Prepared for Prepared by Jornata 8 Faneuil Hall Boston, MA Submitted on February 1, 2011
Thinking SharePoint? Think Jornata.
SharePoint 2010
Social Computing Best Practices
Scott Jamison
About Scott Jamison
• CEO of Jornata, a Gold Certified SharePoint & Office 365 partner in New England
• Works closely with Microsoft on product planning, business & technical guidance • SharePoint Certified Master
• Author:
– Essential SharePoint 2007 – Essential SharePoint 2010
– Four whitepapers on SharePoint 2010
• Contact: scott.jamison@jornata.com • Twitter: @sjam
Agenda
• Why Social Computing?
• Why Social Computing for Business?
• What does Social Computing mean in the context of SharePoint?
• Best Practices for Social Computing in SharePoint 2010: Top Ten
Social Computing for Business
Professional
So what can SharePoint do for me…?
Use SharePoint 2010 For…
1) Social Identity - user profiles, properties, org chart, Outlook socialconnector
1a) Personal Site - MySites (different and complementary from a profile) 2) Social Networking - status, noteboards & activity feed, discussion boards, people discovery
3) Social Feedback - doc comments, rating, tags
4) Social Authoring & Publishing - Blogs & comments 5) Social Search / Expertise Location – People search
6) Knowledge Management - wiki pages, podcasting, Ask me about
7) Enterprise Collaboration - project teams, issue lists, surveys, document libraries
8) Social Targeting - Push authoritative content to the right groups (Audience targeting and opt-in)
9) Social Discovery - Tag Clouds
1) User Profiles
• Key Goal: Provide a Social Identity
• Why? It’s the basis of most social features in SP2010
– User Profile Service Application
• User Profile Database
• Synchronization Database • Social Tagging Database
User Profiles & My Sites
• User profiles are rendered using single pages:
– Public profile:
• http://<mysiteurl>/<mysitehost>/person.aspx
– Newsfeed
• http://<mysiteurl>/<mysitehost>/default.aspx
• My sites are individual site collections rendered at:
• http://<mysiteurl>/<mysitehost>/<useraccount>/default.aspx
• My Sites are optional!
– You can have profiles without my sites
Tip: Plan for User Profiles
• Clarify Your Business Goals
– What will you use profiles for? • Plan your My Site Web sites
– Just profiles? Or My Sites, too? • Plan Permissions
– UPSA permissions
• Plan Container Selection
– Sync from where? AD? LDAP? BCS? Other? • Plan Profile Properties
– List of user properties, mappings, and visibility • Plan Filters
1A) My Sites
• Key Goal: Provide a site that’s owned by a user for a user
• Why? Enables Users to:
– Customize exactly what they want to see – Gives them a private place to put stuff
• Shhh…it’s really just another site collection that’s named after the user…stored in a specific place
• And did I mention you don’t need MySites if you want to use profiles?
2) Social Networking
• Key Goal: Provide a means for social interaction • Why? Enables Users to:
– Provide status updates
– Interact with other users via noteboards (aka “the wall”)
– View stories via Activity feeds
– Discuss stuff via discussion boards – Discover people (“colleagues”)
3) Social Feedback
• Key Goal: Provide a way for the masses to categorize, comment, and rate content
• Why? Enables Users to:
– Leave comments – Socially tag content – Rate content
• Tip: Ratings are overrated. (Use with caution.) • Tip: Encourage users to observe and use the
4) Social Authoring & Publishing
• Key Goal: Provide a way for the masses to create and publish content
• Why? Enables Users to:
– Share experience – Share opinions – “Be real”
5) Social Search / Expertise Location
• Key Goal: Provide a way to find an expert • Why? Enables users to find other users (like
social networking, but a little more stalkerish) • Tip: Make sure user profiles are up-to-date for
best results. Profile photos help, too.
• Tip: Launching (or re-launching) SharePoint? Pre-load profile info for a “Big bang” effect. • Tip: Search keywords & best bets can be used
6) Knowledge Management
• Key Goal: Also provides a way for the masses to create and publish content – just this time, it’s not all about them!
• Why? Enables Users to share info via:
– Team sites – Wiki pages – Podcasting – Ask me about
• Tip: Wikis can be free-form or structured. What matters is that anyone can author. (Think of a wiki page as a
publishing page with more open permissions.)
• Tip: Afraid of anyone-can-author? Use SharePoint’s approval and publishing features!
7) Enterprise Collaboration
• Key Goal: Provide a way to share and collaborate
• Why? Enables users to share in an ad-hoc manner using:
– Project team sites – Issue lists
– Surveys
– Document libraries
• Tip: This is SharePoint’s bread & butter!
• Tip: Plan for the Enterprise using Term Sets, Content Types, Information Policies
• Tip: Configure the Enterprise Metadata and Keywords Settings
8) Social Targeting
• Key Goal: Provide a way to target groups of users based on interests
• Why? Less junk for users to filter out
9) Social Navigation
• Key Goal: Provide a way to navigate via Social Tags
• Why? All of the cool kids are doing it
• Tip: The tag cloud web part is there for the taking…
10) Communities of Interest
• Key Goal: Provide a way to find topics you like, along with content and other people
• Why? I like it, therefore someone else probably does, too (“I’m not alone!”) • Tips:
– Use team sites to create community content
– Or, use tag profiles to show lists of tagged content – Click through on user profile property values to
SOCIAL COMPUTING
Governance Considerations
• Social Computing Implications
– Standard SharePoint content like items in lists
(blogs, wikis, publishing pages, discussions) can be audited, retained, etc. But the social content cannot. – SharePoint 2010 offers users a far more
participatory role in the solution information
architecture through the use of “social data” such as tags, bookmarks and ratings.
• Users need to understand and internalize the value proposition for leveraging these features.
• Solution designers will likely need to provide both guidance and encouragement for their use.
SharePoint 2010 Considerations
• Managed Metadata
– Consistent Terminology
– Better Navigation/Filtering – Better Search Results
– Easier on Users
– But…potential for confusion
• What is Metadata?
• Authoritative Tagging vs. Social Tagging
SharePoint 2010 Considerations
• Records Management
Adoption Does Not 'Just Happen'
Reach critical mass to stay in the game
VHS and Betamax: adoption x time
Tipping point
Crossing the Chasm
critical mass
Adoption Must-Have Elements
• Communication Plan • Training Plan
• User Support Plan
Communication Plan
• Leverage Experts and Champions • CEO Memos
• Town Hall Meetings • Break Room Posters • Other Fun Ideas:
– Online Scavenger Hunts – “Birth” Announcements – Launch Parties
Training Plan
• Training: Not just for Developers and IT • Also For:
– Power Users (Site Owners) – Visitors
– Members
– Web Content Contributors – Workflow Approvers
User Support Plan
• Contact Person for Every Contnet Page
– Use pictures and contact info
• Internal Site Owner User Groups
– Empower users to help each other
• Get the IT Help Desk on board
– Giving users power means more questions
• End-User Feedback Loop
– Get feedback in two ways:
• Metrics-based (number of users, rating scale, etc) • Anecdotes (good/bad experiences)
Incentives & Reward Plan
• Answer WIIFM
– Show (with real data) why something is useful
• Make It Fun!
– Buck the company culture
• Provide Recognition for Content Contribution
– Money talks; so do titles & certificates
• Have a Fantastic User Experience
