Client Director
Prefer to speak to us about getting policy storage right in SharePoint? Book a short call with one of our team to get answers to your questions.
(If you’re at the planning stage, you may also find our pricing on SharePoint projects useful.)
Rolling out Microsoft SharePoint can completely transform how your organisation collaborates, manages documents, and communicates. But without a clear plan, the very flexibility that makes SharePoint powerful can also make it confusing.
In our consulting experience, a common mistake is treating SharePoint like a file server or a simple cloud storage tool such as Dropbox. Organisations often:
The result? A disorganised digital workspace where people revert to old habits, emailing attachments, saving duplicates on desktops, or working outside the platform because it isn’t obvious where to store or find information.
SharePoint should make information easier to find, not harder. Yet when organisations contact us, we see the same seven mistakes again and again. Here’s how to avoid them - and set yourself up for effective information management and AI adoption.
SharePoint can handle a lot: team collaboration, document management, internal comms, even process automation. The mistake? Trying to cram all of that into one site. Take HR as an example:
Each of these serves a different purpose, so each needs its own SharePoint site. Grouping related sites, by audience, into a Hub then gives you consistent navigation and search. For instance, an IT communications site and an HR communications site can both sit under a common Communications Hub aka your intranet.
When you blur these boundaries, you create problems: drafts mixed with approved documents, unclear permissions, and ultimately drives a lack of trust in the system.
Practical steps
1. Run a discovery workshop with business leads.
2. Identify your top three to five use cases: e.g. project workspaces, policy management, or employee communications.
3. Define who they serve and what outcomes they should deliver.
These priorities guide every decision about design, permissions, and governance. Most importantly, they give you boundaries so you don’t end up with a sprawling, confusing platform.
(See our case studies for real-world examples of how organisations define their SharePoint purpose.)
Mistake 2: Treating SharePoint like a file server
It may feel quick and easy but simply lifting and shifting folders into SharePoint usually creates more problems than it solves.
Folder structures rarely keep pace with how an organisation evolves. When you migrate them “as is” you also carry across outdated files and a tangle of historic permissions. The result is confusion and a lack of trust in the system.
SharePoint is not designed to mimic Windows Explorer, even though the OneDrive app helps with the transition. Its real value comes from clear permissions, relevant metadata, and automation. This allows users to save and surface content quickly and securely, rather than digging searching through folders.
Practical steps
1. Plan your information architecture before migrating anything.
2. Use a tool such as TreeView to map and understand your existing file structure.
3. Tidy up files before you move to SharePoint. (It never happens after.)
4. Group content by audience and function.
5. Decide what not to migrate. Removing ROT (redundant, outdated, trivial) content improves adoption and prepares you for Microsoft Copilot.
Collaboration and publishing both rely on Office documents, but that does not mean they belong in the same place.
The mistake is blurring the line between working documents and final content. Put drafts next to approved policies and people stop trusting either.
Think of it like this: a project team needs a private site for active collaboration, while HR needs a polished communication site for employees to read the final policy. Mixing the two makes both less effective.
Practical steps
1. Use Microsoft Teams-connected SharePoint sites for collaboration and dedicated Communication Sites for publishing.
2. Build clear ownership and approval steps so content moves smoothly from draft to published. Power Automate can help manage the publishing step.
Separating collaboration from publishing builds trust in content and cuts down on the constant question: “Is this the latest version?”
“Good SharePoint governance is like guardrails on a path — it keeps you safe and gives you the confidence to move faster.”
Governance may sound tedious, but without it SharePoint quickly spirals into chaos. If anyone can create sites or Teams without oversight, duplicates appear, abandoned spaces accrue, and empty sites multiply. Over time IT cannot tell what matters and what does not. Data shifts from being an asset to a liability, creating compliance risk and draining user productivity.
Effective governance does not have to be heavy-handed. Simple measures such as naming conventions (PRJ-Client-Project), clear ownership rules, and periodic reviews make a huge difference. We have developed tools to manage this, but if your volumes are low a simple manual approach can work too.
Practical steps
1. Set a clear process for new site creation.
2. Balance creation with end-of-life rules for sites.
3. Assign ownership for every site and Team.
4. Use reports to keep things in check: show owners, members, files stored, and last access. (See Mistake 7 for more on this.)
A technically perfect SharePoint site will still fail if people do not know how to use it. One of the biggest rollout mistakes is underestimating training. Too many teams assume users will “figure it out,” but habits from shared drives or older SharePoint setups are hard to break — and your new way of working may be very different.
Even experienced users benefit from a reset. Training is not just about features, it is about setting expectations and showing “this is how we work now.”
Practical steps
1. Build and budget for training as part of your rollout plan.
2. Run classroom-style sessions, can be via MS Teams, with hands-on exercises for best results.
3. Time training close to migration, ideally the week before.
4. Do not assume experienced users know the essentials. Cover sharing links, co-authoring, version history, and restoring content.
5. Reinforce learning with short video tutorials and “How to” pages on your intranet.
You can also tap into Microsoft’s adoption resources, which include ready-to-use templates and training materials.
Design freedom sounds fun. SharePoint lets each site owner customise layouts, colours, and navigation, but too much variation confuses users. When every department designs its site differently, people spend more time learning interfaces than finding information.
Consistency does not mean everything has to look identical. It means users can predict where things are and how to interact with them.
Practical steps
1. Create standard templates for common site types: department, project, and communication sites — including home pages and content layouts.
2. Share your brand guidelines with site owners so designs stay aligned, as you cannot lock everything down.
3. Review existing content regularly to make sure sites stay consistent.
A consistent experience makes SharePoint easier to use and strengthens your organisation’s identity and professionalism.
A successful SharePoint launch is only the beginning. Over time, content grows, people change roles, and Microsoft releases new features while retiring old ones. Without an ongoing plan, your environment will slowly lose relevance and trust.
Regular reviews help you stay ahead of clutter, storage issues, and permission drift. They also give you a chance to improve based on real user feedback. SharePoint should be treated as a living system that evolves with your organisation, not a one-and-done.
Practical steps
1. Have a trusted person or partner to turn to for guidance, avoids the quick fixes that risk damaging the quality of your solution.
2. Schedule quarterly reviews to archive inactive sites, remove obsolete documents, and validate permissions.
3. Track usage metrics to spot areas that need improvement and re-assign ownership to keep content fresh.
4. Stay up to date with new features and retirements by following Microsoft’s announcements.
5. Have an ongoing training capability so new starters and movers can understand how SharePoint is specifically designed for your organisation.
Want all this handled for you? Our SharePoint Success Service starts from £500 / US $650 per month and covers all of this, and includes Microsoft Teams, Loop and Copilot. Speak to us to find out more.
Start with purpose, add light governance, and commit to keeping it simple. Do that, and you’ll build a SharePoint environment that people trust, use, and genuinely value.
Usually not. Start with the content people actively use and high-value archives. Leave redundant or low-value data behind. A smaller, well-organised environment is faster, easier to manage, and cheaper to maintain.
OneDrive is personal storage for individual use. SharePoint is for teams, departments, and organisation-wide collaboration. Use OneDrive for personal information, SharePoint for organisation and published content.
Yes. Collaboration and communication are separate needs. Teams-connected SharePoint sites support working documents, while a Communication Site serves as your internal publishing hub for news, policies, and updates.
Enough to keep control without blocking progress. A lightweight governance model with naming rules, ownership, and review cycles usually works best. The goal is consistency, not bureaucracy.
Run core training just before go-live, then follow up with refreshers every few months. Keep it short, practical, and scenario based. Training isn’t a one-off event - it’s part of adoption.
Yes, Policy Express supports separate policy hubs for different jurisdictions, allowing country- or state-specific policies while maintaining central control.
Developing a similar system in-house would take weeks and significant salaried time. Policy Express offers an efficient, pre-built solution that reduces costs and speeds up deployment.
Absolutely. It supports delegated approvals, allowing a designated signatory to sign off on behalf of committees, simplifying multi-level approvals.
Client Director
Ask how we can help you:
Implement a centralised, accessible policy library for your team.
Streamline approval and attestation processes for compliance.
Enable easy tracking, feedback, and timely reviews with Policy Express.
Questions? We reply within a working day.
Or Book a call to speak to an expert.
Click through to see our other blog posts.
Utilising templates like Word Letterheads and PowerPoint Sales Proposals is essential for maintaining consistency in document creation. They help enforce branding guidelines, ensure legal compliance, and reduce friction for employees.
Within your organisation, a risk, a legal requirement or a standard has been identified, and it has been agreed that it should be addressed via a documented company policy. We can expand this approval requirement more broadly to Controlled Documents.
Policy awareness refers to the extent to which employees are informed about the existence and content of organisational policies and procedures.
