners, and the end users. You don’t want to move information that’s critical to

someone’s job without clearly communicating what’s happening and where the information is

going.

• It can be difficult, especially in large organizations, to determine who owns what data and

whether it is stil in use or not. In those cases a simple solution is to leave the data in place and

remove everyone’s access to it, leaving a “readme” behind. If no one contacts the SharePoint

team for a set period of time (e.g. 90 days, 180 days, etc.) it might be safe to archive it. Do be

sure to check your organization’s compliance rules to ensure you’re not deleting something that

you’re required to keep, though!

• If you’re moving from a complex system like Lotus Notes you’ll need to have Notes experts on

the project team as wel . Most SharePoint experts don’t “speak” Lotus Notes, and vice-‐versa,

and you’re going to need to be able to understand each side at a deep level to make sure the

migration goes smoothly.

Operation & Administration

The fol owing section touches on the areas of ongoing operation and administration, i.e. what happens

after the platform is deployed and users have been migrated into the system. There is a wealth of

information in print and online regarding the technical aspects of SharePoint administration, so we’re

going to leave those topics out of scope for this paper.

IT operations

The SharePoint Administrator(s) wil be the focal point of SharePoint IT operations, but he or she wil

need to work closely with other members of your IT group. Some of the roles that are usual y cal ed on

from time to time are the fol owing:

• Database administrators, to ensure the back-‐end SQL Server databases are “healthy” and

functioning as expected. The DBAs wil be responsible for keeping SQL Server patched and up-‐

to-‐date and can help troubleshoot certain types of issues.

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• Windows administrators, for “care and feeding” of the operating systems on the SharePoint

servers. These individuals wil maintain patch levels, monitor the servers, and assist in

troubleshooting exercises.

• Network administrators, to assist with connectivity and bandwidth issues

• Information security professionals, to make sure you’re keeping al that data properly secured

and in compliance with policies and/or regulations.

• Help desk personnel, to support the end user community

SharePoint administration

SharePoint administration is the province of the SharePoint administrator(s). The administrator(s) wil

perform a variety of functions, including:

• Troubleshooting and support as issues arise

• Configuration changes to the system as needed

• Provisioning new site col ections, sites, etc. as the usage of the system grows

• Search tuning

• System patching and upgrading, in concert with other members of the IT team

• Usage analysis and reporting

• Cross-‐training site and site col ection administrators

• Serving as a primary point of contact if vendor escalation is needed

• Writing utility scripts (e.g. PowerShel scripts) as needed

Depending on the size of the organization, the amount of activity surrounding SharePoint, and the

nature of the user community, the administrative functions may constitute only a portion of one

person’s job. In larger, more complex environments it can easily be a ful -‐time position and in many

cases something that’s assigned to a team.

Change management

Change management refers to the processes and procedures your organization follows to ensure that

system changes are well coordinated across environments and don’t lead to outages or other problems.

If your organization maintains multiple SharePoint environments (e.g. Development, Test, Staging,

Production, Disaster Recovery) you’l need to ensure that changes are applied consistently across the

various server farms and that the changes don’t lead to problems.

Unfortunately, updating SharePoint is not as easy as just copying files from one system to another.

Teams that are accustomed to working with basic websites are often surprised by the complexities

involved with SharePoint. There are a number of approaches that can be taken to package changes and

deploy them automatical y, but in many cases it comes down to careful y documenting the changes and

applying them (manual y) consistently from one farm to the next.

During the initial stages of the SharePoint program, encourage the project team to work with the other

members of the IT group to incorporate SharePoint into your change management processes.

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Organizational Change Management

The fol owing section provides a starting point for addressing organizational change management as it

relates to SharePoint. Like many of the topics this white paper touches on, this is a very deep topic and

wil not be covered exhaustively. For the executive or manager, the important point is to realize how

important the change management aspects are to a successful SharePoint implementation. If an

organization doesn’t adequately address the organizational change management aspects, the

SharePoint deployment wil not be successful – even if the technical aspects are executed flawlessly.

• Establish clear sponsorship

• Consider organizational readiness

• Ensure a communications plan is in place

• Plan for training, customized to various audiences

• Plan for support

• Track user adoption and promote “What’s in it for me”

Sponsorship

First and foremost, the SharePoint initiative needs a clear sponsor. Optimally there wil be both a

business sponsor a technical sponsor; see the roles and responsibilities section above for details. In

addition, it can be very helpful to establish a steering committee, comprised of executives that

represent the major stakeholders in the deployment and ongoing use of the SharePoint portal.

Readiness

The term “readiness” is nothing if not vague; when we think of organizational readiness we mean the

fol owing:

• Executive sponsors are identified and actively engaged; if sponsorship doesn’t exist (or exists

only in a “figurehead” sense) the project wil be imperiled from the start

• The project team has formed, has funding, and has a clearly established set of objectives and

deadlines

• The technical resources have been hired, trained, or contracted with and have sufficient

availability to work on the project

• The infrastructure is prepared for SharePoint (see section above re: Technology Platform)

• Support resources have been identified and are actively engaged in the project

• Content owners are aware of the initiative and understand their roles

• A wel -‐coordinated communications plan has been developed to let the organization know that

SharePoint is coming, what its goals are, and when they should expect to see changes

If you can check all of the boxes above your organization is in great shape and will have a substantially

greater chance of success.

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Communications

It is important to develop a communications plan for the variety of audiences in your organization,

especially those users who wil be early adopters of the new platform. Here are some tools we’ve used

in the past that have worked wel :

• Ask the executive sponsor(s) to update their colleagues in the executive staff meeting; this is a

simple step but sometimes overlooked. The other executives in the organization wil appreciate

hearing about the initiative first, rather than from their reports.

• Get something online quickly that you can point people towards. If you have an existing

intranet, get a set of pages up about the SharePoint initiative. If not, put something on the

fileserver and distribute the link.

• Plan for a series of sponsor emails that go out to the user community at large over the course of

the deployment.

• Make use of email, in-‐person meetings, conference cal s, webinars, and online resources to

communicate with the initial end users. They wil be your marketing, good or bad, to the rest of

the organization. Make sure they understand what’s happening and have a vehicle for asking

questions and providing feedback.

Your communication plan should:

• Identify audiences (e.g. division, various departments, individual executives, technical teams,

etc.)

• Identify communication channels (e.g. email, online, in-‐person meetings, “town hal ” sessions,

etc.)

• Assign ownership to appropriate individuals and teams

• Set the schedule

• Provide for two-‐way communication options and feedback mechanisms

Training

Training is an important part of the change process and will help ensure your people are prepared and

confident; a variety of options are available. Content and delivery mechanisms should be tailored for the

variety of audiences.

• Offsite classroom training: this is most appropriate for the SharePoint administrator(s) and

SharePoint developer(s). There are a wide variety of options, many from Microsoft partners who

offer official MS-‐approved courses. While expensive, sending critical resources to a week of

offsite training wil give them the opportunity to focus intently on SharePoint, network with

peers, and ask questions of experienced trainers. If you do opt for offsite classroom training, our

suggestion is to immerse the administrator(s) and developer(s) in SharePoint a few weeks

before they go to the class. This wil give them at least some background in the product, which

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wil help give the class context; this also lets your core technical team prepare questions and

scenarios to take to the class.

• In-‐house classroom training: if your organization has an in-‐house training group you may want

to consider developing classroom training. End users can benefit from a half-‐day introduction to

SharePoint, while site administrators may need a ful day or more to address the more advanced

topics of security and site customization. If this is an option for your organization and the cost

can be justified it’s worth pursuing.

• Online training: a number of vendors offer commercial online training products that are either

hosted, or instal able on your SharePoint instance. In addition, it’s quite straightforward to

develop online training materials even if you don’t have a formal training group. Screen-‐cast

software (i.e. applications that let you record what’s on a computer screen + a voice-‐over) such

as Camtasia can be purchased for a few hundred dol ars and are relatively easy to use. The

SharePoint administrator or other knowledgeable resources can create short, effective how-‐to

videos that show users how to accomplish basic tasks.

• Written materials: there is a wealth of published books available for purchase, as well as a

number of online resources. See the Appendix for details.

The most important take-‐away here should be: users won’t “just figure it out” unless your organization

is relatively technical in nature. While SharePoint is a user-‐friendly product, it represents very different

ways of working, and providing training to your people wil greatly improve the adoption curve.

Support

This should go without saying, but preparing your support resources is a critical element in the

organizational change process. The help desk, desk-‐side, and tier II / III support resources need to be

ful y prepared and ready to support SharePoint before it gets deployed. The initial user groups’

experiences need to be positive; this wil help generate supportive “buzz” in the organization and wil

improve adoption. If early users don’t have the support resources they expect, they will be left to work

things out on their own and may not have nice things to say around the proverbial water cooler.

End-‐user adoption

Beyond communications, training, and support there are a few things the organization can do to help

increase end-‐user adoption. Primary among these is explaining, and demonstrating, to users what’s in it

for them. If they are presented with tools that make it more difficult to do their jobs, they are going to

find ways to work around the new system rather than in it. For example, if users are forced to enter 19

pieces of metadata every time they upload a document to SharePoint, presumably many wil revert to

email and file shares. However, if users see that search, views, and flexible libraries help them find

information quickly they’re going to embrace the new approach. So remember to emphasize the

“WIIFM: what’s in it for me?”

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Governance

This section of the document describes the SharePoint governance process, why it’s important, and

provides a basic outline for a governance document.

• A successful SharePoint environment requires effective governance

• Develop a governance document

•

Executive summary

•

Information architecture

•

Service design and features

•

Customization

•

Policies & standards

•

Information security

•

Approved tools

•

Roles & responsibilities

•

Operational management

•

On-‐Boarding process

•

Site lifecycle management

•

Service Level Agreements (SLAs)

• Strike the right balance between control & flexibility

What’s meant by governance?

Wikipedia offers the fol owing definition of governance:

Governance relates to decisions that define expectations, grant power, or verify performance. It

consists either of a separate process or of a specific part of management or leadership processes.

Sometimes people set up a government to administer these processes and systems.

In the case of a business or of a non-‐profit organisation, governance relates to consistent

management, cohesive policies, processes and decision-‐rights for a given area of responsibility.

For example, managing at a corporate level might involve evolving policies on privacy, on

internal investment, and on the use of data.5

Governance is particularly important for SharePoint for the fol owing reasons:

• Administrative rights and responsibilities are often delegated “downward” or “outward” into

the various departments and teams that make up an organization. While many systems are

central y administered by the IT department, most SharePoint environments delegate some

level of administrative rights to the groups that own the various sites and information resources.

5 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governance

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Clearly explaining how those rights and responsibilities are assigned is critical to avoid

confusion.

• SharePoint offers a wide variety of features and functionality, some of which may not be

appropriate for your environment. Explicitly stating which features are made available and

which are not (in the governance document) empowers the SharePoint team to say “no” when

needed.

• A variety of standards and policies need to be defined for the portal, covering thing such as

security, information lifecycles, compliance, publishing processes, approved tools and processes,

etc.

In short, governance is needed to define who can do what, what will be available, what policies apply,

and who’s in charge.

Governance document

Searching the web wil turn up a variety of resources that wil help your organization develop a

governance document. The fol owing sections are a reasonable starting point.

Executive summary

Begin the document with an executive summary that highlights the most important concepts. General y

this should be kept to 1-‐2 pages and is usually written last.

Information architecture

The governance document should define the high level information architecture, e.g. how site

col ections wil be assigned to various divisions or groups and how global navigation wil work.

Optional y the governance document can refer to a separate detailed information architecture

document.

Service design & features

This section should describe what features wil be available and how the portal services will be deployed

to the organization.

Customization

The governance document needs to address what types of customization wil be allowed. Examples

include:

• Simple point-‐and-‐click customizations of web parts and pages

• Custom branding elements and custom master pages (your developers wil know what this

means)

• Custom .Net development

The last bul et point, custom .Net development, has been discussed in previous sections of the

document. Spend the time to think through whether this wil be al owed, where it will be allowed, and

what types of testing and change control wil govern deployment of custom solutions.

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Policies & standards

The governance document should clearly define policies and standards that end users and site

administrators wil be held to.

Information security

Your organization’s security team should adapt applicable security policies and standards to the

SharePoint platform. Security policies should be captured in the governance document or referenced in

an external security policy manual.

Approved tools

A variety of tools exist to work with SharePoint, e.g. Visual Studio and SharePoint Designer. These tools

require elevated privileges in the portal and give users a great deal of power. The governance document

needs to define what tools wil be allowed and who can use them.

Roles & responsibilities

The governance document should list and describe the major roles and responsibilities of the people

involved with SharePoint. The following table can also be found in the “Technology Platform” section

above:

Roles

Responsibilities

Business Owner / Sponsor

This person is usually an executive-‐level sponsor with budgetary

authority to pay for the initial project. Usually represents the

business and is primarily interested in the ROI potential of the

platform.

Technical Sponsor

This person is usually an executive-‐level technology manager

who manages the technical teams that wil deploy and maintain

SharePoint

SharePoint Administrator(s)

The SharePoint Administrator wil be responsible for the day-‐to-‐

day administration of the platform, as wel as al system

upgrades, major configuration changes, etc.

Backup / Storage Administrator This is the person who is already responsible for enterprise

backups, and often storage management (in most large

organizations this usual y a team rather than an individual). It is

important to involve this person intimately, as backup/restore

operations are both critical to the enterprise and chal engingly

complex

Site Col ection Administrator(s) These are the people who wil administer the various high-‐level

col ections of sites once the platform is deployed. In corporate

environments, each division may have one or more site

col ections specific to their users and data; the Site Col ection

Administrator(s) would manage the system at this level and

report to the SharePoint Administrator for technical purposes.

Site Administrator(s)

Site Administrators are often members of business

departments and/or teams; usual y these are “power-‐users”

who are interested in taking on administrative duties for their

department’s SharePoint site(s)

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SharePoint Developer(s)

The SharePoint Developer(s) wil write custom .Net code to

enhance and modify the base SharePoint platform. While many

organizations choose to create custom-‐code solutions for their

SharePoint portals, there are strong arguments to be made for

limiting customization.

Help Desk Resource(s)

End users wil rely on the Help Desk and desk-‐side support

resources, so this team needs to be involved in the SharePoint

project and properly trained and prepared

Technical Trainer(s)

The training team (or your training vendor) wil need to create

and/or deliver training materials to the end user community.

They should be involved in the project as soon as the basic use

cases and end-‐user audiences are identified.

Operational management

The primary operational management standards should be defined in the governance document. These

include topics such as the following:

• Change management (see section above for details)

• Patching and upgrading

• Backups and disaster recovery (DR)

• Monitoring

• System tuning

• Web analytics

• Site archival / deletion

• Etc.

In short, this section should call out the primary elements of ongoing system management or refer to

other complementary documents.

On-‐Boarding process

The “on-‐boarding process” describes how new user groups wil be brought into the portal6. Generally

this wil cover the fol owing:

• Roles and responsibilities of the group to be on-‐boarded

• Roles and responsibilities of the SharePoint team

• Training

• Content review and migration

• Team site design (including review and approval)

• Resources involved

• Support, both during and after the transition

• Sample schedule of on-‐boarding activities

6 Note: you may want to begin the SharePoint initiative with a set of pilot groups that get on-‐boarded first. If the

“rules of engagement” wil be different for these groups you may wish to document that separately.

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• Documentation and other resources to be provided to the on-‐boarded team

• Workshop materials to be developed

Site lifecycle management

The SharePoint portal wil grow over time as new sites are added and new users are brought into the

environment. As a result, the governance document needs to define what wil be done to keep

SharePoint “cleaned up” and relevant; old, unused sites wil use storage space, confuse navigation,

clutter search results, and general y degrade the user experience. The governance document should

define:

• How ownership information (i.e. who to contact regarding a site) wil be maintained

• How long a site wil be al owed to go un-‐used before it is archived or deleted

• Whether sites wil be deleted (gone forever) or archived (moved out of the primary portal)

• Whether auto-‐delete functionality wil be turned on in SharePoint

• What compliance and information retention policies apply

Service Level Agreements (SLAs)

The governance document should also clearly define service level agreements (SLAs) for the SharePoint

portal, even though these are less “contractual” in nature for most organizations. The fol owing SLAs are

a usually defined in the governance document:

• Uptime goals

• Support schedule, e.g. when is the help desk available

• System maintenance windows

• Response time for reported incidents

• Response procedures and escalation protocol

• Incident severity ratings

In short, the document should spell out for users when they can expect the system to be available, when

support resources wil be available, and how quickly things wil go into motion if an error occurs.

Striking the right balance

SharePoint governance needs to strike the right balance between control and flexibility. While every

organization is different it’s often easier for the executive sponsors to err on the side of too much

control rather than too much flexibility. This is easy to understand (it’s usual y easier to say “no” than to

say “yes”) but keep in mind that if your organization’s policies are too restrictive, SharePoint may not

live up to its fullest potential and the users may not be willing to adopt the system. Our advice:

• Be flexible wherever you can

• Cover the most important bases

• Allow the governance process to grow and change over time

• Ask for feedback and act on it

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Roadmap

The fol owing section of the document outlines some basic steps along the way in your SharePoint

roadmap. Adapt them to what makes sense for your organization.

• Try it

• Limited pilot

• Divisional deployment

• Enterprise deployment

Try it out – today!

The best way to get started with SharePoint is to start using it; documentation and online resources are

great, but you’re not going to understand the product until you’ve had a chance to try it and “live with

it” for a while. Getting started is easy:

• Microsoft offers online demos; see the Introduction or Appendix for details

• There are a wide variety of web hosting companies that offer inexpensive hosted SharePoint

sites. Sign up for one and use it for a few weeks; the cost is minimal and there’s no engineering

work for your IT group.

• Have your IT team provision a server (or virtual server) and ask them to download the trial

version of SharePoint. It offers a basic instal option that essential y amounts to a one-‐click

install that builds a single server instance of SharePoint. While not quite as easy as the hosted

solution, your team wil get a chance to see the administrative side of things, and a couple of

sharp technologists can get this done in a day or less.

Limited pilot deployment

Once you’ve had a chance to try SharePoint and you’re ready to move forward, consider starting with a

limited pilot deployment. This can be done using minimal server resources, and will give you the

opportunity to involve a carefully selected group of users. A smal pilot wil be a great learning

experience, and getting a system set up for this purpose can be done in a week or less. The feedback

and hands-‐on experience your SharePoint team gets wil be valuable, and might be the perfect step to

take prior to sending them to offsite training.

Divisional deployment

When the organization is ready to deploy SharePoint on a widespread basis, you may want to consider

whether it should happen at the divisional level or at the corporate level (we use these terms loosely, in

case you happen to be a government organization, university, etc.)

If IT is already a distributed function, it may make the most sense to allow each division to proceed with

its own SharePoint initiative. On the other hand, federating the sites in the future could prove

chal enging. This is a question that bears deep consideration at the beginning of the planning process.

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Enterprise-‐wide deployment

For many organizations, deploying SharePoint at the enterprise level is the best approach. While often

the most complex, this option ultimately builds an information system that crosses organizational and

political boundaries and al ows disparate groups of users to discover each other’s work and build upon

it. Microsoft IT has some interesting case study materials about their experiences deploying and

managing a global SharePoint infrastructure.

Adoption lifecycle

Understand that adoption and change wil take place slowly; it’s not going to be an al -‐at-‐once

phenomenon. It’s generally wise to set the expectation that change will happen over an extended time

period, but fol owing these steps will help you build a vision for your SharePoint program and

communicate what’s going to happen along the way.

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A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Concluding Thoughts

We hope this white paper has been valuable and that it sparked some thought and conversation in your

organization. SharePoint is a complex multi-‐faceted topic and too often the technology discussions

crowd out the topics we’ve presented here.

Please do take the time to send us an email with your thoughts and feedback; we always appreciate it

and would like to improve this document over time with the benefit of others’ insights and experiences.

Good luck with your SharePoint implementation and please don’t hesitate to let us know if we can be of

service.

The Acuff Group

contact@acuffgroup.com

http://www.acuffgroup.com

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Copyright © 2009 The Acuff Group

32

A Manager’s Guide to SharePoint

Appendix: Useful Resources

The fol owing table lists some useful resources by audience:

int trators

trator

sers

ePo

signers

te

ar inis

velopers

Si inis

d U

Sh

De d De

En

Resource

Adm

an

Adm

Online

Microsoft’s SharePoint site

http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/Pages/Default.aspx

•

•

•

•

Microsoft’s SharePoint blog

http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/blogs/GetThePoint/default.aspx

•

•

•

•

Technet SharePoint site

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-‐us/office/sharepointserver/default.aspx

MSDN SharePoint site

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-‐us/sharepoint/default.aspx

•

SharePoint Team Blog

http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/

•

•

•

EndUserSharePoint.com

http://www.endusersharepoint.com/

•

•

Heather Solomon’s blog

http://www.heathersolomon.com/Blog/

•

kbAlertz.com SharePoint RSS feed

http://kbalertz.com/rss/SharePointServer2007.xml

•

•

Printed

Microsoft® Office SharePoint® Server 2007 Administrator's Companion

By Bil English, ISBN: 0735622825

•

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Best Practices

By Ben Curry and Bil English, ISBN: 0735625387

•

Pro SharePoint Solution Development

By Ed Hil and Susie Adams, ISBN: 1590598083

•

The SharePoint Shepherd's Guide for End Users

By Robert Bogue, ISBN: 0615194494

•

•

Classes

Microsoft SharePoint Training Portal

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/training/office-‐sharepoint-‐

•

•

•

•

server.aspx

Course 5061A: Implementing Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007

•

Course 50146A: Programming Microsoft Office SharePoint Server

•

Collection 6285: Working With Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007

•

•

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