How to not get locked out of Microsoft SharePoint is probably a question that’s not even crossed your mind but the simple fact is that unless you get your SharePoint adoption right, you may spend a lot of time – and a lot of money – trying to find the key to getting ROI for your business while you stand there in the pouring rain.
Most of us have, at some point, been locked out of our homes or office and it’s an incredibly frustrating experience! You’re stood at your own front door, you know that everything you need (and own) is on the other side but for the simple sake of you not having the foresight to have gotten your keys then you cannot get in! Best case scenario, you may be able to find a back door to open instead and find another way in but doing so usually requires the painful vaulting of some kind of fence. Worse case scenario, you end up standing around in the cold for hours while you call out an expensive locksmith who has to retrospectively gain you entry for a lot of money. You will probably kick yourself for not having paid a small bit of money upfront to have a spare key cut by an expert when you got the house because then, if you ever did get stuck, having that up your sleeve somewhere would have saved you time and money.
In our experience, getting what you want out of SharePoint can feel just like this scenario of being locked out of your own home. The door is looming in front of you, it’s raining pressure and you really need to get in but you just can’t find the key to getting out of SharePoint what it is you know it should be able to deliver. And when you eventually do, it will often feel like it has been a complicated process that you’d rather avoid in the future.
Look at MindPoint as the SharePoint locksmiths. We give you all the keys and we make sure that they are keys which you can never forget. Having faced every scenario imaginable to unlock ROI for businesses all around the world then we’ve already got the skeleton keys (best practice) to unlock anything when it comes to SharePoint. And we’re always on standby ready to let you in. Work with MindPoint and you’ll be able to pick your own lock with ease! If you’re already facing these problems, we’re here to open the door for you and as the experts, we’ve even got free tools for you to mitigate a lot of potential problems (see below).
There are a number of tips we’d like to give you which will make sure that you don’t get locked out of SharePoint but we’d first recommend that you do one or all of the following:
(A) Register for one of our free SharePoint webinar masterclasses which cover a whole range of SharePoint subjects and themes. These concise, high impact and engaging webinars cover a whole range of deep dive Microsoft SharePoint topics such as Content Types, Workflow, Outlook, InfoPath, Lists/Libraries/Views and more. You can book onto one of our live webinars on a scheduled date or you can even book a one-to-one presentation of any of the webinars at a time and date to suit you and/or your team. Just click here to check out the full schedule of SharePoint webinar masterclasses that we have coming up.
(B) View/Download our free and exclusive Top Tips Best Practice Guide to how to get the most out of Microsoft SharePoint. This comprehensive guide explains why many SharePoint implementations fail or fall short. It illustrates what all the implementation and adoption mistakes are that you need to avoid or attack and provides best practice recommendations, expert insight and practical advice for anyone implementing and adopting SharePoint – or about to.
(C) Join the thousands of businesses around the world who have already watched our feature packed YouTube video on how to make your business leaner, greener and more profitable with SharePoint. Click here to watch the video – you can even request a PDF or Powerpoint copy of it to share with your team.
(D) Book a free and friendly Discovery Call with one of the SharePoint experts at MindPoint by clicking here. There’s no sales spiel or hard sell – just straight talking and practical advice.
(E) Visit the E-Library on our website to access free, hand curated and independent best practice advice on Microsoft SharePoint. You can also view some of our client case studies.
In the meantime, here’s some quick top tips to prevent you getting locked out of SharePoint:
1. Make sure that your infrastructure is up to the job. A slow performing site will not reach a critical user mass. Windows SharePoint service is a good starting point but as your company grows you may need to migrate to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server.
2. Carefully work out what you need SharePoint to deliver. Don’t just let IT decide which features to enable because SharePoint has got to work for everyone so others need to be brought on the journey. This is something we cover in detail in our free Sharepoint Top Tips Guide.
3. Make sure SharePoint is optimally configured for your business. The success of SharePoint often depends on you getting the right balance. One size doesn’t fit all and what works for you will probably be different from what works for others. Getting your SharePoint configuration right will make it easier to do things like locate content. You have to remember that not everyone using the system will be an IT expert, so don’t over engineer the system. Our Content Types webinar masterclasses are something you may find useful (see here).
4. There’s a big difference between collaboration and publication. Take the time to understand the information you are trying to organise and work out who your audience and who your contributors are. If information is needed for collaboration then ensure users have access to archive sites and that access generally is not over restricted or you will certainly suffer the getting locked out scenario. Read-only corporate content will be treated differently. This sort of information is ‘published’ so make sure that you keep it frequent/regular and that you inform people when new content is available.
5. Don’t forget the simple stuff. You can get tremendous extra benefits from features like workflow, forms, views, alerts and lists and from tools like InfoPath. Make sure you know how to use them and, again, you can do this for free by joining any of our regular SharePoint masterclass webinars here.
6. Don’t do it all on your own. Getting the right help to work out what your SharePoint priorities are will save you time and money in the long run and this is something we blogged about. At MindPoint, we start with your business not your system and we work SharePoint around your company’s exacting needs. Book a Discovery Call with us here and find out how.
If you get it right then SharePoint can and will be an incredibly powerful part of your business and will give you competitive edge for many years to come. Everything we do at MindPoint is designed to ensure you get all the keys you need to truly unlock SharePoint in an economical, agile and hassle-free way.
Dont Get Locked Out Of Microsoft SharePoint – Call MindPoint Today On 01206 432 000 or email info@mindpoint.co.uk