Options for trying and using SharePoint in any environment
Adding on a bit to a recent post by Andrew about some methods and reasons for adopting SharePoint (see Popular migration paths), I want to discuss some conversations I have had with clients.
More than a few clients have been skeptical about the adoption of SharePoint. I'd like to discuss some of the reasons for their hesitation and some common responses I have for them.
1. The licensing is very expensive considering we only need basic collaboration (or some other singular feature of SharePoint).
The licensing model, costs, and packages can be expensive, confusing, and even frustrating when you're new to the product and trying to figure out what you need from it.
Remember, you can purchase a server license and pay for Client Access Licenses for what I consider to be incidental costs if your user-base is small. This allows small companies to gain the benefits of an enterprise platform.
You can also be thrifty about server allocation if necessary. Choose your level of risk in terms of redundancy and clustering to lower overall server costs. Choose to use WSS 3.0 only machines in some parts of your infrastructure where access and functionality is separate from your complete MOSS farm and the requirements match functionality. WSS 3.0 licensing is part of your Windows 2003 Server license as opposed to a full MOSS license. These are aspects of the SharePoint architecture we can help determine and setup to save our clients money.
If you end up relying on and building out your infrastructure over time, the licensing costs become nominal relative to the gain in efficiency. Until that happens, you do have options for keeping costs down.
2. It takes a long time to set up. To "do it right" we need lots of different Active Directory accounts, multiple servers, etc. It's daunting if we don't have the resources or hardware allocated.
Although it is true that we allocate some time to a proper environment setup, there are multiple ways to get going with the product. Although there are many levels in the middle, we most often talk about the following 2:
A. Complete setup for an enterprise client who knows where they are going. This is a complete "package" setup so that the farm has legs and is the foundation for a complete SharePoint or Office Server infrastructure. You can't short-cut this, so don't risk it. It takes some time to do correctly and requires some involvement from corporate IT and business stakeholders. You wouldn't just install Active Directory or Exchange and set it up one morning without some planning and discussions about how to implement, manage, etc. We're starting to get to Governance, so I'll stop there.
B. The quick setup. We have begun to offer this to clients that are still on the fence about the product, unsure if they want to license, don't know what the product can do, etc. Sometimes we'll just run the Easy Configuration wizard on an empty server or even a VPC. This reduces the install time down to minutes. This lets you get your feet wet and utilized the rapid capabilities of the platform. This is meant to be a testing ground only, so production-level use should not be allowed on this instance, but get your employees hands' on the features this way. Try it!
3. We were sold SharePoint based on all these great features, but I installed it and fired up a browser and I don't see any of those things!
If I had a nickel every time I talked to someone who said something along these lines to me, I'd have at least a couple dollars. :)
The point is valid: SharePoint doesn't come with an instruction manual on what to use it for. When you buy a camera, it doesn't tell you where to use it and what to take pictures of. It assumes you already know that, so it just tells you how utilize the functions required to take pictures. SharePoint is essentially the same thing. Don't let the tail wag the dog. Take control of SharePoint so it meets your needs.
The Office Server 2007 SDK and WSS 3.0 SDK are great tools for learning how to do things that you already know you want to do, but too many people have asked me: "What can this product do for me?" It actually isn't an easy question to answer. Soon I'll be posting a multi-part series on the different parts of SharePoint and how they might work for you, but in the mean time I'll try to break it down to how we try to get the answer from our clients.
Because the platform is so open, you essentially start with a blank slate. The key is to determine where certain needs exist within your organization. Yes, document management, project/collaboration sites, intranet or extranet portal etc. are all standard responses, but that's only the easy part, everyone knows that. SharePoint can do so much more. What are some of the process pain points in your organization? What were some of the features that sold you on the product? How do you think those features could improve efficiency/cost/organization within your company? Do you need audit trails on certain documents, digital signatures? Could the migration of certain forms or paperwork to an automated system save you time, money? Do you have problems with "loose" content and clutter in email and shared drives? What about specific, secure, backed up, logical areas where people can work on projects or teams? How much searching do you do or want? Personal sites, task lists, calendars, blogs, wikis. The list goes on and on...And how to I incorporate those into my enterprise? I tried to set it up and people can't log in or can't use it effectively, or it got out of hand quickly. Call us and we'll help you.
It's important to remember: I've yet to see a company roll out *everything* they want to do with SharePoint at the same time. You get it running and solve one set of problems first. You will start to see areas the product can improve other aspects of your organization as you use it. Then you launch your second round, etc.
Don't confuse this with rapid application development as a style for rolling out SharePoint. Careful planning needs to go into your initial rollout and objectives, then the infrastructure can fill out and meet needs as intended in a manageable fashion.
4. We tried or used SharePoint 2003 and were not too impressed.
SharePoint 2007 / WSS 3.0 were completed re-built for this latest version. The architecture, feature-set, compability, usability, and coding platform have *all* been improved significantly. This version clearly shows us the level of commitment to this platform when you look at the amount of functionality and characteristics. Please evaluate this product independently from any previous versions.
5. What else can we do with this platform since everyone says it is so great.
A lot of clients purchased SharePoint because they got a deal on their enterprise licensing or were convinced by a good presentation.
These companies often don't realize what they got their hands on. In many cases we have used WSS or SharePoint as the base platform for a site or application that one normally would not associate with the SharePoint feature set. It is an extremely flexible environment.
There are multiple public web sites out there using SharePoint as the platform. Most people would not recognize these sites as being SharePoint applications because of the significant customization made to them. Many of these companies chose SharePoint for their applications or sites because of the return on their investment in terms of features for price.
Content Management, Publishing, Enterprise Searching, built-in Web Parts and Business Data Catalog connectivity are just a handful of the features that organizations choose to use in an external web site. When you add in security, Active Directory integration, profiles, etc. you quickly can determine that any one of these features would cost more than an external SharePoint license to build or often buy on your own. The built-in web service integration alone can be worth a full license depending on your project. Generally speaking, you can find reasons to use the platform that will save you money in many web-base projects/applications. This applies equally to both internal and external uses.
In many cases, WSS 3.0 can be used at minimal cost to gain some of the required features and infrastructure that you would have to build or buy on your own.
One final note...
One of the biggest reasons I have for convincing clients to use some flavor of SharePoint as a platform is stability. Pre-built infrastructure requires a fraction of the Quality Assurance testing usually involved in a custom application. This reduces development costs, time to market, and costly maintenance over the lifecycle of the application. Any built-in pieces of SharePoint that can be used will save costly and time-consuming development and testing efforts.
I hope this helps,
-Ryan