Week 1 - Improving Visibility [Custom Columns/Meta-Data, Filtered Views, Alerts and Notifications]
This is a seven week series that will give you a TON of tips on how you can use SharePoint to save time and money just by applying best practices that I have learned over the years. The good news is that no code is required, and no deep technical experience either! I will walk you through the steps each week, and I guarantee that if you’ve touched SharePoint, and have access to creating your own team site, then you can do this! This first week focuses on improving visibility to key information and best practices, next week we’ll improve visibility to your key people (don’t want to forget about the people!).
The problem is clear: hours, even days of time, are wasted trying to locate information or the right person to get something done. Usually, the sad thing is, that the time to find the information or person takes longer than the actual task at hand! SharePoint can help you fix that. Here is what you want to do – and if you do these three things we promise INSTANT return on investment:
Step 1: Set up self-service information libraries with key documents that people can share. Key document candidates are template files, presentations, knowledge base content and contacts. Be sure to assign an owner to manage the content and keep it up to date.
Step 2: Add meta-data (extra columns that define documents in lists better) to your SharePoint Lists and Libraries so that people don’t have to open the document to know what it is about.
Step 3: Surface Your Key People. a. Make use of “presence” (all those little colored balls you see on SharePoint if you have Unified Communications), and b. Link Contact Lists to Exchange Server.
{Next week’s blog will go into detail on how to use presence with SharePoint to connect people with content. It will also outline a few great tips on automating contact information using your internal exchange server for contact updates. Aren’t you tired of seeing that out-of-date contact list on your SharePoint site?! I know you are. Come back next week to learn more about that.}
Self Service Libraries – How To
Setting up a Library on SharePoint couldn’t be easier with the built in templates to help you. You can set up a library to manage any type of file (i.e. Word, PDF, Excel etc.), or you can focus on a particular content type such as PowerPoint Slides (see my blog about slide libraries here: http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/blogs/GetThePoint/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=43). I plan to do a blog after this series all about “Content Types” as they provide a new feature that really adds value to any shared library. For now, let’s dive into how we create the library in the first place:
1. Depending on which template you used in creating your site, you may have varied navigation options. The most common route to do this is to click on “view all site content” link on the left navigation. You can also access the "view all site content" command from the Site Actions button. Once you are viewing all the site content click the "Create" button at the top left of the list. You’ll be shown all the templates for document libraries in the left pane. The standard I usually select is the “Document Library” (see my blog on Understanding SharePoint Templates coming up in March). Tip: When you name your library use a short one-word name for now (I’m using KB), you can change it to be more descriptive later. The first name for any library creates its permanent URL – so keep it short – trust me.
2. You’ll end up with the minimum design for a document library. Note: After I create my library, I go back into the Document Library Settings and I change the Title to "Knowledge Base" so that users will understand the purpose of the library. However, when I change the name in the list settings the URL will remain //server/site/KB/Forms/AllItems.aspx - and this is a good thing as it keeps the path short and concise.
Meta-Data: Customizing Lists and Libraries for “Show and Tell” Viewing
The out-of-the-box document library just has four columns visible; type, name, modified, modified by, and it has a few columns which are hidden from the default display view.
You may want to modify the default view to include; File Size, and ID (unique identifier) – but more important than those are adding custom columns that define the document according to your business. This will help your team to understand the content/value of a file or list item – without having to open the file. This saves hours of wasted time opening and closing documents looking for something that isn’t visible in the file name. Let’s try adding a column together:
Scenario: My document library holds technical and marketing documents about SharePoint Server, but I’d like to share these with my marketing group and my technical leads. So I want to add a “Category” field so each would know what content is useful to them. I’d like the following categories: Client Engagement, Custom Solutions, Marketing, Pre-Sales, and Technical Document.
Steps to make it happen:
1. From the document library click the “Settings” button and select “Document Settings”
2. Scroll down and look for “Create Column” and click on that
3. Give the column a name – in this case I’m calling it “Category”
4. Select CHOICE as the type of field.
5. Scroll down to enter the choices in the choice area. One per line.
6. Click ok.
Voila! I have a new column in my document listing. Notice the difference in how that looks now, upload a few documents so you can see how nicely that shows up in the list when you associate the new metadata with your files. I can now imagine that everyone would therefore easily be able to filter (one click of a button) the list to only show the document category they are looking for….that should save time!
Now I can think of a few other columns I’d like to add like: Audience, Feature Highlight, and Product Version…..wow no one will ever have to open a file again to find what they need! Note: If library was 100% PPT presentations I would have used the Slide Library (more about that in March) instead of Document Library.
Tip: Did you know how simple it is now to filter for all Marketing items? Anyone can hover over Category – a drop down will appear – and they can select “Marketing” to zoom in on only the marketing documents (no fishing through too many docs)!
Notifying People of Updates – Automatically!
I mentioned earlier that it is a Best Practice to assign an Owner to SharePoint Sites that will be responsible to keep the content up-to-date. There is no better guarantee that people will NOT use your site than old content….so assign a passionate person to do that. But how do you update your readers when things change? There are three approches that I prefer:
1. Allow them to subscribe to focused views on the list. Remember I filtered for “Marketing” in the above scenario? Well if we create a view for “Marketing” we can also set an “alert” that will let Marketing members know when things have changed or been added related to them. They can input their own “Title” for the alert that will show up in the subject line of the email messages.
2. Pre-set Alerts for team members. The Site Owner can set up views and alerts in advance. In this case be sure to let people know that you have set up the alerts, and what follow-up (if any) you expect from them – otherwise you might confuse them as to the purpose of the new emails coming in. In this case, do not set up “immediate” emails, weekly notifications will be appreciated more in most cases. Note: Also make sure they know how to “unsubscribe” as I have found that to be less obvious to the average user.
3. RSS Feeds can also be fun ways to keep up with the content. Setting an RSS feed for a particular list or view on SharePoint is easy and can help you incorporate the information with other systems that you are tracking. Here at Xtreme we have provided custom solutions to our clients that include the standard RSS Feed Icon strategically placed in all the right places. In this case, anyone can subscribe to very specific content from the landing pages without knowing where, or how, to do this on SharePoint…(normally done from the list menu bar: choose ACTIONS > View RSS Feed).
Learn all about alerts and RSS feeds:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepointserver/HA102487581033.aspx?pid=CH101788361033
Looking ahead...
Next week we’ll dive into improving visibility to your best people and key contacts. Look forward to tips on automating your contact lists and using presence icons to reach out to the people that drive your business! Feel free to post comments and questions – I’ll get back to you as quickly as I can.
More about Audrie Magno:
Audrie Magno is a Senior SharePoint Architect and Technical Consultant at Xtreme Consulting Group. Although joining our team under a year ago, Audrie has more than 23 years of experience helping organizations and Fortune 500 companies design and develop information worker solutions on the Microsoft Office platform. Most of her current assignments focus around SharePoint, InfoPath and Outlook integrated technologies. You can contact Audrie at Xtreme [(425) 861-9460] if you’re interested in getting help with your Office applications – or plan to customize them to match your business.