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I gave this presentation at the Iowa SharePoint User Group meeting on June 7, 2012. Many companies construct their SharePoint site structure using a hierarchical framework that closely resembles their org chart, for example by business unit, department, or team. GreatAmerica decided to go against conventional wisdom when rolling out SharePoint 2010 company-wide last year. Instead they implemented a very loosely structured, non-hierarchical architecture for their corporate intranet and collaboration portal. While this model does provide certain benefits, great care had to be taken to ensure people would know where to go to find the sites they were looking for. This session will explain the reasons behind GreatAmerica's atypical architectural decisions, the challenges they faced in pulling everything together, and what's coming next after listening to user feedback to improve findability and the user experience.
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HOW WE DID IT:GreatAmerica’s Nontraditional SharePoint Site Structure
Largest privately-owned small ticket leasing company in the U.S.
Corporate headquarters in Cedar Rapids, IA◦ Offices in Marshall, MN; Moberly, MO; and Kennesaw, GA
Founded in 1992 Six business units:
◦ Office Equipment◦ Communications & Data◦ Automotive Repair/Distribution◦ HealthCare◦ Direct Programs◦ Specialty Markets
Approx. 370 employees
WHO WE ARE
SharePoint Architect/Developer for GreatAmerica Leasing
Personal Blog www.sharepointwendy.com Company Web Site: www.greatamerica.com E-mail: wneal@greatamerica.com Twitter: @SharePointWendy Contributing Author for
NothingButSharePoint.com and SharePointEduTech
Passionate about all things SharePoint: Branding, evangelism, governance, training, user adoption, user empowerment
WENDY NEAL
AGENDA
▪ Brief SharePoint history▪ Old Intranet▪ New Intranet/collaborative environment
◦ SharePoint 2010 architecture/design◦ Challenges we faced
▪ What’s next at GreatAmerica?▪ Closing thoughts/advice
2008 2009 2010 20112007 2012
SharePoint 2007 RolloutRollout to Systems team; momentum stopped after initial installation and no company-wide rollout ensued
End of Term SystemGo live with our End of Term System – custom application built on SharePoint 2007
Insight LiveFirst phase of our collaborative environment is in place; soft rollout
Usage Transaction SystemGo live with our Usage Transaction System – custom application built on SharePoint 2007
Info-Zone Beta Our dealer Extranet goes to Beta
GAIN RetirementCurrently moving stuff from our old Intranet (GAIN) environment piece by piece to SharePoint 2010
2008 2009 2010 20112007 2012
SHAREPOINT HISTORY
Info-Zone LiveOur dealer Extranet officially goes live
Install SharePoint 2010 BetaConduct proof of concept for Extranet
Decision made to go forward with SharePoint 2010 internally and externally
GA UniversityGo live with our GA University site – OOB SharePoint 2007 site
OUT WITH THE OLD
TIME FOR AN UPGRADE
▪ Built in ColdFusion 5▪ Living on unsupported hardware▪ Uses (gulp) frames!▪ 93 left navigation links?!!▪ Hardcoded security logic
PREVIOUS INTRANET
PREVIOUS INTRANET
IN WITH THE NEW
PHYSICAL ARCHITECTURE
▪ Two SharePoint 2010 farms
LOGICAL ARCHITECTURE
WHY SEPARATE SITE COLLECTIONS?
▪ Scalability concerns◦ Content database size/future growth◦ Easier to move site collections to different content DB
▪ Cleaner security boundaries◦ Different site owners & contributors
▪ Separate administration◦ Site collection admins & SharePoint Designer settings
▪ Allow different features & web parts▪ Allow different quotas▪ Encourage different themes, colors
CHALLENGE SOLUTION(S)No shared navigation • Site directory
• Channels dropdown• Insight home link• Footer links
Content types duplication • Central content type hub to publish enterprise content types
Mass activation of features • Axceler ControlPoint
Permissions management • Axceler ControlPoint
Rolling up data across site collections
• Bamboo Cross-Site Display web part
CHALLENGES WE FACED
DEFAULT DASHBOARD
PERSONALIZED DASHBOARD
SITE DIRECTORY
SITE DIRECTORY – MORE INFO
PEOPLE DIRECTORY
SHARED LINKS
▪ Visible on every SharePoint site◦ Enterprise, Team, & MySites
MYSITE - EXAMPLE
DEFAULT TEAM SITE
CUSTOMIZED SITES - EXAMPLES
A FEW STATISTICS
▪ 55 team/collaboration sites◦ 86 sub sites
▪ 7 Enterprise sites◦ 7 sub sites
▪ 111 MySites▪ Approx. 20 power users identified
SINCE GOING LIVE (SEPT. 2011)
NEXT STEPS
▪ Continue to migrate old Intranet to new◦ Moving 3 high traffic items soon
▪ Company-wide training▪ Implement changes based on feedback
◦ Lack of navigation confusing◦ Questions regarding difference between GAIN
and Insight, and how to find stuff◦ Proposed additional navigation element that is
unobtrusive
MEGA MENU MOCKUP
CLOSING THOUGHTS
▪ Plan, plan, plan◦ Understand what all SharePoint entails
▪ Consider 3rd party tools or custom dev▪ Create a governance plan
◦ Review it!
▪ Assign an owner to SharePoint◦ Someone who is passionate
Thank You.
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