Boston, MA – April 10, 2009 – Information Architected announced the release of its new consulting methodology for the development of a hybrid business-technology SharePoint strategy.  The methodology, which is executed in three phases, can be executed before or after an organization embarks on using SharePoint. (Details of the methodology are below.)

“We developed this methodology because of a compelling need we saw in the market,” said Carl Frappaolo, Information Architected co-founder and principal. “Most organizations fail to realize that SharePoint deployments have two distinct design components: technical and business. Most SharePoint assessments focus exclusively or largely on technology and fail to plan for key usability and business issues critical to maximizing the effectiveness of a SharePoint’s deployment, while simultaneously minimizing any risk associated with it.”

In conducting market research and developing SharePoint case studies, Information Architected found that many organizations lack suitable control, governance and planning for SharePoint.  In the spirit of open collaboration, they often let technology and content run away from them, leaving themselves vulnerable to security and compliance violations and poorly designed search and access capabilities.  SharePoint sites end up being silos rather than corporate assets integrated into a centralized strategy.

“Implementation of SharePoint from a technical perspective is obviously important,”, said Dan Keldsen, co-founder and principal at Information Architected. “While our methodology takes technical issues into consideration, it also examines the underlying business strategy and information architecture. We ask our clients to consider:

•    Compliance,
•    Discovery,
•    Corporate Governance,
•    Usability and Interfaces,
•    Taxonomy and Metadata,
•    Process Analysis, Redesign and Workflow,
•    Findability,
•    Business Analysis and ROI,
•    Mobile Users and Synchronization,
•    User Adoption and Change Management,
•    Legacy Applications and Integration,
•    Content Migration, and
•    Back-up, Recovery and Business Continuity.

These are the issues that will ultimately decide if you have a successful SharePoint deployment or not.”

ABOUT THE METHDOLOGY
The methodology is executed in three stages.  It begins with an assessment of overall business goals and objectives.  It identifies and ranks the business issues associated with the SharePoint implementation, expected outcomes and benefits targeted.  The assessment includes a rationalization of the needs for collaboration and knowledge sharing versus the needs for compliance and security. It also examines user work habits, the need to collaborate, search and navigation habits and needs, related processes and overall business goals and objectives.

The second step looks at current and planned technology strategies. This includes everything from network capacity, to existing and planned tools and techniques for collaboration.  This can include existing portals, document and content management systems, enterprise 2.0 technologies, and any existing SharePoint sites.

The third step aligns the findings of the first two steps, resulting in an implementation strategy that balances technology capabilities with business requirements. Alternatives are presented that highlight alternative cost and change management issues associated with the SharePoint implementation. For each targeted goal or benefit, alternatives regarding deployment in SharePoint “out of the box”, integration of SharePoint with existing systems, customization of SharePoint and/or simple tweaks of SharePoint are compared.  The solution is positioned within an information architecture, ensuring easier and wider scale adoption and alignment with corporate governance. The result is a well thought out business-technology strategy that maximizes the value derived from SharePoint and minimizes any risks of shortcomings in the short and long-term.