What does it mean when someone says SharePoint?

What is SharePoint?

We first started using SharePoint, this video was widely used to explain the 'idea' of SharePoint.

In recent years, there have been many additional tools added to the Office 365 that do some or part of this 'traditional' workload. This article introduces the common ways that people refer to SharePoint today.

SharePoint is a [cloud] file storage location

In this scenario, SharePoint is seen as an equivalents may be other Dropbox or Google Drive or replacement to a network drive or file share. SharePoint is a place to store stuff.

SharePoint is a product

When you click on the SharePoint Icon in the waffle, you go to SharePoint…the product.

What Does SharePoint allow you to do?

In its simplest it is a tool to create websites that are mostly visible to internal audiences. There are 2 main flavours, a Communication Site (Used to Tell a Story) or a Team Site (Used as a Collaboration Space).

Each site contains the following:

• Pages - Pages are places to publish words and pictures. A SharePoint page can also contain functionality by added a webparts that allow you to do something on a page (eg Display a Dashboard, contain a form).

• Files - Files are stored in libraries. You can have more than one library on each site, and you can put most files types in a library. There are also special kind of libraries available if you just want to organise photos for example.

• Data - stored in lists. Again there are special types you can use (eg contact lists, task lists, issue lists), you can have more than one list per site, the fields types and permissible values in a list can be defined. Each list automatically comes with 3 forms, (New Item, Edit, Display) and Fields types can be controlled changes in data, can trigger things to happen.

SharePoint is a content service

There are other Office 365 products that utilise SharePoint 'infrastructure' to provide make them run.

• OneDrive is built on SharePoint and is a personal space for each user

• Microsoft Stream uses SharePoint to store it's video

• Microsoft Teams create SharePoint TeamSites and uses them to store channel files, and wiki files

SharePoint is a platform (within the Office 365 platform)

One of SharePoint's strengths and weaknesses is that you can do anything with it. Basic to complex scenarios can be solved. In the document storage scenario for example, the platform allows more sophisticated control on versions, approvals, prescribed information types (eg a contract always uses a particular template), smart ways to filter the information that isn't folder based, all the way to formal records management.

SharePoint is a development platform

SharePoint can be used to build custom solutions on utilising programmers and code, although this is no longer as popular as it used to be.

Why is this important?

From a client point of view, there is always more in the platform that allows you to do and where a client is in their journey. It's worth listening to what the problem they are trying to solve is, and how they are thinking and what they may need next. From a adoption point of view, there is a range of staff competencies that can be developed to empower staff in each of the scenarios.