Want Real Adoption? Implement SharePoint Upside Down

Want Real Adoption? Implement SharePoint Upside Down

The Routine

Most organizations implement SharePoint in the same step-by-step manner:

1. IT department buys the product and the licenses
2. Install the platform
3. Deploy a site for each department manager
4. Migrate the content of shared drives into these new sites
5. Move into “maintenance” mode.
6. Training

Also, each department manager most likely got a SharePoint ‘team site’.  They may have also received a memo about their new site, providing them with their username, password and a link to the site that they now ‘own’. Unfortunately, Managers tend have no idea what to do with their new site and it’s not their fault.

A New Perspective

SharePoint training probably wasn’t considered to be the responsibility of the IT department when they planned for SharePoint deployment. Without valuable content, the environment sits there unused, or worse it becomes the Wild Wild West.

Though it might seem like a radical departure, the fast-track to an incredibly successful SharePoint deployment is to implement the last step, first.  That’s right, implement the training first.

-Before you buy the product
-Before you purchase the licenses
-Before you deploy the team sites

Training First

The advantage is that the line of business subject-matter experts will come to understand what SharePoint is capable of doing before any implementation occurs.  This will empower departmental managers to:

-Participate in the design of the Departmental Sites
-Help select the Web Parts to be used
-Make suggestions for Content Types
-Add their business knowledge to the entire implementation.

It will also provide invaluable insight into the type of SharePoint environment and licensing it will actually require.

The result will be a much more effective SharePoint implementation that achieves a high level of adoption because it’s designed around the needs of the employees and management.

While it’s true that training before the implementation means that there will be a gap of many weeks between the two, you need not worry about the employees and managers forgetting everything that they learned in their SharePoint training. Just make sure that your training is implemented in the form of online video  that you incorporate into your intranet when it’s built.  This will give everyone the ability to refresh the training as soon as the new intranet is up and running.

Webinar: Good, Better, Best…an Executive Tour of Branded SharePoint Intranets