The Slippery Slope of Migrating to SharePoint Online or On-Premises

Jill HannemannDirector, Advisory Services@jhcherryblossom

Adam LevithanProduct Manager@Collabadam

Jill Hannemann@JHCherryBlossom

Editor, Digital

Workplace Today

Director of Advisory Services

10+ years in Knowledge Management

SharePoint expertise: information architecture, records management, content migration, document management

Culinary project: It’s soup and chili season!

About Me

Adam Levithan@collabadam

CMS Wire & AIIM

Blogger

Product Manager 9+ years in Collaborative Systems

SharePoint expertise: Out-of-the-box solutions, business process management, Governance, adoptions, information architecture

Next Adventure: 200 Mile 1-Day Cycling Event in June 2016

About Me

What’s so Difficult?

What’s so Difficult?

The Slope (complexity of your

technical environment)

= Level of Effort and

Complexity

The Rock (alignment between IT and

the Business)

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What are your Motivations for Upgrading SharePoint?

Get off hardware

Redesign intranet

Move to the cloud

New data center

Have search work

Get new features

Automate processes

Improve user experience

Stabilize the infrastructure

Expand usage of SP to other business units

Develop a new look and

feel

Redesign IA

Introduce social tools

Consolidate multiple SP

farms

Implement records

management

Combination of Business and IT

Get off hardware

Redesign intranet

Move to the cloud

New data center

Have search work

Get new features

Automate processes

Improve user experience

Stabilize the infrastructure

Expand usage of SP to other business units

Develop a new look and feel

Redesign IA

Introduce social tools

Consolidate multiple SP

farms

Implement records

management

Complexity of Your Environment

Get off hardware

Redesign intranet

Move to the cloud

New data center

Have search work

Get new features

Automate processes

Improve user experience

Stabilize the infrastructure

Expand usage of SP to other business units

Develop a new look and

feel

Redesign IA

Introduce social tools

Consolidate multiple SP farms

Implement records

management

Understanding Your Environment

Audit & Inventory – WHY spend the time?

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Audit

•Total size of database•Custom User Interface •Content types•Infopath forms•Workflows•Checked out documents•Business connectivity web services (BCS)•Permissions•Site StructureIt’s not only how much content that matters, but the character of how you’re using it.

URLs

Site Collection Name

Site Collection Size

Sub site count

Large Lists

Document Versions

Customizations

Site Location/position

Content DB – Size, Number

Site Collections per DB

Duplicate or Orphaned Site Collections

My Sites – Content DB, Size

Everything TROUBLE

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Inventory• 2007 - 2013 see if usage is

turned on and view latest reports• Metalogix Migration Expert• Tree Size Pro• Create a Script• Metalogix Essentials

(formerly MetaVis) Farm Analysis• Interns (Manual)

InfrastructureEnvironment

Health

Central Administration

• Network Infrastructure• Test Throughput/ Transfer

rates• Run Microsoft Pre-Upgrade

Checkers• Review Databases• Review Web.config

• Authentication Methods• Farm Structure• Deployed Features

FunctionalityInterviews Manual

Review

Pass/ Fail Tests

• Ask the users• View how they do their daily

work• View Most complicated site

(Open in SharePoint designer if possible)

• Review last modified in View All Site Content

• Find workflows • Create a sub site within each site

collection• Create a page in the Pages and

Site Pages libraries• Upload document• Create an item

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Choose wisely.

Which migration approach is right?

Methods for Moving Content

Which approach is right for you?Manual Migration Content Database

Attach 3rd Party Tools

To O365

Main use case

Benefit

YesNoYes

All SituationsOn-Premises version upgradeBrand New Deployment

• Source can be SharePoint or Unstructured file repositories

• Flexibility to rebuild IA

• SP to SP version upgrade Few customizations

• On-Prem to on-Prem• No IA rebuild required

• Copy, paste, tag• Works in all situations• Extremely labor intensive

SharePoint/ODBFinal Destination

Pull from Azure

Azure Temporary Storage

Items packaged, pushed in batches

Copy Site Collection /Site/List

File Share,SharePoint On-Prem,Potentially any other Data Source.

1. Read List details from source2. Write List to target

On-Premises SharePoint

Package

1. Create Package of 100+ items2. Create XML file containing items,

permissions and metadata3. Upload to Azure Temporary Storage4. Tell SPO to pull package from Azure

Timer Job Based imports content in a scalable way that will not hurt the service using back end resources.

New Migration API Overview: Migration Tools using New API

OOTB vs. 3rd Party Migration Tools

Vendor EvaluationMetalogix Content Matrix

Metalogix Essentials for O365

Sharegate AvePoint DocAve

Bit Titan

User InterfaceReorganize during migration

Set up migration rules or bulk transfer

Create new metadataRetain and migrate existing metadata

Content mappingChange roll backsClient InstallPricing ModelExchangeOne Drive for Business

Align requirements with the right tool for your migration

test …. Test …. TEST

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Test Migration is Critical! • Determine a rate of transfer• Forget theory and/or 3rd party promises review actual

output• Allow users to test small subset of real content to gain

feedback• Challenges to look for:

• Links breaking• Custom content types not carrying over• File accessibility• Permissions • Page layouts not transferring• Infopath forms• CUSTOM SOLUTIONS YOU DIDN’T KNOW ABOUT

Beware: 2007 Non-Publishing default.aspx pages stored outside of file structure.

Migration Strategy

Two major approaches to migration schedulingCutover MigrationThe Idea: Migrate everything and turn off the old system when you start to use the newBenefits: • Convert all users to the new system• Minimize duplication• Enforce change management and adoptionRisks: • Could take a long time• Could also never happen• Change management could be challenging

Gradual MigrationThe Idea: Migrate group by group and onboard users to the new system when their group has been moved overBenefits:• Onboard groups in small batches• Gradual change management• Feedback loop can support easier adoptionRisks:• Could never finish• Large risk for duplication• Users could resist change• Content authenticity/system authenticity could be

questioned

27

Big Bang! Living in two

housesor

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Migration Prep Migration

Test Migration

Site Build Out

Inventory

Redesign

Content Clean Up

Migrate

Redesign

Cutover Migration

Cuto

ver/

Trai

ning

NOTE: Most of the advice in this presentation is for a Cutover structure

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InventoryRedesign

& Test Migration

Content Mapping

Migrate

Training

Support Both

Platforms

Retire Old System

Gradual Migration

Gradual migrations can work, but you must deeply understand usage of the system

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Sample Project Schedule

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Take the opportunity to• Clean up the content in the system• Introduce an improved look and feel• A more intuitive navigation• A more robust search• Create site personalization• Address current solutions:• Infopath end of life• Connectivity to other data systems• Content publishing process

Garbage… Garbage…

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Restructure Information ArchitectureContent

Types

Lists and Libraries

Sites/Navigation

Site Collections/Navigation

Web Applications

Recommended! Supports growth and sustainability

Determines how users navigate to browse content

Influences metadata, templates, and searching for content

Beware: Beware of lack of control of URLs in O365

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Content Cleanup

Beware: The time it takes to perform this step is almost always underestimated. Add time to your original estimate.

3 Approaches

rule-based cleansing

business users/content owners for subjective analysis

Combination of both

ROT Analysis

Redundant

Outdated

Trivial

ROT Options

Migrate

Migrate and Update

Archive

Delete

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Content Clean Up with Content OwnersLeverage last modified dates and sixe of library/list to assist in guidance

Approaches: Automate Workflow

Walk through of content on the site

Provide worksheets to make decisions

Allow for in-place deletion

Remember - The clean up exercise is intended to provide benefits! • Ensure valuable content is migrated • Help reduce noise in the search

index • Minimize risk in reducing the overall

amount of content to migrate • Reduce risk in removing content that

could be a liability to the company

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Archive Strategies• Move it to Office 365 site collection or One Drive for Business • Leave it in older SharePoint • Move it from SharePoint to a file share • Migrate to new SharePoint to an archive site collection

Archive Options:

• Keep it in READ ONLY mode

If content continues to exist…

• Consider deletion policies • Is it a risk if the file is kept? • Apply retention schedules and delete what does not need to be kept

Records Management policies

Recommended Path for a Successful Migration

1. Define business need 2. Inventory/Audit

3. Design/Implement

To-Be Technical Architecture

4. Design/Implement

To-Be User Experience

5. Create Migration Plan/Test Migration

6. Create Change Management Plan

7. Migrate! 8. User Training 9. Decommission

original environment

Thank YouJill - @jhcherryblossom – jhannemann@portalsolutions.net Adam - @collabadam – alevithan@metalogix.com