Share Point Governance

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SharePoint Governance

SharePoint Governance, Part 1
Robert Bogue

Microsoft SharePoint technologies offer an immense amount of power for
an organization, and harnessing this power is the goal of every business
that installs SharePoint.

But adoption of the SharePoint technologies can get out of control without
proper governance. In this two-part article you'll learn what governance is
and learn about

some of items that you should consider for a SharePoint technologies
governance plan.

Before delving into the details of the specifics of SharePoint governance,
it's important to clarify meaning and to understand an overall approach to
governance that works well for organizations of all sizes.

Governance is defined as quot;a method or system of government of
managementquot; (Dictionary.com). It is also defined in part on Wikipedia.org
as quot;… focused on information technology systems and their performance
and risk management.quot; Governance is managing the deployment of
information technologies. Managing, like project management, is
concerned with the risks, the costs, and the usefulness of the solution
once it has been created. Thus when we define governance we are
attempting to manage risk, cost, and adoption.

We must strike a balance between these goals, seeking to find a
manageable path which is neither overly loose nor overly tight. We can
not exercise no governance and have broad adoption without
manageability nor can we exercise heavy governance which eliminates
adoption.

EROL GIRAUDY – source : Robert Bogue


Now that we understand the purpose of governance it's time to review
categories that may be important in your SharePoint governance. They
are:

Project and Operational Management
Development and Configuration
Infrastructure
Operational Concerns
Education and Training
Navigation, Taxonomy, and Search
The following sections drill into the details of each area and describe the specific items that
you may want to include in your governance plan. Each section contains a table which
indicates a name of a general grouping for the activities and decisions, the specific actions
(quot;What to doquot;) and the reasoning behind the actions (quot;Why to do itquot;). The objective here is to
provide you with both a practical guide for creating your governance plan as well as to
enlighten you on the background for the items so that you can identify additional,
organizationally unique, items that should be a part of your governance plan.


Project and operational management encompasses traditional project
management concerns as well as those concerns which may be more
formally described as operational management - as they refer to the
ongoing management of the platform and not to the project management
associated with the initial construction. In this section we are concerned
with the initial construction and those operational items which need early
decisions to promote consistency.

Item What To Do Why To Do It
Communication Establish a Establishing an
communications expectation as to what
plan that includes: communications will
1. Who will do the happen will help users
communications understand how to
2. When the contact the project team
communications will and what they can
occur expect the
3. What each communications pattern
communication will to be. This improves the
contain perceived openness of
4. How each the process and
communication will facilitates adoption
come (i.e. email,



hard copy
document,
newsletter, etc.)
Create central
points of contact for
those who are not
directly involved in
the governance.
Deployment Define a process Defining the deployment
Process which will be used process creates a clear
for in-house understanding for
developed and third development teams on
party software to be what to expect if their
deployed to software is to be
SharePoint platform installed on the platform.
or platforms. This eliminates last
minute problems during
deployment and reduces
the number of variations
thus reducing
management costs.
Change Define how Maintaining a high
Management changes will be availability is essential to
Process tracked, cataloged, adoption. Solid change
and approved (configuration)
Decide what management processes
repositories will hold create better availability.
older versions of Consistency in approach,
configuration, code, approvers, and
and compiled responsibilities
components of the encourage ownership
solution and better stability.
Cost Allocation Decide whether SharePoint governance
you will be allocating in general, and
costs back to SharePoint technology
business units or not platforms in particular
If not - Consider cost money. Governance
where the costs in most cases implies a
should be centered, centralized platform.
often this is with Finding the funding to
costs associated pay for the centralized
with email. platform is an essential
If so - Consider and sometimes difficult
what metrics you'll task.
use for the charge
back: users: number
of sites, amount of
storage, amount of
activity, etc.



Sponsorship Establish a SharePoint technologies
SharePoint have the potential to
Governance board to radically redefine the
review adoption and way software is
controls. developed and projects
Solicit executive are run - for the better.
champions to create However, if the
the right management team
management doesn't understand this
attention to the and the users don't feel
value of the excited about the
initiative. possibilities that
Encourage SharePoint brings then
business evangelists the prospects for success
to share the power are not bright.
of SharePoint with
other business
leaders.
Roles and Define clear roles Clearly defining roles and
Teams and responsibilities establishing formal
for the initiation of teams to address both
the SharePoint the specific tasks which
technologies arise and to evaluate
platforms as well as cross functional
its operation. problems creates the
Define strategic structure necessary to
teams to address complete the initial
strategy issues. development of the
Establish cross- central platform and to
functional problem resolve issues that arise
resolution teams to quickly.
address complex
issues which arise.
Site and Create a Create a common
Platform classification by understanding for the
Classification number of users and types of SharePoint
longevity: solutions the
enterprise, organization knows how
departmental, team, to do well and a
project, and vocabulary for speaking
personal. with parts of the
Create a business about what is
classification by type needed.
of use: portal for
communications,
application for
tactical results, and
collaboration to
facilitate team
operations.


Service Level Create a service Establishing service level
Agreements level agreement agreements drives the
around the length of understanding of the
time and approvals organization as to what
necessary to create to expect. Service level
a site. agreements are a
Establish service commitment upon the
level agreements for part of the core team
problem resolution that the systems will be
through the help available which can in
desk turn drive adoption.
Negotiate
performance service
level agreements for
the first load of a
site, subsequent
loads of a site, and
performance at
remote locations


SharePoint technologies significantly blur the line between what is
development and what is configuration. This section covers the items
which are either software development or are configuration. These are
essential parts of the governance plan so that the solutions implemented
on the platform are consistent.

Branding Establish templates for Establishing a core
what the SharePoint sites brand will not only
will look like make the site
Determine which types of seem to belong to
sites may be modified and the organization
which may not but will promote
Define which parts of the better navigation
template may be changed and organization.
by site owners, and which Defining which
may not. areas can and can
not be changed
creates the
flexibility
necessary for
adoption.
Customization Define what customization Nearly every
Tools tools will be allowed. business unit


Communicate what within the
actions will be allowed and organization will
not allowed in the tool. (i.e. want to place their
unghosting) stamp on their
site. The challenge
is controlling this
so that their need
for individuality
doesn't hinder
maintainability.
Site Establish guidelines for Site definitions
Definitions the development of site and site templates
and definitions and mechanisms have their own
Templates for coordinating ID usage. unique challenges
Communicate policies for with regard to how
site template deployment to manage them
such as the requirements for in a large
a globally installed template. environment.
Clear
communication
and decisions up
front can improve
the ability to
manage input
from multiple
groups.
Source Code Source code is the
Determine if a central
and Build essence of your
repository will be required
Control organizations
for all code installed on the
enhancements to
platform.
SharePoint.
Establish standards for
Establishing a
building components either
common set of
on a centralized server or as
expectations and
guidelines for building
rules around the
software.
development of
Communicate
code will make the
expectations as to reference
maintenance
documentation (compiler
process easier and
generated) and warnings
will lead to a more
(whether they are allowed)
stable system.
On-going Describe the Defects will be
Source Code responsibilities of business found in code,
Support unit for ongoing code sometimes long
support. after it's initial
deployment -
understanding
who will address
those defects is



essential to the
long term
survivability of the
platform.
Development Establish guidelines for The security of the
Standards which assemblies may be site is determined
installed to the Global by what code is
Assembly Cache and which allowed to run and
may not. with what
Establish rules about the permissions.
use of the .NET's code access
AllowPartiallyTrustedCallers security and the
attribute. implications of
GAC deployment
are important to
maintaining a
secure system.

Infrastructure

While most infrastructure items can honestly be considered
implementation details there are a few which will have a significant impact
on how you implement SharePoint and what the features will be available.
The infrastructure items outlined here are important for inclusion in your
governance plan because their impact on the way the solution will be
used.

Infrastructure
Firewalls Establish and Best practice is to not allow
communicate rules servers to access the web
for outbound directly. Further including
connections from content from a third party
the web servers for site through a content
use by the Content editor web part or through
editor web part and the RSS reader web part
RSS Viewer web creates exposure for cross
part site scripting attacks.
Controlling what sites can
be linked to from these
tools is a security and
operational concern.
Load Decide upon and Developers must know if
Balancing communicate the they are expected to handle
load balancing situations where a single
settings related to session is transferred


session stickiness. between servers.
Environments Define the Defining the environments
environments which helps business users and
will be used to developers know what
develop and test resources they have
solutions in available to test changes
SharePoint. without impacting
Describe the production.
actions which are
expected and those
which are
prohibited in each
environment
Communicate
policies for site
template
deployment such as
the requirements
for a globally
installed template.

Tune in later this week for Part 2 of this article, where I'll cover
operational concerns, education and training, and navigation, taxonomy,
and search.

SharePoint Governance, Part 2
Robert Bogue

11/29/2006

Microsoft SharePoint technologies offer an immense amount of power for
an organization, and harnessing this power is the goal of every business
that installs SharePoint.

But adoption of SharePoint can get out of control without proper
governance. In part two of this article, you'll learn more about some of
the issues that you should consider

for a SharePoint technologies governance plan.



Click here for part 1.

Operational Concerns

Operating a SharePoint environment, like any large scale web
environment, has many components. The items listed here are an
important part of your SharePoint governance plan because they help to
ensure that the system will remain operational and because they set
proper expectations with the business about the availability of SharePoint
technologies.

Item What To Do
Monitoring Establish
monitoring at the
server, site, and
SharePoint level
Define
responses to each
type of failure
that may occur
Uptime and Define
Downtime Scheduled
downtime periods
Communicate
the procedure to
report
unscheduled
downtime or
specific
performance
issues
Define response
procedures to
unscheduled
downtime
Disaster Plan for single Disasters will happen. It's
Recovery file recovery not a question of if but of
(perhaps using when and how. Planning
version control for them further reinforces
and the recycle the commitment to the
bin) platform and the instance
Plan for single that it will remain
or multiple site available.
recovery
Plan for server
recovery



Plan for geo-
disaster recovery
Data and Codify SharePoint technologies
Documentation corporate records can help with the records
Recovery management management issues
requirements into associated with maintaining
SharePoint. too much - or too little
Define rules for information. Defining how
archival of sites SharePoint will work aligns
including it with the corporate
warnings and governance.
approvals
Quotas Establish Storage management is
storage quotas by the responsibility of
site type everyone within the
Establish a organization the
process for establishment of
requesting a technology supported
larger quota guidelines can help to
provide reasonable control
around disk space
consumption.
Reporting Define required Reporting upon what has
auditing reports been done is essential for
Establish various compliance needs.
storage usage Developing user reporting
reports to report on activity and
Develop activity storage create a necessary
based reporting feedback loop for the
for administrators organization to understand
and business the value that is being
users derived from the
SharePoint technologies
platform.


As adoption is an important measure of SharePoint governance success,
education and training are important proactive tools. Education and
training not only explains the features that SharePoint technologies
expose but it also helps users understand real world solutions that they
can create.




Initial Acquire end user Training both in the
Training training and facilities and capabilities of
resources SharePoint as well as the
Acquire help desk policies that have been
training and defined by the organization
resources is the most important
Acquire proactive step to ensuring
administrator the consistency and
training and manageability of the
resources SharePoint technologies
Develop platform.
administrator policy
guides which
describe
organization specific
policies
Acquire developer
training and
resources
Develop
developer policy
guides which
describe
organization specific
development
policies
Community Create online Some kinds of information
Development forums where users doesn't communicate well
can support each through structured training.
other and ask The context necessary for
questions. users to understand how to
Create apply it in their
opportunities for environment is sometimes
face-to-face best created through users
learning in talking with each other
unstructured or about the kinds of solutions
semi structured they've implemented.
environments such
as lunch and learns
or after hours
discussions.
Renewal Plan for renewal Formally defining your
Training training which intention to review
gathers the learning progress from a user
from multiple adoption standpoint can
groups and exposes encourage the health
it to other groups. review of the solution and
Perform periodic what additional training is
audits of the required.
platform to discover


what features are
not being utilized
and which features
are not being
utilized correctly.


The final set of considerations for your governance plan are those related
to finding information - those related to navigation, taxonomy, and
search. They are important for the long term adoption of SharePoint
because they are the framework by which users find the information that
they are looking for when they don't know where it's located.

Site Define the Defining a structure for how
Directories structure of the site sites will be organized is an
directories including essential part of helping
the major groupings users find the information
and associations. they need. Developing a
Develop a linking linking strategy is necessary
strategy between when a single directory
different types of becomes to unwieldy to
sites such as manage as a one entity.
enterprise, divisional,
departmental, team,
etc.
Content Define core content Consistency, which leads to
Types types in the a greater ability to locate
organization information, can be
Define key fields to encouraged through the use
link documents and of standardized fields
operational systems through standard content
types.
Search Establish content Search is an immensely
Locations sources to the file powerful tool which can be
based repositories in essential in being able to find
the organization. information throughout the
Use the Business enterprise. The more content
Data Catalog to allow SharePoint search can index,
searching of business the easier it will be for users
data to find the information
they're looking for.
Search Define who will be Although search relevancy



Relevancy responsible for core has dramatically improved in
relevancy settings the SharePoint 2007
Implement platform, additional
organizational efficiencies can be gained by
enhancements of the fine tuning search for the
noise words file, organization.
thesaurus file, and
keyword best bets

Defining Success

SharePoint technologies governance is a broad need with guidance needed
in many different areas. By developing a minimally sufficient governance
plan that emphasizes expectation setting and communication, you can
have a successful adoption of SharePoint technologies while maintaining
an appropriate amount of control.


Share Point Governance

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