Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College Creating Great Client Experiences with SharePoint 2010 for Web Content Management Fostering Cross-Team Knowledge Sharing Rebecca Dornin Web Technologist, HBS ITG Mary Fowkes Senior Project Manager, HBS ITG Anne E. Holden HBS EE Web Marketing Manager June 23, 2011

Agenda What is SharePoint? Deep dive on the project with Executive Education Program Management Training and Outreach Collaboration From the Customer’s Perspective Lessons Learned Q & A 2

What is Microsoft SharePoint? An out of the box web publishing and collaboration platform Common uses include intranet sites, extranet sites, document management, and internet sites such as HBS Executive Education (EE) Industry leading collaboration portal in the enterprise space Offers page-editing, file-storing and custom design ('branding') capabilities A SharePoint site is a collection of pages, lists, and libraries configured for the purpose of achieving an express goal 3

Key goals and benefits of WCM Great user experience Establish and promote web standards – common header, footer, navigation, global CSS Establish reusable templates that support HBS look and feel Content reuse within and across sites (news, feeds, faculty interests) Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Establish shared content types and metadata taxonomies Site personalization Platform flexibility and scalability Content versioning and workflows 4 Decision to Implement a Web Content Management (WCM) System

Why SharePoint? A Focus on Web Content Management Access to a large community user base SharePoint dynamic pages with content that is editable by MS Office like ribbon controls Lists and Libraries of many types Announcement Lists, Blogs, Contacts, Discussion Boards, Document Libraries, Pages, Surveys Tasks Ability to copy, create, delete, or rename lists and libraries, pages, and sites Manage user permissions and view document/page version histories Evolve with industry. Take advantage of technical innovations (mobile, foreign language support, targeted content) Utilize consistent visual design framework across sites 5

About the Exec Ed SharePoint 2010 Project Upgrading and Redesigning a Site on SharePoint 6

What is the HBS Exec Ed Web Site? Marketing web site with thousands of pages of unique content Over a thousand video and article assets that must be shared dynamically across sub sites More than 80 programs, with dates, fees, and application info Forward facing public site targeted at the world’s top executives Fortune 200 companies looking at this site 7

Key Considerations of the Project Technical Software upgrade needed to support new functionality New hardware needed to support software upgrade Finding ways to improve EE’s workflow Working with the system out of the box capabilities Customer Engagement Ease the learning curve for the customer with new technology Understanding how to map the requirements of the customer to the feature set of SP2010 Content integrity Open communication channels 8

Project Management Identified success factors for HBS, ITG, and Executive Education Early decision was made to use a two pronged approach to achieve long term success Project 1–SharePoint 2010 with EE Site Upgrade Upgraded SharePoint WCM from 2007 to 2010 Built robust infrastructure, all new hardware (intDEV, STAGE, PROD, DR) Upgraded EXISTING Executive Education site Seized opportunity for training ITG and EE on SP2010 9

Project Management Project 2-Executive Education Site Redesign Focus was exclusively on Executive Education’s goals Training and knowledge transfer were deliverables on project plan Agile project methodology Milestones were agreed to collaboratively Approach for solutions were signed off on prior to coding Executive Education tested and approved deliverables throughout project lifecycle 10

Customer Engagement Conducted three 8 hour on site training sessions for EE marketing Met bi-weekly in person to determine training needs and ways to improve workflow Based training off information gathered in meetings, tailored trainings to the customer’s workflow Worked with SharePoint out of the box enabled rapid prototyping of workflow changes Created Transparency: Kept customer knowledgeable and heavily involved in the requirements gathering process Used Agile approach by listening and adapting to the customer as the project progressed, ability to adjust as needed 11

SharePoint Out of the Box Functionality 12

Executive Education Admin Tools 13

Edit A Program 14

Edit Sessions 15

Document Library 16

Pending Edits Screen 17

FAQ List – Storing Questions and Answers 18

Customer Perspective Ownership between both ITG and EE Inclusive Team Dynamic Willingness to let down defenses to build good chemistry Daily stand-ups and weekly meetings supported real-time communication facilitated the smooth project flow Coding Best Practice Documentation Established standard of excellence for all developers on the team Provided the customer with a high-level of confidence for the deliverables Transparency Challenges elevated to the team-level, not left for discussion within only the impacted group Alternative ideas for processes and resolutions solicited and discussed with merit 19

Customer Perspective The EE Marketing Approach Project Schedule Persistent close monitoring with a keen eye on dependencies Limited deliverables slippage and avoided surprises Shared Learning Reciprocal learning between departments: EE process and ITG application knowledge Collaboration to identify training scenarios provided solid foundation to write training documentation Local desk-top training sessions allowed comfort level to EE and process insight for ITG 20

Lessons Learned Regular communication both internally and externally created opportunities for agile decision making Upgrading to SP2010 prior to the site redesign gave customer a chance to ease into the new user interface enhancements A deep understanding of the customer’s needs allowed the team to use the SharePoint out of the box functionality to meet goals without the use of custom code Face to face meetings proved to be extremely effective, particularly when arriving at solutions Recognizing that when content and code are involved quality is always a key driver for success 21

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