Comic Style to Explain Process

As I sat back to gazed at all the nonsense I scribbled, I thought, "how can I put all of this in a single document WITHOUT it becoming a 20-pager that people would just gloss over?" The answer was pretty simple. I would keep everything on one page - the same tabloid sized page that I was using for my doodles. But I still had a story to tell so the comic approach kept on jumping out at me as the way to go.

Sample Security Model

Being a SharePoint Business Analyst

As a SharePoint Evangelist, you preach that SharePoint is the Alpha and Omega. The truth of the matter is that it will not solve everything, but then again, what does? Outside of the quick wins, SharePoint remains a strong alternative for automating the inefficient processes that are in place. The dangers of this is that client grow to assume that SharePointcan do simply what it was not meant to do. Your challenge is to provide a solution whereby SharePoint's out-of-the-box features can accommodate for 70% of the functionality - you can use your creativity to push it to more than that. But for the sake of this example, I have set it to roughly about 70% in the diagram below. The other 20% can be achieved through, policies, guidelines and manual processes that occur before it reaches the SharePoint solution.

About

It can be difficult to navigate through the murk and the mire of the web. Deciding on which technology to use and whether or not it can scale with your business is a difficult decision for even the most tech-savvy CIO. PT Designs, LLC (PTD) can be the light to show the way.

Guarantee Profits – relaunched. GP 6.0

4 days after I got the login info from Dreamhost, Guaranteeprofits.com is LIVE! The site is leaps and bounds above anything I've ever produced. Wikinomics was right. I tapped into everyone else's resources. WordPress 100% open source. Even down to the theme of Guarantee Profits. I only had to do minimal changes to widgets and images. Everything else was just a matter of migrating.

Minor Brand Refresh

2 months ago

by tpham211 in Design

I’m just gearing up for 2012. In 2012, well, starting right now, why wait?, I am repositioning PT Designs. I am repositioning PT Designs to be a User-Centered Design Consulting Firm. I am hiring a few people, training them in the art of UX and refreshing company collateral.

This includes a minor website refresh and some new business cards. Also in the company strategy, more useful and more frequent posts to reach out the user community. Promise. (more…)

Comic Style to Explain Process

9 months ago

by tpham211 in Design, Process, SharePoint

Recently, I was tasked to put together a document to explain the provisioning process for interdepartmental site creation (creating sub-sites in a SharePoint Publishing Site). This document was to be a quick guide for site requestors to understand the process and provide guidelines.

To begin, I reviewed the notes of the meeting and started to doodle on a tabloid sized paper. The doodles were ideas I wanted to convey. I thought of all the commonly asked questions and wanted to come up with a way to answer them using diagrams, icons and images. (more…)

business analyst collaboration sites Design diagram documentation SharePoint site provisioning solution

Sample Security Model

10 months ago

by tpham211 in Governance, Permissions, Security Model, SharePoint

I was lucky enough in my illustrious SharePoint career to have managed the SharePoint Helpline [sarcasm intended]. I can confidently say that more than two-thirds of our problem tickets are permissions-related. You don’t have to manage the Customer Relations Management team to take my word for it. Being a basic SharePoint Administrator will get you close enough to feel the annoyance that permeates from SharePoint site permissions.

Gather around younglings. Though I won’t solve your permission problems, I will share with you how I navigate these murky waters. (more…)

business analyst collaboration sites Design diagram documentation out-of-the-box permissions SharePoint site provisioning

SharePoint Out-of-the-Box Solution Approach

1 year ago

by tpham211 in SharePoint

I manage a team of business analysts that support users and power users.

We are slammed on a regular basis of requests that fit neatly in between support calls and software development projects.

Out-of-the-box Solutions in SharePoint do not need the lengthy Software Development Life Cycle process. But having managed software projects in the past, I recognize the importance of the governance that such a process brings.

Below are not some theoretical, in-a-perfect-world approach that we pretend to adhere to. Rather, they are actual steps that I oversee to manage the sanity levels of the short-staffed team I have in place.

Click to Enlarge

Keep fighting the good fight!

business analyst Design diagram documentation out-of-the-box SharePoint solution

Collaboration Sites vs. Publishing Sites

1 year ago

by tpham211 in SharePoint

Overview

From MSDN Blog: Clarifications: Collaboration vs. Publishing

In SharePoint-Land there are two concepts that people have a hard time separating out: “Collaboration” and “Content Management”. A lot of people like to blend them together, use methods, features, technology, or processes… but the truth is these are separate capabilities, and should be separately managed.

If you provision site creation within your department, you must understand the difference in the communication model.

Please take the time to read the above article to understand the dialogue that is needed to determine what communication model to use.

Understanding your communication model will make it that much easier to create and maintain your security model (the Departmental SharePoint Permissions Document). (more…)

collaboration sites permissions publishing sites SharePoint site provisioning

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