Chapter 24. Governing the SharePoint 2010 Ecosystem

Managing any software product takes time and energy, but few software products provide the number of tools and allow for the same range of interactivity with end users and their data and ideas as the SharePoint product line. With many software products, the work is mostly done when the servers are built and the software installed and working. But with SharePoint 2010 (and previous versions), it can be said that the work is just beginning when the environment is configured and in use.

Of course, SharePoint 2010 can be locked down so that a very limited number of users can add documents, use My Site sites, or add items to lists, but then the value of what is at heart a set of collaboration tools diminishes. At the other end of the spectrum, allowing complete freedom to all users to create sites, delete sites, and leverage every tool in the SharePoint 2010 arsenal would most likely lead to a state of anarchy where users would have little faith in security and stability of the environment.

The term governance in the context of SharePoint 2010 includes concepts of maintenance of the hardware and software that supports the tools, but is more focused on creating and enforcing policies, rules of conduct and the process of understanding “what’s going on” in the environment. This chapter discusses governance from a high conceptual and process-oriented level, while giving examples of specific SharePoint 2010 tools and components that should be included in the governance plan, many of which are covered in other chapters of this book in greater detail.

Ultimately, this chapter shares strategies and tools to consider for defining a governance plan for a SharePoint 2010 environment that any sized or shaped company should consider and helps provide impetus to get started on the road to effective governance.