How to Increase SharePoint End User Adoption

Kim Lund — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 13:53:00 GMT

Depending on who you are in your organization, you may either LOVE SharePoint or HATE it. There are many promises on what SharePoint will deliver; however, have those promises become a reality in your organization? The answer may be the key to why your colleagues, employees, and end users use SharePoint or create work-arounds to avoid taking the time to understand it.

If you find that user adoption of SharePoint is avoided or slower than anticipated in your working environment, you are not alone. Many students that I have trained, consulted and listened to have expressed their pain points for SharePoint adoption. As I am blessed to work with and interact with many SharePoint users I have discovered and witnessed what works and what doesn't for successfully increasing people's use, acceptance, knowledge and confidence of SharePoint.

Pain Points

Some of the Pain Points I've heard expressed as it relates to slow user adoption are:

Employees Unaware of Powerful SharePoint Features
SharePoint Deployed Without Governance
User Community Not Involved in Planning SharePoint Site Use
End Users Expected to Create or Manage SharePoint Sites
Inefficient Use of Document Management Features
Uncertainty that Confidential Information is Secure
Added Training Needs Burden Staff
SharePoint Training Not Based on End User Needs
Help Desk Unable to Answer SharePoint Questions
Change in Organizational Culture Required for SharePoint to Be Accepted

How to

The key to overcoming these pain points and increasing end user adoption of SharePoint and achieving better buy-in from users at large is to develop a plan that includes:

Governance planning that includes:
- Key members from various business units - not just IT
- Focus on the vision and long-range goals
- Ability to adapt to changes in requirements
- Relevancy to needs of the organization
Taxonomy planning that includes:
- Governance team that will own and manage the taxonomy
- Classification of information according to categories
- Focus on the business, not on SharePoint
Communication plan that includes:
- What SharePoint is
- Governance and taxonomies for use in SharePoint
- Building excitement for what SharePoint will be able to do in their environment
- How it fits into the existing ecosystem of technologies
- What it might be replacing
- Discovering and building SharePoint advocates
A training plan that provides succinct training that:
- Focuses on the needs of individual users
- Available when needed
- Holds users accountable
- Teaches the technical "how-to" about SharePoint
- Shares the reasons and best practices for using SharePoint
- Incentivizes employees
- Provides key competency certifications that encourage and build confidence when key concepts are mastered

If any of these important steps are missing in a SharePoint adoption plan, you will find that the effectiveness of the other steps will be less. For example, if you have not provided governance and have a poor taxonomy plan, use of SharePoint will be inconsistent. When this occurs, even if users receive useful training, there will be confusion about the proper use of SharePoint features. Even if governance and taxonomy planning has been completed but this information is not communicated to employees, there will still be confusion and inconsistency with the use of SharePoint. Lastly, if you have planned for proper governance and taxonomy, communicated to your employees that SharePoint is coming, but then fail to train employees, end users will not know how to utilize the new features provided by SharePoint.

For this reason, in order to receive the anticipated return on investment (ROI) of a SharePoint deployment, the key for success in usability and user adoption is tied closely to implementing a plan that includes governance and taxonomy, communication to employees, and relevant training.

First Get Help!

If you think the suggestions included in the previous section are a tall order, you are right. You are probably not staffed to handle all of the steps that are recommended and you likely do not have the SharePoint expertise in-house to accomplish this plan. Mindsharp has the expertise, services, and products to help you implement all four key areas mentioned above. The biggest struggle for any company is a well thought out, effective training plan that meets the needs of the end user population.

That is why we developed UserVersity to deliver an end-to-end turnkey SharePoint communication and training program. We work with your staff to compliment the talent you have in-house, and then provide expertise in areas you may not have. UserVersity provides communication tools and a variety of training tools including:

Adoption Manager
E-learning
Online or in person instructor-led training
Quizzes
Certifications
Incentives and motivation for employees you would like to target

We are excited to be the first to offer such a flexible solution that encompasses all of your needs and provides a customized approach to training.

If you would like to learn more about this you can also attend a free 30 minute webinar about Increasing End User Adoption and about our UserVersity program. Please check out our website at http://www.mindsharp.com/Default.aspx?top=TRAINING&left=END_USER_ADOPTION

The following chart summarizes how Mindsharp and UserVersity can assist organizations when dealing with one or many of the pain points highlighted in this paper.

Pain Point	How Mindsharp Can Help
Pain Point 1: Employees Unaware of Powerful SharePoint Features	Mindsharp's UserVersity provides a communication plan that informs users about the key SharePoint features. Our communication plan includes e-mail templates, posters, and additional resources as requested.
Pain Point 2: SharePoint Deployed Without Governance	Mindsharp has SharePoint experts that can guide your governance and taxonomy planning or provide you with resources to assist your team in planning these important components.
Pain Point 3: User Community Not Involved in Planning SharePoint Site Use	Mindsharp can help obtain feedback about who should be part of the team that develops your SharePoint governance and taxonomy plans.
Pain Point 4: End Users Expected to Create or Manage SharePoint Sites	Mindsharp's UserVersity includes training in various formats that provides end users with the information they need to create and manage sites.
Pain Point 5: Inefficient Use of Document Management Features	Mindsharp's UserVersity provides training on correct document management including topics such as: Creating and saving documents Adding metadata Searching Collaborating Using check in and check out Version history Users can choose training that meets their needs and fits into their busy schedule.
Pain Point 6: Uncertainty that Confidential Information is Secure	Mindsharp's UserVersity provides training for end users on the topic of security. We provide thorough coverage on how SharePoint security works, as well as how to add or remove users from the SharePoint groups and permission levels. Users will gain confidence that they are securing their content appropriately.
Pain Point 7: Added Training Needs Burden Staff	Mindsharp's UserVersity provides an adoption manager that guides you through the program so you can make training decisions confidently. The advantage is that you are working with a SharePoint expert with years of training experience.
Pain Point 8: SharePoint Training Not Based on End User Needs	Mindsharp's UserVersity is structured to provide specific training for every role and function in your organization to ensure competency in appropriate SharePoint functionality. UserVersity provides over 90 different lessons that simplify SharePoint by breaking training into six key functional competencies. This allows end users to focus on the aspects of SharePoint that relate to them currently, and then grow into other areas as their use and knowledge of SharePoint expands. Training can be repeated when knowledge of a skill needs to be refreshed or reinforced.
Pain Point 9: Help Desk Unable to Answer SharePoint Questions	Mindsharp's UserVersity provides multiple ways to assist your Help Desk including: Mindsharp has the leading SharePoint experts on staff who can answer questions from your Help Desk employees. UserVersity has help desk crash courses to provide your IT and Help Desk staff with a thorough understanding of SharePoint. The Help Desk can refer employees to specific computer-based training modules that address the user's problem. This is another way to provide the needed help without the Help Desk employee guiding users through each step.
Pain Point 10: Change in Organizational Culture Required for SharePoint to Be Accepted	Training with Mindsharp's UserVersity helps users understand the value of using SharePoint functionality. It goes beyond showing the "how" to teach the best practices and answer the "whys" in SharePoint. This approach helps increase end-user adoption and satisfaction.

Summary

SharePoint is one of the fastest growing corporate technologies on the market today. In fact, SharePoint has surpassed anticipated sales within Microsoft but has the frequency of its use in your organization surpassed expectations? Just because your organization has deployed SharePoint does not mean it is being used successfully.

I have identified some of the reasons end user adoption of SharePoint is slow in companies and offered ways to change that slow adoption. If companies create a SharePoint adoption plan that meets end user needs, SharePoint will be a tool they depend on to work smarter and faster.