10 bullet-points for governance, planning and implementation

I my opinion some of the expected benefits of implementing intranets with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS) are enhanced collaboration and sharing through the organisation with proven application and known user interfaces.

However, without governance your intranet will come out of control and lead to chaos. Many organisations don’t implement a holistic plan for the intranet, instead intranet project is initiated from various departments and projects, resulting in multiple, uncoordinated and separate deployments, each with its own structure and server farm. Often content grows and the user experience become inconsistent. If end-users are unable to collaborate, find and search for information due to poor implementation and lack of Information Architecture (IA) the total value of the intranet is lost.

Why implement a governance plan? You need to gain early support from key stakeholders across the organisation. A governance plan forces consensus and designates ownership, roles and responsibility. Ultimately governance is critical to avoid chaos.

My 10 bullet-points for governance, planning and implementation:

1. Business objectives (agreed upon measurable goals linked to the business strategy)
2. Information Architecture (consistent site structures and navigation)
3. Taxonomy (consistent naming conventions)
4. Search (users can find information – linked with taxonomy)
5. Provisioning (consistent site usage and user policies)
6. Branding/design (correct use of corporate profiles)
7. Testing (to ensure consistent use of sites and content)
8. Training (tools and governance plan)
9. User feedback (monitor and measure)
10. Change- and deployment plan (structural change and implementation)

In my opinion organisations will enjoy greater success with their MOSS installations if the pay attention to the listed 10 bullet points for governance, planning and implementation. Use the bullet point to write an implementation and governance plan, ensure stakeholder buy-inn, ownership of tasks and consensus of business objectives.

I know that this is just bullet points, and they need to be described further for you to be able to use them in daily work. I will describe some of the bullet points by separate Blog-spots on a later stage. – Stay tuned!

For more reading: Microsoft TechNet