Orange County STC Newsletter www.stc.org October 2011 Vol. 50, No. 10 How to Encourage Good Use of SharePoint By David Dick, STC Fellow M any organizations are adopting Microsoft SharePoint as a content management system and view it as a low-cost alternative to a high-end content management system. Just because an organization has SharePoint, however, doesn’t mean that everyone is aware of its availability. Likewise, just because it’s available doesn’t mean everyone will use it. The paradox is that nobody knows how to win user acceptance and how to transition users from maintaining documents on desktops and shared drives to SharePoint. I faced these problems when I took the initiative to transition my cowork- ers from maintaining documentation on a shared drive to SharePoint. The transition was mostly to my benefit because it would centralize documenta- tion and enhance collaboration. This article describes my efforts to encourage good use of SharePoint, and the lessons learned. Opportunity for Change I recognized the opportunity for change when I saw my coworkers’ situa- tion. Multiple versions of a document were stored on individual desktops • and on a network/shared drive. The owners of the documents usu- ally had the latest version, but not always. Documentation reviews involved emailing a document to several • people who returned them with markups. Electronic versions of the document had distinctive file names to denote who made the changes. Occasionally, documents were deleted from the shared drive. Re- • covering the document meant asking the help desk to restore the file from the previous backup. Restoration of the document was not a priority for the help desk. Folders on the shared drive were listed by project name and subfold- • ers named by categories such as user guide, system design docu- ment, and project charter. The latest version was not always in the folder—it could be on anyone’s desktop. Documents on the shared drive were not indexed, which compli- • cated finding them using a search tool. The shared drive did not support version history, which encouraged • saving every document with a version number. The shared drive was not accessible to coworkers who worked off- • site. Introducing new technologies into the workplace involves change, and people aren’t always open to change. SharePoint could easily solve the above problems if I could convince coworkers to try it. This Issue: How to Encourage Good Use of SharePoint 1 President’s Message 2 Next Meeting 3 October Meeting Information 3 Editor’s Desk 4 September Meeting Review 6 Society Pages 7 OCSTC Employment Information 7 Sponsors’ Corner 8 Orange Slice— Calendar of Events 8 Continued on Page 5 >
Transcript
Orange County STC Newsletter
www.stc.org October 2011 Vol. 50, No. 10
How to Encourage Good Use of SharePointBy David Dick, STC Fellow
Many organizations are adopting Microsoft SharePoint as a content management system and view it as a low-cost alternative to a high-end
content management system. Just because an organization has SharePoint, however, doesn’t mean that everyone is aware of its availability. Likewise, just because it’s available doesn’t mean everyone will use it. The paradox is that nobody knows how to win user acceptance and how to transition users from maintaining documents on desktops and shared drives to SharePoint.
I faced these problems when I took the initiative to transition my cowork-ers from maintaining documentation on a shared drive to SharePoint. The transition was mostly to my benefit because it would centralize documenta-tion and enhance collaboration. This article describes my efforts to encourage good use of SharePoint, and the lessons learned.
Opportunity for ChangeI recognized the opportunity for change when I saw my coworkers’ situa-tion.
Multiple versions of a document were stored on individual desktops • and on a network/shared drive. The owners of the documents usu-ally had the latest version, but not always.
Documentation reviews involved emailing a document to several • people who returned them with markups. Electronic versions of the document had distinctive file names to denote who made the changes.
Occasionally, documents were deleted from the shared drive. Re-• covering the document meant asking the help desk to restore the file from the previous backup. Restoration of the document was not a priority for the help desk.
Folders on the shared drive were listed by project name and subfold-• ers named by categories such as user guide, system design docu-ment, and project charter. The latest version was not always in the folder—it could be on anyone’s desktop.
Documents on the shared drive were not indexed, which compli-• cated finding them using a search tool.
The shared drive did not support version history, which encouraged • saving every document with a version number.
The shared drive was not accessible to coworkers who worked off-• site.
Introducing new technologies into the workplace involves change, and people aren’t always open to change. SharePoint could easily solve the above problems if I could convince coworkers to try it.
This Issue:
How to Encourage Good Use of SharePoint 1
President’s Message 2
Next Meeting 3
October Meeting Information 3
Editor’s Desk 4
September Meeting Review 6
Society Pages 7
OCSTC Employment Information 7
Sponsors’ Corner 8
Orange Slice— Calendar of Events 8
Continued on Page 5 >
2 • October 2011
President’s MessageBy Michael Opsteegh, OCSTC President
Every OCSTC president enters his or her term with
an agenda (and goals for the very ambitious) for the year. Past goals have included building up chapter reserve funds, instituting a chapter library, and overhauling our web site. My goal for this year is to encourage every council member to evaluate the duties of his or her posi-
tion and eliminate processes that yield few results, streamline those processes that provide the most ben-efit to our members, and think of ways to collaborate more effectively.
In addition to streamlining our jobs, making our-selves more agile and responsive to our members, and reducing the demands on our personal time, we have adopted tools to enable us to collaborate more effec-tively in real time. One of the tools we have adopted is Google Apps. Google Apps is an online suite of ap-plications that allows us to send mail, chat, and share documents. Google Apps also offers a number of other features that the council can leverage over time.
The net effect of streamlining our jobs and using new tools has several benefits. Most obviously, these initiatives reduce the burden on our volunteer council. Their jobs are easier and the demands on their per-sonal time have been reduced. These initiatives benefit you because our council can focus more on your needs rather than on processes that keep the chapter running.
Finally, these initiatives benefit you in another way. Since we’ve invested the time into streamlining the various functions of the council, your job will be easier when you serve. As a member of the council, you will spend fewer hours a month giving back to your profession and community while remaining just as effective and influential. Think about that if the nominating committee calls you soon asking if you’d like to volunteer. If you do, you’ll be getting more bang for your buck.
If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, see me at the next chapter meeting of email me at [email protected].
Chapter Contacts
OCSTC P.O. Box 28751 Santa Ana, CA 92799-8751
Web site: http://www.ocstc.org
Administrative CouncilPresident, Michael Opsteegh, [email protected]
Directions to the DoubleTree Club HotelMap of the I-405 and SR-55 area. The star below indi-cates the hotel location. Parking is FREE.
If you would like to receive email notifications about upcoming OCSTC meetings, visit www.ocstc.org and sign up for our mailing list.
This list broadcasts only meeting notices and STC announcements
October Meeting InformationAbout the PresentationJoin us Tuesday, October 18, and listen to Rebecca Lyles discuss the relationship between project management and technical communication. She’ll share with us her views on
how project management and technical communication can and do work together, •
what applies and what doesn’t, and•
what you can expect from PMP certification and her assessment of how it might help technical commu-• nicators.
She’ll also share how to take the best from both worlds.
About the PresenterRebecca is the manager for IBM Software Group (ECM Sales Performance) at the Costa Mesa office. She has a rich educational background including a BA from Purdue University along with 24 postbaccalaureate units in piano performance and electrical engineering from California State University, Fresno. She’s a certified Pro-gram Management Professional (PMP) along with a certificate in Lean Six Sigma.
4 • October 2011
Publication PoliciesTechniScribe is published 11 to 12 times a year as a benefit to the members of the Orange County Chapter of the Society for Technical Communi-cation. The goal of the publication is to reflect the interests, needs, and objectives of OCSTC members. TechniScribe strives to be an advocate for, and an inspiration to, technical communicators by keeping them connected to each other and to opportunities for professional growth.
Articles published in this newsletter may be re-printed in other STC publications if permission is obtained from the author, credit is properly given, and one copy of the reprint is sent to the TechniScribe managing editor.
Submission InformationThe editorial team retains and exercises the right to edit submitted and requested material for clar-ity, length, and appropriateness.
When submitting material, please remember to:
Include a 25-word biography about yourself.•
Send articles in Word (doc, docx), Rich-Text • Format (RTF), ASCII (txt), or in the body of an email message.
Send material to the managing editor • (techni [email protected]) five weeks before the date it will be published.
Editor’s DeskBy Jennifer Gardelle, TechniScribe Managing Editor
In answer to Michael Op-steegh’s article this month, I
want to go over some changes that I’d like to see in the Techni Scribe.
One huge change has already taken place—we no longer print and mail copies of the newsletter. It’s available only online. We’ve had the online option for years, but it was
time to move solely online.
This was, of course, a huge decision. Many people said they preferred to receive a printed copy, so we weren’t sure how people would feel if we stopped. There came a point, however, when we just had to make the decision to cut the print version. I didn’t hear any complaints after the change, so I hope this means you’re are happy with this change, or at least used to it.
The next change I’d like to see a blog format added to the newsletter. Blogs can be interactive. For example, we can allow commenting at the end of each article, which would make the newsletter richer. We could also include multimedia content on the blog, which could really add a punch to the TechniScribe.
Finally, I would like to see someone else take over the newsletter. I’ve had a great time managing it, and part of me will be sad to let it go. To keep things fresh and interesting, however, I feel it’s time for a change (not only for me, but for the TechniScribe). I believe that an occasional changing of the guard also brings about positive changes.
I’m hoping the new blog format (once we make the change) will make volunteering to take over really ap-pealing to one of you out there.
Please contact me at [email protected] if you’re at all interested in taking over as managing editor, and I’d be happy to answer any questions you might have.
Did you know that shopping at Amazon.com is not only a great place to find books and other items?
It’s also a great way to give back to the OCSTC! The next time you shop at Amazon, please access the
site via OCSTC.org. Amazon donates a percentageof your purchase to the chapter.
Skeptics and ProponentsWhile navigating the corporate intranet, I discov-ered that somebody had already tried to introduce SharePoint in 2007 and created SharePoint sites for several projects and divi-sions. Most of those sites, however, were either under construction, dormant, or contained a few documents of little value for establish-ing a presence. How could a potentially valuable tool be so underused?
Three factors contributed to the lack of interest in SharePoint:
SharePoint didn’t have the support of man-• agement to champion its use.
Management didn’t have a rollout strategy.•
Users weren’t taught how to use SharePoint.•
I never aspired to evangelize for SharePoint through-out the organization, only to one small group: my coworkers.
I discussed the use of SharePoint with my project team leader who, fortunately for me, was willing to discuss improvements for documentation manage-ment. If SharePoint could satisfy his expectations, he was willing to consider it. This story could have easily ended here if the team leader were against trying something new; however, he became a champion for change.
The SharePoint system administrator gave me full control of the SharePoint site that was created for the project. Following the guidelines from Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Best Practices, I enhanced the site with SharePoint’s out-of-the-box templates such as calendars, announcements, and documenta-tion libraries. I then introduced the new project site to my coworkers at our weekly team meeting and did a walkthrough of the features and functions.
Corporate policy required that the project’s home page be accessible throughout the organization, but my supervisor didn’t agree. She didn’t want external audiences to view documents, calendars, and an-nouncements. SharePoint makes it possible to restrict access at every level of the site. Over time, she agreed to allow selected parts of the home page to be visible to external audiences.
Access control and user privileges were an important concern of managers. Best practice suggested assign-
How to Encourage Good Use of SharePoint< Continued from Page 1
ing individuals to user groups. The SharePoint system administer created user groups for owner, manager, contributor, and reader. The highest level of access was site owner, and the lowest level of access was reader. When I proved that adequate control was established, my role evolved from being the custodian of the SharePoint site to maintaining the site and pro-moting best practices.
I provided individual training on how to use Share-Point, which helped to alleviate anxiety my cowork-ers had from using SharePoint in the past. I provided my coworkers with a quick reference card for using SharePoint. I offered to be the point of contact for all concerns, complaints, and problems with SharePoint. My supervisor agreed that familiarity with SharePoint would be part of everyone’s job description. Within six months, my coworkers became acquainted with basic features and functions, and I received fewer requests to help them.
The SharePoint Project Site TodayOur project’s SharePoint site has evolved into a dash-board and became an integral part of project commu-nication:
The home page has two calendars: one to • track absences and meetings and another to track developers who are on-call and when new software releases are ready for produc-tion.
Important links to web sites and documents • on the corporate intranet are accessible from our SharePoint home page.
We send links to documents instead of attach-• ing documents to emails.
When we conduct peer reviews, peer review-• ers checkout a document, enter comments, check a document back in, and inform the next person that the document is ready for review. We use the SharePoint reporting tool to track the progress of peer reviews.
Microsoft Office products seamlessly interface with SharePoint. For the interface to work, however, the organization must be running SharePoint 2007 and Microsoft Office 2007 and above. My employer runs Microsoft Office 2003 and SharePoint 2007, which aren’t compatible. As soon as the organization up-grades to Microsoft Office 2010, I will train coworkers on how to take advantage of SharePoint’s ability to interface with PowerPoint, Outlook, Word, and Excel.
Lessons LearnedIn my quest to transition my coworkers to SharePoint, I learned a few lessons.
Continued on Page 6 >
6 • October 2011
Introducing a new technology to the work-• place involves change, and not everyone welcomes change—so be prepared to address stakeholders concerns and issues.
An important step towards winning user • acceptance and encouraging proper use is to train users on fundamentals and good prac-tices to avert bad habits from forming.
To encourage user acceptance, always be • prepared to help users.
SharePoint isn’t always properly implemented and maintained, which results in significantly slow re-sponse times during peak use and frequent system crashes—none of which you have control of. Conse-quently, people quickly lose trust in SharePoint and revert to a traditional and reliable way of working: maintaining documents on desktops and saving docu-ments on shared drives. This situation fuels the skep-tics that SharePoint isn’t a reliable tool so be prepared to address these issues and concerns when they occur.
SharePoint is more than a platform for a web site, file repository, blogs, and wikis. In the hands of an experienced SharePoint system administrator, the out-of-the-box features can be tailored into a myriad of business solutions that will enhance communication and collaboration.
Recommended Reading and ResourcesMicrosoft offers free introductory SharePoint training courses. Each course includes video lessons, a quiz (not scored), and a print-able quick reference card. See http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint-server-help/take-sharepoint-server-2010-training-
at-your-desk-HA101859255.aspx.
SharePoint for Dummies is written for technical and nontechnical audiences on how to install and manage a SharePoint portal.
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Best Practices presents proven techniques for designing, deploying, operating, and optimizing Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. This book isn’t intended for novice users, but it’s well written, and a helpful resource to under-stand the anatomy of SharePoint.
David is a member of the Washington, D.C. Chapter and works as a contractor for a government agency in Northern Virginia. David is editor of Usability Interface; newsletter of the User and User Experience community. David Dick can be reached at [email protected].
How to Encourage Good Use of SharePoint< Continued from Page 5
September Meeting ReviewBy S. Travis Wilson
The September meeting presentation was all about assessing our corporate value and making sure your
company is aware of it. Jack Molisani was originally scheduled to give his presentation “Assessing Your Corporate Value,” but owing to a scheduling conflict, he asked Bonni Graham Gonzalez to take his place. Bonni modified Jack’s presentation and expanded it to “Assessing and Increasing Your Corporate Value.”
She began her talk by saying, “Nothing is true until you try it and see that it is true for you.” That is, all infor-mation can work, but not all of it will work in all situ-ations. She encouraged us to assess our own situation and try the solution that seemed best. Making mistakes is part of the process. Learning from those mistakes cre-ates the wisdom to not make the same mistakes again.
The presentation was split into three parts: a definition of value, how to assess it, and how to increase it.
She gave the dictionary definition of value and then ex-panded it into two distinct types: actual and perceived. While actual value can be backed up with statistics and makes the powers that be happy, perceived value is in-tegral to being a part of a company team. And you need both types to advance in your company.
Assessing your value works with both types. Actual value is a matter of metrics. How do you affect the bottom line? What are the bean counters and corpo-rate heads going to appreciate? Perceived value, on the other hand, involves knowing what soft skills you bring to the table. How do you solve the problems that keep others awake at night? How do you get invited to be a part of the team that finishes projects, not just as-signed to key projects? Knowing your perceived value is usually based on your effect on others.
Once you assess your value, how do you increase it? Actual value often increases as a by-product of increas-ing perceived value. If your perceived value puts you into the creative process earlier, you’ll have more time to affect the decisions that will increase actual value. Increased perceived value increases opportunities and increasing perceived value comes with a willingness to solve the problems that others find difficult. Make someone else’s job easier by offering to assist wherever possible. This will increase your actual value, and you might learn new skills to solve tough problems. In-creased knowledge is a way to increase actual value.
The end of the presentation was the support for infor-mation. The quantitative support was presented and discussed. The qualitative support received less empha-sis, not for a lack of value, but rather because many of the examples were presented alongside the main body of the presentation.
OCSTC Employment InformationGo to http://twitter.com/STCSoCal, where you’ll find employment and general information about the San Diego and Orange County chapters.
InquiriesIf you have an inquiry, email our employment manager, Betsy Malone, at [email protected].
Society-Level Job ListingsSTC maintains job listings on the Internet. You can download the listings from the STC web site at http://jobs.
stc.org.
October 2011 • 7
Society Pages
STC Mission StatementSTC advances the theory and practice of technical communication across all user abilities and all media.
Positioning StatementSTC helps you design effective communication for a technical world through information sharing and industry leadership.
The Society for Technical Communication (STC) is the world’s largest organization for technical com-municators.
Its members include writers, editors, illustrators, printers, publishers, photographers, educators, and students.
Dues are $75–395 per year. Membership is open to anyone engaged in some phase of technical communi-cation, interested in the arts and sciences of technical communication, and in allied arts and sciences.
Society for Technical Communication 9401 Lee Highway, Suite 300 Fairfax, VA 22031-1803
703.522.4114 (voice); http://www.stc.org
TechniScribe Copyright and Trademark StatementOCSTC invites writers to submit articles that they wish to be considered for publication. Authors retain copyright to their work and implicitly grant a license to this newsletter to publish the work once online for an indefinite period of time. In your cover letter, please let the editor know if this article has appeared elsewhere, and if it has been submitted for consider-ation to other publications.
Some articles might refer to companies or products whose names are covered by a trademark or regis-tered trademark. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Reference to a specific product does not constitute an endorsement of the product by OCSTC or by STC.
ColophonTechniScribe is written using Microsoft Word, and laid out using Adobe InDesign CS3 for Macintosh. Gill Sans and Palatino Linotype are used for heading and text fonts. PDFs are produced using Adobe Acrobat Professional 8.
TechniScribe relies on the following editorial refer-ences for style: American Heritage Dictionary, Chicago Manual of Style, and Words into Type.
Author-it Software Corporation (ASC) is a world leader in enterprise software for authoring, content management, publishing, and localization. Its flagship product, Author-it Enterprise Authoring Platform (EAP), is a user-friendly software solution providing everything you need to author, manage, publish and deliver documentation. ASC has offices in San Jose and Newport Beach, California, Dubai, UAE, Sydney, Australia and Auckland, New Zealand.
Author-it Software Corporation | www.author-it.com | USA - Newport Beach CA 92660 Tel: +1 888 999 1021 | Australia - Sydney NSW 2000 Tel: 1800 650 895 New Zealand - Auckland Tel: +64 9 915 5070 | Middle East and India - Dubai Tel: +971 4 311 6779 | One Source. One Solution
Author-it Software Corporation (ASC) is a world leader in enterprise software for authoring, content manage-ment, publishing, and localization. Its flagship product, Author-it Enterprise Authoring Platform (EAP), is a user-friendly software solution providing everything you need to author, manage, publish and deliver documentation. ASC has offices in San Jose and Newport Beach, California; Dubai, UAE; Sydney, Australia; and Auckland, New Zealand.
roundpeg offers consulting, web development, and training services to both individuals and corporations, focused primarily on Adobe products. Started in San Francisco 15 years ago, roundpeg now offers classes in Newport Beach, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Santa Clara.
As Adobe’s largest training partner on the west coast, roundpeg sees training as not only a separate service, but strives to support the client through the entire lifecycle of a project. The firm prides itself on its small class sizes—often no more than six participants—in order to provide the kind of one-on-one training often needed when students are learning high-tech or complex software applications. In addition to on-site classes, instruc-tion is available via e-learning. All instructors are Adobe certified.
Special thanks to Author-it and roundpeg, OCSTC’s new sponsors!
8 • October 2011
Orange Slice: Calendar of EventsDate Event Location Time
October 18OCSTC Chapter MeetingRebecca Lyles, “Project Management from a Document Perspective”
DoubleTree Club Hotel, 7 Hutton Centre Dr., Santa Ana, CA, 92707, 714.751.2400 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
November 1 OCSTC Council Meeting Airport Executive Suites, Irvine 6 p.m.-7 p.m.
November 15 OCSTC Holiday Party DoubleTree Club Hotel, 7 Hutton Centre Dr., Santa Ana, CA, 92707, 714.751.2400 6 p.m.-9 p.m.
December 6 OCSTC Council Meeting Airport Executive Suites, Irvine 6 p.m.-7 p.m.
December No meeting Enjoy the holiday! See you in January.
