Question

research SharePoint or other team collaboration tools in terms of its applicability to Information Governance

Answer 1

Hi,

In my experience, both as a consultant and SharePoint "user,” the biggest problems with SharePoint were ease of deployment and ease of use. It was (and remains) far too easy for IT to set up a SharePoint site (or site collection with multiple sub-sites) and hand them over to a business group that has no expertise in information governance or information management.

Some organizations took a “center of excellence” approach and provided business groups with a central point for advice, templates, training and education. But other organizations did not put this effort in. They left business users to their own devices, who often had no clue as to the implications of their decisions on how they set up document libraries, custom lists, permissions, etc.

The SharePoint vendor ecosystem tried to fill in some of the gaps with add on products to make information management and information governance easier to set up and maintain. Consulting organizations, both large and small, made a fortune in advising organizations how to manage their SharePoint environments and the information within them in a more thoughtful fashion.

Governance is the set of policies, roles, responsibilities, and processes that control how an organization's business divisions and IT teams work together to achieve its goals. Every organization has unique needs and goals that influence its approach to governance. Larger organizations will probably require more—and more detailed—governance than smaller organizations. A good governance plan can:

• Streamline the deployment of products and technologies, such as SharePoint.

• Help keep your organization's system secure and compliant.

• Help ensure the best return on your investment in technology.

SharePoint Governance Components

Infrastructure and Security Governance

• SharePoint and/or Office 365 Disaster Recovery Governance
• Defining SharePoint and/or Office 365 SLAs for System Architecture and the overall underlying architecture
• Defining SharePoint and/or Office 365 Maintenance
• SharePoint and/or Office 365 Security Governance
• Site Provisioning Governance
• Lync Server and OneDrive for Business Governance
• Defining compliance and regulatory governance

Custom Development Governance

• Development of organizational SharePoint Development Standards
• Creation of Deployment and Code Promotion Standards
• SharePoint and/or Office 365 Branding Governance
• Visual Studio 2012/2013 and Team Foundation Server policies and procedures

Content Governance

• Policies for Enterprise Content Management
• Policies for Storage (quotas, file upload limits, and so on)
• Policies for My Site and Social Computing
• Guidelines for Power User and Content Updating
• Policies for Executive and Legal Content
• Policies for Apps, Libraries, and List Configuration and Customization

Training and Administration Governance

• Guidelines for SharePoint and/or Office 365 Training
• Guidelines for SharePoint and/or Office 365 Communication Plan
• Policies for SharePoint Steering Committee
• Support Model for Enterprise SharePoint and/or Office 365
• Guidelines for Executive SharePoint/ Dashboard Reporting