Avoiding SharePoint Governance Mistakes

April 9, 2014

SharePoint governance is a big topic for most organizations. A panel of experts from Avanade, HiSoftware, Portal Solutions and Metalogix tackled the issue in a recent webinar. CMS Wire gives all the details in their article, “How to Avoid SharePoint Governance Mistakes.”

The author writes:

“If you’re wondering what your SharePoint governance plan should look like, look around you. It should probably look a lot like your organization.

There’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all approach, even if you’re in an highly regulated industry like healthcare of financial services that imposes strict regulations on information sharing.”

Stephen E. Arnold knows all to well the difficulty surrounding SharePoint governance. He is a longtime search expert, and often covers SharePoint issues on his Web site ArnoldIT.com. Webinars, training, and services like ArnoldIT.com are important resources for enterprise managers as they seek to balance the needs of their organization.

Emily Rae Aldridge, April 9, 2014

SharePoint Governance Woes and Solutions

February 5, 2014

SharePoint governance is an important aspect that’s often overlooked. And while developing a plan on the front is often hard and requires a lot of time, having some well-thought-out in place is invaluable. Read more in the Search Content Management article, “SharePoint Governance Plans Doomed Without Business Buy-in.”

The article begins:

“SharePoint implementers are often stymied when attempting to bring discipline to business processes so that SharePoint can be an effective tool in the first place. It’s about bringing order to chaos, noted Sue Hanley, founder and president of Susan Hanley LLC, in her session on developing SharePoint governance plans at SPTechCon 2013 this week. Failure to design information governance into SharePoint implementation plans can lead to deployments that resemble the ‘Wild, Wild West,’ Hanley said.”

Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime leader in search and the man behind ArnoldIT.com. He spends a lot of attention on SharePoint and governance is not an infrequent topic. If a plan is not in place, extensive customization and fancy training will not do an organization any good. It all begins and ends with a smart plan.

Emily Rae Aldridge, February 5, 2014

SharePoint Gets Serious with Information Governance

March 19, 2015

SharePoint has enjoyed continued success over the last 15 years, but it has not been without some bumps along the way. Information governance is one of the noted areas in which Share has fallen flat. Read more in the CMS Wire article, “Keeping SharePoint In Check with Information Governance.”

The article begins:

“Historically, SharePoint was thought to cause as many information governance problems as it solved. The 2001 to 2003 versions did not show Microsoft putting much effort into helping customers with information governance. But after the massive take up of SharePoint Portal Server 2007 licenses, and the often negative conversations coming out of the sizable SharePoint user community, Microsoft started to take governance issues seriously.”

In addition to keep an eye on your news feed for the latest SharePoint buzz, staying tuned to experts in the field is a great way to save time and get pointed information pertaining to improving a SharePoint installation. Stephen E. Arnold has one such SharePoint feed on his Web site, ArnoldIT.com. Focusing on tips, tricks, and news, Arnold collocates much of content that users and managers alike will find helpful for navigating day-to-day SharePoint operations.

Emily Rae Aldridge, March 19, 2015

Stephen E Arnold, Publisher of CyberOSINT at www.xenky.com

SharePoint Information Governance Concerns

April 23, 2014

Most users of SharePoint know about the struggles and concerns of governance. CMS Wire covers the issue in their article, “The SharePoint Information Governance Problem.”

Speaking to those experienced with using SharePoint as a document management platform, the article begins:

“You’re also likely familiar with the negative impacts that typically result from using SharePoint ineffectively: a proliferation of sites, often on a proliferation of SharePoint versions, with no clear standards on what documents should (and shouldn’t) be stored there or how, no clear guidelines for users on how to classify their documents, little to no capabilities for promoting effective information lifecycle management, little to no end user governance or oversight for things like site and document library structures, security and access settings, or document hygiene, and dozens, hundreds or even thousands of orphaned sites that, taken together, represent a digital landfill of staggering proportions.”

The article then goes on to assert that most of these issues are due to SharePoint’s lack of ease of use. This is a topic that Stephen E. Arnold often covers on his information site, ArnoldIT.com. Specializing in all forms of search, Arnold has a lifetime of experience. Tune in to his SharePoint feed for tips and tricks on increasing ease of use.

Emily Rae Aldridge, April 23, 2014

SharePoint 2013 Hybrid Governance Support

December 6, 2013

SharePoint grows in breadth and depth with every update. SharePoint 2013 offers more features than ever before. However, the time and expertise it takes to customize those features is becoming more and more demanding. For that reason, organizations are looking for add-ons and intuitive customization options without a lot of hassle. PRWeb gives another good option in its latest release, “Microsoft SharePoint 2013 Hybrid Support Highlights New Release of AvePoint DocAve Governance Automation Service Pack 4.”

The release begins:

AvePoint, the leader in governance, compliance, and management solutions for social enterprise collaboration platforms, announced today the latest version of its flagship product for automated service and proactive governance enforcement, DocAve Governance Automation Service Pack (SP) 4, with support for Microsoft SharePoint 2013 hybrid deployments.”

Finding and analyzing all the latest add-ons and SharePoint supplemental services can be exhausting. Many would benefit from a news service that boils down the important stuff. That’s just what Stephen E. Arnold does with ArnoldIT. A long-time leader in enterprise search, his recent attention has turned to enterprise search, and his expertise is invaluable.

Emily Rae Aldridge, December 6, 2013

SharePoint Gets a Stricter Governance Tool

December 31, 2012

SharePoint is Microsoft’s glorified collaborative content management platform. It usually provides decent out-of-the-box solutions for managing projects and allowing users to work and share on content collectively, but sometimes it needs help from an IVP to make it better. Metavis is an add-on software solutions provider and according to Web Media 360 they have “Metavis Introduces New SharePoint Governance Enhancement Tool.”

The new governance tool is called Informant and is currently in its beta phase. It is supposed to help control the comings and goings of files outside of SharePoint. These actions hold a security risk for all enterprise-based companies:

“Metavis says it is the transfer of content beyond the confines of SharePoint which holds the gravest potential consequences in terms of undermining the integrity of an enterprise’s content management and security strategy. Such transfers, says Metavis, have become more frequent owing to the proliferation of file sharing platforms.”

 

Informant will help SharePoint users monitor and control transfers in their SharePoint environment as well as tagging, archiving, and placing permissions on files. Securing data is a big part of any information governance. Technology makes it so easy to steal information, but it also makes it easier to lock it down. Take precautions to monitor your data.

Whitney Grace, December 31, 2012

Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext

Improving Governance Compliance in SharePoint

March 30, 2012

Jeremy Thake addresses the important issue of governance compliance in, “SharePoint Gone Wild: When Governance Lacks Compliance.” Many organizations employ multiple repositories for sensitive content, and an out-of-the-box SharePoint system makes it hard to enforce the guidelines of where content should go. Thake explains,

“The out-of-the-box auditing features in SharePoint 2010 have some key limitations in this space, specifically regarding the storage of this data over a prolonged period of time (most acts seem to be approximately seven years) as well as the ease of producing a report of an individual user’s activity and attached content. The most common format followed by customers with whom I work is Concordance, which is supported by LexisNexis. But more importantly, from a content perspective, the attached content should be exactly what the user viewed, modified, or created at that point in time so versioning here is the key.”

SharePoint 2010 has many added improvements to address some of the out-of-the-box compliance gaps. But compliance is an area that needs a comprehensive solution. To really extend your SharePoint capabilities and get the most out of your enterprise search investments, look to Mindbreeze.

No matter where your sensitive information is stored, on-premise or in the Cloud, Mindbreeze connects users to the right information while maintaining strict security standards. Here you can read about the cost-efficient solution:

“Fabasoft Mindbreeze Enterprise finds every scrap of information within a very short time, whether document, contract, note, e-mail or calendar entry, in intranet or internet, person- or text-related. The software solution finds all required information, regardless of source, for its users. Get a comprehensive overview of corporate knowledge in seconds without redundancy or loss of data.”

Check out their full suite of solutions to see what will work for you.

Philip West, March 30, 2012

Sponsored by Pandia.com

Survival of SharePoint and the Big Bang Theory

May 5, 2015

The ebb and flow of SharePoint expansion and contraction can be described as a “big bang theory” of sorts. This cyclical pattern can be seen in many businesses, but Redmond Magazine helps readers see the cycle in SharePoint. Read more in their article, “The SharePoint Big Bang Theory.”

The article sums up the illustration:

“As Microsoft added capabilities to SharePoint over the years, and provided the flexibility to configure or customize its features to meet just about any business requirement, the success of the platform exploded . . . End users and administrators alike started thinking about their information architecture and information governance policies. Companies . . . began consolidating their efforts, and started to move their businesses toward a more structured content management strategy . . . [then] the rise of the enterprise social networks (ESNs) and cloud-based file sharing solutions have had (are having) a contracting effect on those intranet and structured collaboration plans. Suddenly end users seem to be totally in charge.”

There’s no doubt that SharePoint has learned to weather the turbulent changes of the last twenty years. In some ways, their adaptability is to be applauded. And yet, most users know the platform is not perfect. To stay attuned to what the next twenty years will bring, keep an eye on ArnoldIT.com. Stephen E. Arnold has made a career of out reporting on all things search, and his dedicated SharePoint feed distills the information down into an easily digestible platform.

Emily Rae Aldridge, May 5, 2015

Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph

SharePoint Usability Workarounds

December 25, 2014

SharePoint is known as the most widely used enterprise solution, but it is definitely not known as the most friendly to use. CMS Wire substantiates that claim in their latest article, “4 Ways SharePoint Navigation Breaks Usability Best Practices.”

The article begins:

“There’s been a lot of interest lately from business users and SharePoint site owners in SharePoint’s usability (or lack thereof), but the issue doesn’t seem to receive as much attention as other topics. When experts talk about SharePoint, they focus on migration, administration, governance, development, cloud, and mobile. Any mentions of usability take a backseat and are only brought up by usability enthusiasts. It’s time to bring this subject to the forefront.”

The author then goes on to list at least four ways that SharePoint Navigation breaks usability best practices. These may seem like minute points to the outsider, but SharePoint managers will find that they make a great deal of impact on the usability and user satisfaction of their implementation. Stephen E. Arnold also reports similar findings on his Web service, ArnoldIT.com. He has made a career out of all things search and frequently reports on tips and tricks for SharePoint on his dedicated feed. Readers may find it helpful for their continuing education.

Emily Rae Aldridge, December 25, 2014

Partnership with SAP, SharePoint, and Open Text

March 24, 2014

SharePoint is improved by customization. Third-party add-ons are often the backbone of this customization, since SharePoint has become such a complex infrastructure. In the latest news, SharePoint is partnering with other vendors to increase efficiency. Read more in the Fierce Content Management article, “OpenText Brings Governance to SharePoint, SAP.”

The article begins:

“In one of the more odd product announcements in some time, three giants of enterprise software–OpenText, SharePoint and SAP–have come together around a governance, content management and an ERP solution. This three-headed monster is called SAP Content Management for Microsoft SharePoint by OpenText. You can view SAP data inside SharePoint or SharePoint content inside SAP, and OpenText takes care of the governance bits to make sure everything is done within the rules of the organization.”

Stephen E. Arnold has made a career out of reporting and analyzing all things search. His SharePoint coverage also points to the importance of customization, especially through add-ons. Read more on his Web site ArnoldIT.com.

Emily Rae Aldridge, March 24, 2014

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