understanding organizational uses of sharepoint technologies · understanding organizational uses...

CHAPTER 3

UnderstandingOrganizational Uses of

SharePoint Technologies

Unlike many software applications developed for a specificpurpose (for example, an email application for sendingmessages back and forth, a calendaring application formanaging appointments and meetings, an accounting appli-cation to maintain financial records), SharePoint technologiesprovide a framework that can be used for many differenttypes of functions. The extent of what SharePoint can do islimited only by the creativity and imagination of the devel-opers and users. This chapter explores some of the ways orga-nizations can use SharePoint technologies to improve theefficiency and decision-making power of their employees.

Why Would an Organization Want toUse SharePoint?From an end-user viewpoint, SharePoint includes many“cool” features such as being able to tell when specific groupmembers are online so that “chat sessions” or instant messag-ing can occur, and the ability to set up a personal Web pagewith things such as the latest local weather report. However,an organization’s management is not going to installSharePoint so that its employees can have instant messagingservices or create their own customized Web pages.Management is concerned with the bottom line, which isaffected by the productivity of employees. In a typical organi-zation, many obstacles result in reduced productivity. Some ofthese obstacles include

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74 CHAPTER 3 Understanding Organizational Uses of SharePoint Technologies

• Lack of an efficient mechanism for sharing knowledge, resulting in duplication ofeffort. For example, User A needs to create a document and does not know that User B created a similar document, which could have saved User A many hours ofwork.

• Inability to find information, resulting in wasted time. Carrying the previousexample one step further, even if User A knows that User B created a documentsimilar to what User A needs to produce, User A spends an hour trying to find thedocument and then finally gives up and starts from scratch.

• IT departments backlogged with requests for granting employees access to applica-tions or information and/or application customization, resulting in the inefficient“manual” way of doing things. An example of this situation is the Payroll depart-ment that wants to make pay-stub information available online to employees, andthus has put in a request to IT to make this happen. Until it does, the Payroll depart-ment needs to take the time to respond to employee requests for this information.

• Budgetary restraints, resulting in a lack of funding for hardware and software thatcould improve productivity. For example, an organization has recently purchased anew accounting system but has only purchased user licenses for accounting depart-ment personnel. Other departments, such as operations, could benefit from havingaccess to the accounting data but must rely on putting in requests to the accountingdepartment, or continue making decisions based on estimates rather than actualdata.

• Applications difficult to use, resulting in lack of information accessible to users. Forexample, an organization has implemented SAP, but it requires intensive training toknow enough about the application to retrieve the desired information. Therefore,the organization is not taking advantage of the information provided by the application.

As is shown in this chapter, SharePoint addresses many of these issues. This chapterfocuses on some specific areas where benefits can be realized from the use of SharePointand demonstrates how some organizations are currently using the technology. Thischapter focuses on the generic use of SharePoint 2003.

Sharing, Managing, and Finding Documents Made EasierAlthough most organizations have a mechanism for sharing documents, such as attachingthem to emails, storing them on a shared network drive or on some other shared mediumsuch as an Exchange Public Folder, or creating copies on a CD or diskette, these methods

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can be inefficient and result in a document management nightmare. For example, attach-ing documents to email messages leads to a proliferation of the document on the network,eating up storage space and causing potential confusion among users. Changes to thedocument are not managed, so one person’s changes may end up overriding someoneelse’s. In addition, finding a specific document or the most current version of a documentcan take hours. Some organizations have minimized the document management issues bypurchasing third-party software applications used to ensure the integrity of documentediting, manage approval processing, and maintain version history. However, these appli-cations are generally expensive, don’t do much more than manage document editing andversioning, and require the user to learn a new application interface for accessing thedocuments.

Other organizations may use a “manual” process where the user stores the document inhis own storage area until completed, then sends it to a reviewer, and then whenapproved, copies or moves it to a “completed documents” area with a manually createdversion number attached to the name. The problem with manual processes are that thehuman error factor comes into play.

SharePoint can be used to alleviate many of these issues. An organization that usesSharePoint realizes the “standard” benefits of a document management system, including

• A central shared area for storing documents as opposed to all over the network,resulting in improved organization and improved storage efficiency.

• Automatic indexing, providing the ability to find documents in less time andthereby improving employee productivity.

• Document check-in/check-out ensures that updates are controlled and users don’toverwrite someone else’s work.

• Automatic versioning of documents, enabling history to be maintained and provid-ing roll-back capabilities.

However, SharePoint provides additional features, not found in the typical documentmanagement system. These unique benefits are discussed in the following sections.

Reducing the Training Curve and Achieving Acceptance UsingMicrosoft Office 2003In general, it is difficult to get users to buy in to a whole new way of performing functionsthat they have been doing for years. This is one of the problems that many organizationsface when trying to implement a portal solution, especially for document management.However, using SharePoint with Microsoft Office 2003 means that users can access theprimary document management functions directly from the Office applications they arecurrently using. When a user is already using Word 2003 or Excel 2003 every day to create

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and modify documents, having them perform a simple set of commands from withinWord to set up collaboration (choose Tools, Shared Workspace, Create) is much easier thantrying to teach them a whole new application interface. The user does not have to leavethe safety of the application she is familiar with to use the collaboration features ofSharePoint. By making only a few minor changes in process, the user will begin to realizethe benefits of SharePoint. If a user is creating a document and it needs to be shared withother people, people who will be contributing to the final product, the user can create ashared workspace directly from the Microsoft Office 2003 application, save the documentto the shared workspace, add members to the workspace, add tasks associated with thedocument, set up an alert to be notified when the document changes, review the versionhistory for the document, see which members of the workspace are online, and send emailto the members, all without ever leaving the Microsoft Office 2003 application. Wheneverthe user opens the document in the Microsoft Office 2003 application, the SharedWorkspace task pane is made available to the user, and updates can be applied both to theworkspace and from the workspace.

Starting simple by using Microsoft Office 2003 applications to get users familiar with theshared workspace concept will break down some of the barriers people have to change inprocess. After the barriers are down, people generally want to see what else they can doand begin accessing the sites and workspaces through the portal interface, which providesadditional functionality.

Collaborating in the Workspace for Producing Quality DocumentsWhen creating documents, a common practice is to have multiple people working on thedocument. There may be one primary writer and then several reviewers, each adding hisown input. When a group of people collaborate on a document, SharePoint’s check-in/check-out ensures that only one person is working on it at a time. If the documentneeds to be approved by someone before it is considered finished, an approval process canbe set up within SharePoint.

Users can create shared document workspaces when working on documents and thenwhen the document is complete, move the final document to a portal available to thegeneral public. For example, a company stores Human Resources forms and procedures ona SharePoint site that all users have access to. When a form or procedure needs to bechanged, the person responsible for making the change creates a shared workspace for thedocument and provides access only to the people involved in the change. When thechange has been completed and approved by the department manager, the updated docu-ment gets put back out on the public Human Resources site.

Using Document Libraries in the Real WorldThe concept of shared libraries is being used by an airline for procedural manuals. BeforeSharePoint was implemented, manuals were printed and sent to the pilots, flight atten-dants, and other associated personnel. When updates were made to the manuals (a process

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that occurred at least on a weekly basis), the updated pages were printed and sent out andthen the “end users” would remove old pages of the manual and put in the revised pages.

With SharePoint, all the documentation is stored online. The pilots use laptops to accessthe manuals, and what they see in SharePoint is always current. No more time is wastedupdating pages in a notebook, and the company saves in paper and mailing costs. In addi-tion, it is easy to find information using SharePoint’s searching capabilities.

Finding Relevant InformationThe proliferation of remote and mobile computing, combined with the increased sophisti-cation of the average business employee, has created information islands. Each remotedevice becomes an island of information. These islands can be on a mobile device, on auser’s home computer, on a corporate file share, in an application, or on a corporateintranet. There may or may not be communications between these resources for informa-tion sharing. However, most organizations do have a way to find information. A docu-ment indexing and search utility might be used. An email might be sent out describingwhat the user is looking for with the hope that someone will respond. Colleagues may bepinged to see whether they know where a specific document is located. A manual searchof shared network resources might be performed. This leads to a concern shared by manyorganizations—employees spend too much time looking for information.

The SharePoint technologies contain a variety of features to enable users to stop searchingfor information, and start organizing and finding it instead.

Organizing Information into AreasContent on a SharePoint Portal Server 2003 site can be grouped into areas, allowing usersto find information when they are not familiar with the site structure. Areas are used in amanner similar to a table of contents in that they direct the users to information based onan organized hierarchy, or “map” of the portal site. An area can contain documents,people, SharePoint Services sites, and links to external Web sites and file shares. Contentcan be associated with multiple areas. The default areas are shown under Topics in theQuick Launch section of the portal home page. Areas can also be viewed and managedusing the Sites Directory.

The administrator controls who has content manager rights for changing the area struc-ture, and for adding and removing content from areas. The content manager can alsodirect areas to be viewed by a specific audience.

Discovering Information Using SearchSharePoint Portal Server 2003’s search feature provides the ability to search for documents,people, information contained in lists, and information from other sources such as exter-nal Web sites or file shares that have been added to the searchable content by the admin-istrator. By default, a text-based search is performed. A user can type in a few words and

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SharePoint searches the entire portal and lists documents or links that match the searchcriteria. The advantage of using SharePoint over other search applications is thatSharePoint can search many different types of data sources, both internal to the organiza-tion and external sites, and return all matches in one place. Because SharePoint can searchfile shares and Exchange public folders, an organization can start using SharePointwithout having to migrate all its legacy information, and still reap the benefit of beingable to find information much more quickly.

Using SharePoint’s advanced search, properties of an item can be searched, multiple crite-ria can be entered, and you can narrow the search to a specific type of item. For example,if an organization’s official company directory is stored in SharePoint, the IT departmentmay want to find all users in a specific department for rolling out an application, theTraining department may want to find all users in a specific job category for a new train-ing program, and the Human Resources department may want to find all users who havebeen with the company for less than a month so that it can provide them with “newemployee” material. Each of these searches could be easily performed from a simple inter-face using a SharePoint portal.

As another example, consider the user who needs to create a proposal for a client. The userknows that Garrett L. created a similar proposal but doesn’t know where it was stored, orwhich client it was for. The user could email Garrett and ask him where it is, but he knowsthat Garrett is on vacation for a week (it was posted as an announcement in the organiza-tion’s SharePoint portal). The user could also start from scratch, but that would be a wasteof time. With SharePoint, the user can search for documents that are proposals where theauthor is Garrett L. and that are in the same category as the proposal that the user needsto create. A final example to illustrate the search capabilities of SharePoint would be tofind an updated HR policy where you know that Lynn updated the policy sometimebefore August 1. A search could be performed for documents created by Lynn with a dateearlier than August 1. Figure 3.1 shows an example of the advanced search page.

As users populate their person sites and personal profiles with information, a SharePointsearch can also result in returning the people who are the experts in a specific area.

Extending Search CapabilitiesAfter items are returned in a search, SharePoint provides users with the ability to do morewith the results than just view or edit them. With SharePoint, an alert can be set up sothat the user is notified whenever the results of the query change, or whenever a specificdocument returned by the query changes. For example, a finance manager does a searchto find items that specify the regulatory statutes that apply to the organization. Whenadditional regulatory items are added, the manager wants to be notified to ensure that theorganization complies with the new regulations. Therefore, the manager sets up an alertfor the query. If there are any changes to the query results, an email is sent to themanager. In addition, the manager knows that one of the regulations will be changingwithin the next six months because of a law that was recently passed. Therefore, the


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manager also sets up an alert for that specific document so that he is notified when thatdocument changes.

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FIGURE 3.1 The Advanced Search options in SharePoint Portal Server 2003.

If a search returns a specific item that the user will be accessing often, the link to the itemcan be added to the user’s personal links. The entire search query can also be added as alink if the user will be running the search frequently.

SharePoint has a feature whereby keywords can be used to tag documents for more preva-lent listing in the search results. Keywords can be created in a hierarchical order, whichmeans that there can be keywords under keywords. For example, “Training” might be akeyword, and under training there could be “videos,” “online,” and “manuals.”

Providing Efficiencies for MeetingsIn today’s environment, meetings can be scheduled in several ways. The organizer can usean electronic scheduling system to find an available time and send out invitations. Themeeting organizer can email the attendees with the date, time, and place of the meeting.The meeting organizer can call the attendees on the phone and invite them to themeeting. After the meeting has been scheduled, any documents necessary for the meetingcan be emailed to the attendees, printed and distributed to the attendees prior to themeeting, or handed out at the meeting. After the meeting takes place, meeting notes can

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be emailed to the attendees or printed and distributed to the attendees. Follow-up taskscan also be emailed to the attendees, placed in a project plan and then distributed, or putinto some other type of document for subsequent follow-up.

Although organizations do have ways for setting up meetings and handling tasks thatemerge as a result of the meeting, the process may be inefficient. SharePoint provides away to bring the meeting objectives, agenda items, associated documents, tasks, and atten-dees all together in one centralized area. This workspace can be created, or linked to, fromthe same screen used to create the meeting in Outlook 2003.

The ability to create a SharePoint meeting workspace, or link to an existing workspace,directly from Outlook 2003 when the meeting is created makes it easy to get into thehabit of linking SharePoint meeting workspaces to meetings. Attendees will automaticallybe added to the workspace, and objectives and agenda items can be entered. Documentsassociated with the meeting can also be put on the site, or links created for accessingthem. When the meeting notices are sent, there is a link in the email that takes theattendee directly to the meeting workspace. Figure 3.2 shows how the meeting workspacecan be created from Outlook when the meeting is scheduled.


FIGURE 3.2 Creating a meeting and a SharePoint meeting workspace using Outlook 2003.

A team of engineers that will soon be starting a project for a client can be used to illustrateorganizational use of a SharePoint meeting workspace. Before going out to the client site,

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there is a project kick-off meeting to go over the project background, ensure that everyoneunderstands the project goals and objectives, discuss project tasks and milestones, reviewproject deliverables, and discuss any other issues that the team has regarding the project.The project manager creates a meeting request in Outlook 2003 and also creates aSharePoint meeting workspace. Therefore, a link to the project workspace is containedwithin the email meeting invitation. The project manager enters agenda items in theworkspace; sets up events for major project milestones; provides a discussion area; and setsup links to the proposal, statement of work, and project plan. Because there is a link to themeeting workspace in the meeting invitation, the team members can go directly to thesite to review the necessary documents and tasks as soon as they get the invitation. Figure 3.3 provides an example of what this meeting workspace looks like.

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FIGURE 3.3 Meeting workspace configured to provide a project team with the informationthey need for the project kick-off meeting.

Adding Value by Using AlertsAs users realize the benefits of a SharePoint solution, sites can grow quickly with informa-tion, users, and applications being added and changed continuously. Instead of having tocomb sites and workspaces for modifications on a regular basis, a user can set up alerts sothat they are only notified of changes in the information of interest to them. SharePointalerts can be set to notify users of changes to documents, sites, lists (announcements,

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contacts, events, tasks, surveys, and links), individual items in the lists, news items, docu-ment libraries, and portal users. In addition, an alert can be set to notify users when theresults of a saved query change. With so many possibilities, it is important that alerts beset up to provide the user with beneficial information as opposed to generating a lot ofmessages that may get ignored.

Alerts can be used by various groups within the organization. The Marketing Departmentcan use a SharePoint document library as a repository for employee-submitted newsletterarticles. The editor of the newsletter can create an alert to be notified when documents areadded so that they can be reviewed and incorporated into the final newsletter. ASharePoint administrator, responsible for managing the hardware used to provideSharePoint services, can set up an alert to be notified when sites and users are added, toassist in controlling resource allocation. The Sales Department can use SharePointContacts for storing customer information. When there is a change to customer informa-tion, the salespeople can be alerted so that they can follow up and take appropriate action.Salespersons can set up alerts for their own specific customers so that they don’t getbombarded with alerts for customers who are not their responsibility.

A project team can use SharePoint Tasks to delegate work to the individuals on the project.The individuals can update the task information as they complete various aspects of theproject. At the end of the week, the project manager wants to know what was accom-plished during the week for the weekly status report, so the project manager can set up aweekly alert on the project task list.

An engineer in the IT department has created a Discussion Board to get assistance fromthe other engineers regarding best practices for migrating an Exchange 5.5 server toExchange 2003. The engineer creates an alert to get notified when someone posts aresponse as opposed to checking the discussion board throughout the day to see whetheranyone has replied to the request.

A group of people collaborating on a research project can use a SharePoint Team site forcollaborating on the project, and set up alerts to be notified when information is added tothe site. When one of the members finds a site with information that can be used for theproject, he can add the site address to the SharePoint Links section of the project TeamSite. Because the team members have created an alert to be notified when links have beenadded, they are notified and can then check out the new information.

A Customer Service department can use a SharePoint Issues list for tracking and respond-ing to customer problems. The department manager can create alerts on the issues list tobe notified when issues are created and modified, to keep tabs on those issues taking toolong to respond to.

Announcements can be used for distributing important company information. All usersmight want to set up an alert for changes or additions to Announcements to ensure thatthey don’t miss any important information.


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Engaging in Online DiscussionsOrganizations use many ways to hold “discussions.” A public forum such as an ExchangePublic Folder or a newsgroup can be used. Emails can be sent back and forth, thus creatingan email thread. A conference call can take place, or a face-to-face meeting can be sched-uled. However, usually the discussion does not take place in a vacuum; it is generallyrelated to a project, task, or issue that the organization needs to resolve. Therefore, itwould be much more effective to have all the information relevant to the discussion avail-able, including an organized grouping of the discussion items and responses.

With SharePoint, a discussion thread can be created on a team site or in a documentlibrary, thus linking the discussion to the other content available on the site. The discus-sion can be organized by conversation so that you can see a user’s entry and the associatedresponses all together. A feature of SharePoint that is of great benefit in the area of discus-sions is the ability to create an alert for the discussion. By doing this, the user is notifiedwhen the discussion changes—in other words, when a response has been posted. Thissaves the user from having to continually check back to see whether anyone hasresponded.

The classic example of a discussion board is the help desk “newsgroup” where someoneposts a question or problem, and others respond with requests for more information,answers, or resolution. Some other organizational uses of discussion boards include thefollowing:

• Getting feedback on a new process or procedure.

• Soliciting ideas for a company event.

• Soliciting ideas for resolution to an issue the company faces.

• Discussing the structure of a document, modifications to it, and additions.

Getting Information from UsersOrganizations can gather information from employees by creating surveys in Word, print-ing them, and then putting them in everyone’s mailbox with the hope that people will fillthem out and turn them back in. Or, an email containing the questions can be sent to allusers, and the users can email their responses back to the sender.

There are a few problems associated with these “manual” processes. Using the printedcopy method, there is always the possibility that someone will lose the document. Forboth methods, the results of the survey would need to be manually calculated.

With SharePoint, however, a survey can easily be created, complete with multiple choiceresponses, numeric or text responses, and date/time responses. The results are tabulatedautomatically and can be viewed graphically. Important surveys can be placed right on theorganization’s home page in a prominent position.

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Surveys can be used to obtain information such as where to hold the winter holiday party,what time of day to have the party, and which date should be used for the party. Thepossible answers can be displayed for the users using a drop-down list, radio buttons, orcheck boxes.

Informing Users with Announcements and News ItemsMost organizations have a way of distributing information and announcements toemployees. An email containing the information can be sent to everyone, the informationcan be stored on some publicly accessible network resource such as an Exchange PublicFolder, or the information can be printed and posted on bulletin boards throughout theorganization.

However, wouldn’t it be nice to have all company announcements and news items in oneplace, easily accessible, and available for a set amount of time? Wouldn’t it be nice to beable to view only the applicable information and not have to sift through ones you don’tcare about? If users are going to the portal on a daily basis, having important companyannouncements and news items right in front of them where they can’t be removed ordeleted is an efficient way of disseminating information to the users. Placing them in aportal also removes the load of sending information to all users off the email server. Anexpiration date can be placed on announcements so that they can be on the home pagefor as long as necessary and then automatically removed. Using the SharePoint audiencefeature, announcements and news items can be targeted to a specific group or department.This saves users having to sort through a long list of items to find the one(s) that apply tothem.

For example, late-breaking news about a competitor can be directed to the sales depart-ment. Announcements about employee promotions can be directed to everyone, or in alarge organization, to the group that works with the employee. When people are going tobe on vacation, they can post the vacation dates and who is covering for them as anannouncement directed at the employees who are affected.

Creating Sites to Meet the Needs of the User CommunitySharePoint contains many different types of sites and workspaces, and these can bedirected and configured for a specific user community. Access to the sites and workspacescan be controlled using SharePoint’s security features (discussed in detail in Chapter 10,“Implementing and Validating SharePoint Security”).

When a site gets too much content to be managed and navigated efficiently, subsites canbe created. For example, a top-level site could be for an entire team or department,subsites developed for specific projects, and more subsites or workspaces for individualuse. The portal administrator can choose to give users the right to create top-level sites,


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but from a management perspective, it is probably best to leave that right only with theadministrator.

This section provides examples of how various site types can be used to meet the needs ofa user group.

Spanning the Organization Using an Enterprise-Level Portal SiteWhen you install SharePoint Portal Server 2003, a portal site is created. The value ofhaving a SharePoint Portal Server 2003 site is that it can bring together information fromother SharePoint Services sites and outside sources through its search capabilities. Mostorganizations will use the top-level portal as the central site (enterprise level) for the orga-nization, or in a very large or international organization, top-level portals may be createdfor separate divisions or locations. In general, the top-level portal should be designed tohandle minimal access on a daily basis by most members of the organization, and as theaccess point for enterprise-level searching. Note that these capabilities may actually behandled on the back-end by multiple physical servers in a server farm, depending on thesize and requirements of the organization (see Chapter 5, “Planning and Designing theSharePoint 2003 Infrastructure,” for details on configuring back-end servers/server farms).

Most users will use the enterprise-level portal as the “home” page, or starting point toaccess other sites, and thus will not spend much time at the enterprise portal.Announcements, events, and news items that apply to the entire organization are gener-ally stored on the enterprise-level portal, as well as links to departmental sites,team/project sites, internal or external sites that are of interest to all users (for example,the organization’s own public Web site, a training Web site, an IT help desk site, a site forthe company newsletter), and the user’s own personal site. In addition, the enterprise sitecan provide access to enterprisewide applications and will have the ability to search allorganizational sites as well as other relevant content from within the organization, andoutside the organization.

Other ideas for the enterprise-level site include

• Have a general discussion area for gathering feedback and ideas on items such ascompany events, ways of handling specific challenges the organization faces, andorganizational improvements.

• Feature an “employee-of-the-month.”

• Provide primary contact information for commonly accessed personnel, depart-ments, and/or offices.

• Provide the current weather or traffic conditions.

Figure 3.4 shows a sample enterprise-level portal.

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FIGURE 3.4 Example of an enterprise-level portal.

Making Department-Level Information Available Using aDepartmental SiteThe departmental site is the place users go for information relating to a specific depart-ment within the organization. Department-level sites contain some of the same types ofinformation as enterprise sites (announcements, news, events, and links) but are morenarrowly directed toward the function or purpose of the department. The “main” depart-mental page may be for general access by any member of the organization, whereas thelinks will be directed at the employees of the department and will be for specific teams orprojects within the department. The departmental site typically also has a documentlibrary for storing department-specific documents and may also have a form library.

An example of a departmental site would be for Human Resources (HR). Most organiza-tions have some type of HR department, whether it is composed of a single person orseveral hundred, that provides services to the employees in the organization. The HRdepartment is generally responsible for areas such as employee benefits, the companydirectory, compensation, and career development. The HR department site would have an“events” calendar that included items such as training sessions and open enrollmentperiods for benefits, a contact list that is the company directory, announcement itemssuch as changes in benefit plans and open job postings, a document library for HR-relatedpolicies and procedures, and a forms library for forms such as benefit enrollment and


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changes in employee status. The links off the main HR page would primarily be to teamsites for departmental personnel working on various HR projects.

Figure 3.5 is an example of how a department-based portal might be configured.


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FIGURE 3.5 Sample departmental-level portal.

Collaborating Using a Team/Project-Based SiteThe team or project site is used by a group of people (the “team”) working collaborativelytoward a common goal or end point. The team shares documents, shares information, hasmeetings, and performs other types of communication with each other.

Within SharePoint, there are three basic types of collaboration sites: document workspaces,meeting workspaces, and team sites.

Document workspace sites can be created directly from Microsoft Office 2003 applicationsand are generally used when a group of people are collaborating on a specific document.When initially created from Microsoft Office 2003, the basic “out-of-the-box” documentworkspace site home page includes announcements, tasks, links, shared documents (withthe document that is the subject of the site), and a list of the site members. Hyperlinks forcreating contacts, events, a general discussion, surveys, and a picture library are alsoincluded in the Quick Launch bar.

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To use the document workspace, the users don’t have to leave Microsoft Office 2003. Theworkspace can be created as soon as the document has been saved, and team membersinvited to the workspace, all from Word 2003, Excel 2003, or PowerPoint 2003. Wheneverany member of the workspace edits the document in the Microsoft Office 2003 applica-tion, the shared workspace is updated. Versions can be maintained automatically bySharePoint, and document check-in/check-out can be used.

NOTE

The user can control whether the document gets updated on the SharePoint site when the docu-ment is saved, or the user can be prompted regarding updating the workspace. The user can alsospecify whether to check for updates from the workspace when the document is opened.

Document workspaces are often used as “work” or temporary areas during development ofa document. When complete, the document is moved to a more permanent, and possiblyread-only, site. For example, a technical writer, consultant, and engineer collaborate tocreate a design specification for a customer. While working on the document, they use ashared document workspace for performing their editing, discussing, and reviewing of thedocument. When it is finished and has been approved, the document is moved to acustomer or project site.

Meeting workspace sites are designed to bring all the documents and tasks associated with ameeting together into one place. As with document workspaces, Microsoft has made iteasy to create a meeting workspace. There is an option on the Outlook 2003 New MeetingRequest form for creating a meeting workspace. Clicking this option creates the site andadds the users. You can also elect to add the meeting to an existing site. This is beneficialwhen project teams already have a site created and want to have a meeting that applies tothe project.

Five different meeting workspace templates are included with SharePoint, each containinga different set of Web Parts. The “basic” out-of-the-box meeting workspace templateincludes agenda items, attendees, and objectives. This can be easily customized by addingsome standard Web Parts:

• A document library and/or links can be set up for referencing documents associatedwith the meeting.

• A general discussion can be started for people to express their views about theproject in general, the approach, or the milestones.

• Contact information for attendees.

Team sites are project- or subject-oriented. Team sites are created through the portal inter-face and can be private or made available to all users. The site administrator determines


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whether the site will be searchable. The basic template for a team site includes announce-ments, events, and links on the “main page” with hyperlinks to Shared Documents,Contacts, Tasks, and General Discussion links on the Quick Launch bar.

Team sites are great for any service business that does projects for clients, or more gener-ally, any business where a group of people are collaborating to produce an end result.Documentation for the project can be stored on the site where the team members will beable to find what they need. Activities such as project status meetings, document reviews,and meetings with the client can be set up as events. The Contact list can be used forstoring information about the customer contacts and any other outside resources involvedwith the project. Although there may be a detailed project plan for the project, majortasks or milestones can be pulled out of the plan and tracked on the project home page,where they are immediately visible.

A centrally available group site encourages members to contribute to the site based ontheir expertise. Sharing and being able to easily find information leads to collaboration forproducing a quality end result. Efficiencies realized by use of a team site also add to theorganization’s bottom line.

Figure 3.6 shows the features a team-based Web site might use.


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FIGURE 3.6 Sample team/project site.

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Customizing the Personal Site to Meet Individual NeedsSharePoint Portal Server 2003 provides end-users with the ability to create a personal sitethat can be configured for how they work, and with the information they need to do theirjob. The user can set up links to documents or sites often accessed, include Web Parts oftheir own choosing, view their email inbox, set up alerts to be notified when importantinformation changes, set up their own lists, and create their own document and picturelibraries. Any of the information on a user’s personal site can be shared with other users. Aseparate “shared view” of the personal site can be created for this purpose to target whatgets shared, and what remains personal.

The site administrator can control the type of customization the user is allowed toperform. The administrator can control the available Web Parts, and which ones can andcannot be added or removed. The administrator can also direct specific content to thepersonal site based on the user’s membership in a special SharePoint group called an audi-ence. The site administrator can also control the appearance of the public view of thepersonal site to maintain consistency within the organization.

In essence, the personal site provides the end-user with the ability to design a site basedon their needs and their own way of working, and the ability to share with the rest of theorganization a view of who they are and what they contribute.

Figure 3.7 shows how a personal site might be configured.


FIGURE 3.7 Sample personal site.

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Expanding SharePoint by Integrating with MicrosoftOffice 2003 and Other ApplicationsA design goal for SharePoint Portal Server 2003 was application integration; therefore, itwas developed to be part of the .NET framework. It takes full advantage of ASP.NET, WebForms, Web Parts Pages, and Web Services, enabling development of customized solutionsusing Visual Studio.NET. In addition, SharePoint Portal Server 2003 supports BizTalkApplication Adapters, providing integration with hundreds of applications.

Accessing Information Using the Office Web ComponentsMicrosoft created Office Web Components that integrate features of Microsoft Office 2003and Windows SharePoint Services. These optional components, which can be downloadedfrom Microsoft’s Web site, are installed on the SharePoint server and consist of a combina-tion of Web Parts (PivotView, Spreadsheet), data access services, templates, and Web PartPage solutions. Each of these components and their use is discussed in the followingsections.

Using the PivotView Web Part to Analyze Corporate DataThe PivotView Web Part enables placing a PivotTable and/or a PivotChart into the WebPart. These can be connected to external data or data contained in another Web Part. Theview of the data can be changed from within the Web Part to Datasheet, PivotTable, orPivotChart to accommodate user requirements for data analysis and calculation.

For example, take the finance director who needs to analyze the company’s cash positioneach day. A PivotView Web Part could be placed on the director’s home page that accessesthe company’s financial data and then displays the information in a PivotTable for analy-sis by the director. If the director wanted to see what the trend has been over the pastmonth, the view could be switched to a PivotChart.

SharePoint enables the current data to be displayed each morning right in the portal forreview. This saves the director from having to launch other applications to access andthen analyze the information.

Performing Calculations with the Spreadsheet ComponentThe Spreadsheet Web Part creates a mini-Excel type of work area on the Web page. It canbe used for doing ad-hoc calculations, or it can be connected to data from another source,such as an Excel spreadsheet. The data from this Web Part can be connected to aPivotView Web Part for analysis and graphing.

Similar to the PivotView Web Part, the Spreadsheet component can be used to work withdata imported from an external source, with a SharePoint list, or with data from anotherWeb Part.

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A resource manager might use the Spreadsheet component to review the daily resourceutilization, pulling information from daily timesheets to determine where the companycould improve with regard to utilization of its employees.

Incorporating Web Pages Using the Web Capture Web PartThe Web Capture Web Part provides a way to incorporate a Web page, or a part of a Webpage, into a Web Part on a SharePoint Portal Server 2003 page. A special Web Capture tool,included with Microsoft Office 2003, is used to browse to the desired Web page, select thepage or a portion of the page, and then “capture” it. This Web capture can then be incor-porated into a SharePoint Web Capture Web Part. The information in the Web capture canbe refreshed by refreshing either the Web Part or the entire Web page.

For example, a purchasing manager accesses a vendor page on a daily basis to check forspecial pricing. Instead of browsing to the page every day, the purchasing manager couldcapture the vendor’s Web page and incorporate it into his site using the Web Capture WebPart, and then refresh the page each day to see the current information.

Retrieving Stock Quotes with the Quick Quote Web PartThe Quick Quote Web Part provides summary information for a stock, index, or fund spec-ified by the user. When the symbol for the stock, index, or fund is entered into the WebPart, the high and low price for the day, trading volume, last price, the difference betweenthe current price and the closing price of the previous day, and the percent of change isreturned. The Quick Quote Web Part also provides a link to the MSN Money Web site forstock symbol look-up and detailed information about the stock, index, or fund.

This Web Part provides a means for users interested in trading transactions a convenientway to check the status of a security without leaving the portal.

Figure 3.8 shows an example of a SharePoint page that has been configured with OfficeWeb components.

Accessing Microsoft Great Plains for Accounting DataSharePoint 2003 includes a series of Web Parts for accessing information from the GreatPlains Accounting system. These Web Parts enable employees to access information suchas pay stubs, past check detail, and expense reports. Using these Web Parts means that theemployees do not have to learn the user interface for Great Plains, and the organizationcan get by with fewer Great Plains user licenses. The end result is that the organizationspends less time training and saves money on software costs.


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FIGURE 3.8 Using Office Web components.

Replacing Corporate IntranetsMany organizations currently have a corporate intranet. However, does it require ITresources to get involved each time a document or form needs updating? Does it requiredevelopers to get involved when changes to the structure need to be made? Is it flexibleand easy to use? Can users customize it to fit their own specific needs? Intranets are oftenout-of-date because they are costly and cumbersome to maintain.

SharePoint, with its flexible design, scalability, and ease of use, is becoming a popularchoice as the infrastructure for corporate intranets. Combined with the ability forcustomization as required, SharePoint is a low-cost solution that provides the ability forusers at all levels to participate and contribute to the corporate intranet. End users withthe appropriate permissions can easily maintain documents and other information on thesite, and most of this can be done through the Microsoft Office 2003 interface.Administrators can still control security, and approval can optionally be required beforeinformation is posted or changes in structure made.

A typical SharePoint-based intranet could have a home page with information applicableto all employees, and department-specific sites, linked to from the home page. The sitecould include Web Parts and features such as

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• Announcements for providing employees with information such as promotions,notification of open enrollment periods for medical benefits, and importantcompany financial statistics.

• Contacts, for storing the company directory. Basic user information could beretrieved from Active Directory and additional items such as photographs of eachemployee could be maintained through SharePoint.

• Forms library, for storing company forms such as insurance claim forms and 401kenrollment forms.

• Document libraries, for storing procedures and policies.

• Events, for listing upcoming company events such as holiday parties, seminars, andinternal training sessions. Items such as month-end close dates and pay dates couldalso be maintained.

• Links, for commonly accessed Web sites such as the company external Web site,support sites, and competitor sites.

• Surveys, for getting feedback and on company issues such as where to have the nextcompany meeting.

• Alerts, for getting notified when important information is added or gets changed.

Figure 3.9 is an example of an intranet created with SharePoint Portal Server 2003.


FIGURE 3.9 Corporate intranet created using SharePoint Portal 2003.

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Hosting SharePoint Sites on the InternetInternet service providers (ISPs) can take advantage of the scalability and managementfeatures of SharePoint 2003 to provide hosting services. Server farms can be configured toload balance indexing and search processing services, and quotas can be set to control thesize of the sites. Quotas can also be used to establish billing rates, charging higher rates forlarger quotas. Security can be put into place to control what goes onsite and who hasaccess for managing the sites. User accounts can be added automatically based on theemail addresses using SharePoint 2003’s Active Directory account creation mode (seeChapter 7, “Installing SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and Windows SharePoint Services,”for information about configuring Active Directory account creation mode). Fees can becharged for additional services such as providing site backup and site statistics.

Communicating with Partners and Customers Througha SharePoint ExtranetThe security and configuration tools within SharePoint 2003 make it easy to set up anextranet for working with external partners. External users can be invited to the site forcollaboration and/or sharing of information. For example, an organization that uses amarketing firm could set up a SharePoint document workspace site where the marketingcompany could post its work. A discussion board could be used for providing feedback andideas regarding the final deliverables. Versions could be maintained to enable reverting toa previous document if the revised one doesn’t meet the client needs. If outside users areuploading documents, antivirus protection can be used, along with SharePoint’s “block fileextension” feature to protect the server from undesirable files.

Another use for a SharePoint extranet that applies to many types of organizations is to useSharePoint as a document repository. Sites can easily and quickly be implemented for part-ners to search for relevant information. For example, product specs and user manuals canbe maintained on a SharePoint site for retrieval by customers, reducing the number ofcalls to product specialists. Government agencies can store forms and procedures on aSharePoint site for retrieval by the public. The beauty of a SharePoint document manage-ment site is that it is easy to create, easy to update, and doesn’t require IT intervention tomaintain.

SummaryHistorically, the business goals of an organization were not always aligned with the toolsand technology implemented by the IT department. IT departments have been focusedmore on infrastructure than business applications, and the applications that were availabletended to be rigid with a high cost for customization. Corporate intranets, when theyexisted at all, contained static information and lagged behind in terms of updates.

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With SharePoint, users are empowered to create a collaboration environment to serve theirneeds. SharePoint’s flexible design enables ease of customization and development forsatisfying application requirements. A well-designed SharePoint solution enables users tohave the resources they need to create confident, smarter decisions in less time, using afamiliar interface. There are no more islands of knowledge; people can easily cometogether to collaborate and share ideas. Improvements can also be made in terms ofcustomer and partner loyalty by providing them with access to resources they can use forconducting smooth business transactions.

When implemented correctly, returns from the use of SharePoint technologies can be real-ized in the areas of business processes and human resources, with regard to efficiency andproductivity. Because payroll is generally one of the organization’s largest expenses, even asmall gain in productivity can result in a considerable return on investment.

Best Practices• Although having the ability to easily create sites encourages collaboration and

sharing of information, it needs to be managed. Left unmanaged, an organizationcould end up with thousands of unconnected individual and group work sites thatgenerate some of the same issues the organization was trying to resolve with acollaborative solution.

• Even if no other SharePoint features are implemented, using its search capabilitieswill empower users to quickly find the information they need. Documents do nothave to be incorporated into SharePoint to realize the benefit of SharePoint’s searchbecause file shares, as well as other external data sources, can be included as contentsources to be indexed.

• Using SharePoint document libraries for storing and accessing policies, procedures,and other types of user manuals that frequently change can save an organization thecost of producing hard-copy documents, the cost of distributing updates, and thelabor cost associated with manually updating a hard-copy based manual. In addition,maintaining an online manual ensures that all employees are accessing the mostcurrent, up-to-date information.

• Introducing users to the SharePoint environment through the Microsoft Office 2003applications they are already familiar with eases the learning curve and improvesacceptance of a new way of doing things.

• Creating a portal structure that has various levels of sites targeted to specific usergroups helps to manage the content and provides users with an easy way to get tothe information they need.

• Eliciting ideas by placing discussion items on an enterprise-level site opens up aforum for tapping resources that may otherwise be difficult to reach.


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• Let SharePoint do the work of letting you know when information has changed bysetting up alerts.

• Take advantage of Web Parts and components already developed to extend the use ofthe portal for accessing application data and for performing functions such as calcu-lations from within the portal environment as opposed to launching a separateapplication.

• Let IT control the overall security and configuration parameters, but encourage end-users to manage and control the content on non-top-level sites to take the burdenoff the IT department.

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