TechFuse 2009 Building a SharePoint Platform Site – Governance in Action

1. Wes Preston http://www.idubbs.com/blog TechFuse 2009 Building a SharePoint Platform Site – Governance in Action

2. Agenda • Quick Intro • Overview • Site Details • Notes and Resources • Questions

3. Quick Intro • Wes Preston • SharePoint Consultant at Inetium • MVP – SharePoint Server • MCTS – WSS and MOSS Configuration • Minnesota SharePoint User Group

4. Overview

5. What is this site for? • Empower the users • Be the single point of reference for users of SharePoint in the environment. • On-demand training • Two-way communication between users and SharePoint team • Put the user base at ease • Answer questions before they’ve asked them • Show that you’ve planned for this • Reduce call center calls/tickets

6. What is this site for? • Container or starting point for other resources • Training • Administrators web • User Group site/schedule • Define roles and responsibilities • A checklist for farm administrators

7. Why are we talking about this? • Get buy-in from the user base • Governance – One of the things that should be done as part of a SharePoint deployment • Sites like this are commonly talked about, but not frequently done • Give administrators a starting point

8. Good, Better, Best • A site like this is a good starting point, but there are a lot of improvements that can be introduced • Automation • User content • Dependent on your environment • Dependent on the tools available

9. Governance • TechNet: • Governance is the set of roles, responsibilities, and processes that you put in place in an enterprise to guide the development and use of a solution based on SharePoint Products and Technologies. • Governance isn’t rocket science, but the platform site is just one example of a governance item that is traditionally forgotten

10. Site Details

12. Taxonomy • The site is a web somewhere in your environment • This specific example is self contained and can be used as a site collection or a sub web

13. Welcome Text • Content Editor Web Part • Welcome message and overview of what users will find here – maybe links to major areas. • You may want to remove a site description or include the text in the Welcome Text

14. Announcements • Use for platform announcements • System outages • New functionality or web parts • Training availability • Encourage alerts or RSS feeds

15. Links • The typical usage… • Keep a list of reference URLs • Use the list to populate a Quick Links web part on the home page • Use categories, filtering, etc…

16. Shared Documents • Reference documents • Training docs or tutorials if you don’t have a training web • SLAs • Lots of options!!

17. FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions • Discussion List • Lock the list down, or at least require approval • May want to use a service account for admins submitting • I need to… web part (MOSS) • Limit or filter the number of items displaying on the home page • Create another page with multiple web parts and grouped by category, etc…

18. Knowledgebase • Extension of the FAQ • More information, more complete answers • Identify processes and standards • Custom development • Adding 3rd party products • What types of sites are available, what do they look like, what are scenarios for using • Scenarios and use-cases

19. Other Forums • User forums on the main site • Users • Site Administrators • Other forums on deeper sites • Training • SharePoint Farm Administrators • Developers

20. Contact Information • List users of the SharePoint Team • Who is the manager (so things can be escalated) • Phone numbers? IM? • Have an e-mail account that the team monitors – link to message from the site

21. Feedback List • Offer a method for submitting feedback • Could be a list with some categories • Admins should set alerts or RSS • Put approval on • Allow others to see the feedback • Add a ‘highlight’ flag to expose a view on the homepage

22. Request Processes • Starts to get a little fuzzy… • Some processes should be isolated more • Site Requests • Security Requests • Solution Requests • Help Requests

23. Calendar • User Group meetings – internal and MNSPUG! • Scheduled labs • Maintenance windows (outages, upgrades) • Meeting workspaces

24. Advertise it! • Let people know about the site however you can • Link from the intranet/portal • E-mail signature • Reference information with links to the site whenever possible

25. Training Site • Reference documents • Links to relevant materials • Office SharePoint Server 2007 Training • Portal and Stand-alone editions • SharePoint Designer 2007 Training • Portal and Stand-alone editions • The SharePoint Shepherd’s Guide for End Users

26. SharePoint Admin Site • Reference documents • Links to relevant materials • SharePoint Issues List • Operational documents • Platform documents • (Backup to an offline location)

27. SharePoint Dev Site • Reference documents • Links to relevant materials • Dev Best Practices • Templates • Tools • PowerShell • SharePoint Designer • Visual Studio

28. Notes and Resources

29. …More to do… • Seed additional content • Clean up • Add a checklist for administrators to go down when implementing

30. Additional Notes • Have a SharePoint Admin account that administrators can use to submit content • Keep the content relevant • Set schedule reminders • Publishing site – same idea, different implementation

31. Resources • Download this presentation and template • Wes’s Blog:http://www.idubbs.com/blog

32. Resources • Minnesota SharePoint User Group • http://www.sharepointmn.com • Latest Governance presentation:http://www.sharepointmn.com/User%20Group%20Presentations/September%202008%20MNSPUG.ppt • SharePoint Joel Governance Slide Deck:http://www.slideshare.net/joeloleson/best-practices-conference-spring-09-avoiding-failed-deployments-and-newbie-mistakes-10-steps-to-success-keynote-by-joel-oleson • SharePoint Deployment Guide and Checklistshttp://office.microsoft.com/download/afile.aspx?AssetID=AM102552101033

33. Questions

34. Thank you for attending!