An intranet is much more than a space where you can share files and information: it serves to strengthen internal communication, improve accessibility to services and enhance brand identity. This is especially true for international companies, which must be able to count on an environment capable of responding to the global and local needs of their offices scattered around the world. Being able to coordinate distributed teams, while maintaining a good UX, is not an easy task. But what happens when you decide to migrate your intranet from SharePoint On-Prem to SharePoint Online, focusing on cloud capabilities to support the business community? A customer asked us this question. Here's how it went.
Our client was faced with an important challenge, which is increasingly common in large companies with an international reach.
In fact, the request was to create a new intranet with which to replace the current digital workplace, still based on SharePoint 2013, and able to respond to very different needs through a user experience that is as fluid as possible.
A platform was therefore needed:
Although this involved redesigning the entire digital environment in use, from the architecture to the interaction with the contents, the real complexity was operational in nature.
The project involved a team distributed in several countries, with different expectations and processes that were often not aligned. Coordinating such a heterogeneous group and bringing it to a common vision was in itself a great challenge.
In parallel, the customer needed customized features, designed for the organization but without exceeding the limits imposed by the available budget.
It was necessary to avoid building a portal that was too complex or too expensive to maintain and, to arrive at the right solution, a balanced approach was needed that would guarantee maximum value for users with sustainable investments for the company.
Another priority concerned design.
The customer wanted to enhance the brand through an elegant and modern interface, without burdening navigation. Often, in fact, impactful aesthetic choices can become an obstacle in terms of usability, if managed in the wrong way.
Finally, there were the contents.
How to organize information to make both global content, aimed at the entire company, and local content, designed for individual offices, more accessible?
Finding an answer to this question was a delicate matter, since it depended on it how people would perceive the usefulness of the platform.
If the information of interest is not easy to find, the risk is always that of not obtaining the desired results in terms of the adoption of the new platform. The company would therefore have risked wasting its investment.
For us, the solution was obvious from the start: yes, to create an intranet, but based on SharePoint Online.
To meet customer needs and overcome the main critical issues, listed a little while ago, we have provided a tailor-made, solid and at the same time flexible intranet solution.
But let's start from the initial phase of the project, namely the migration from SharePoint On-Prem, an outdated version of the system, to SharePoint Online, with which it is possible to take advantage of all the advantages offered by the Microsoft cloud.
However, this was not a simple technical migration: the transfer of data required the management of two complementary phases.
In the first phase, we focused on analyzing and mapping existing content that would allow us to understand what information to keep, which to update and which to delete directly.
The goal was to ensure that only useful content was moved to SharePoint.
The second phase consisted of the construction of the new intranet.
And here the work has gone far beyond simply reorganizing the contents.
In fact, new areas and sections have been created, designed to facilitate access to services, improve internal communication and enhance corporate culture. Each element has been designed to be usable even from mobile devices and to accurately reflect the visual identity of the brand.
Of course, there was no lack of difficulties along the way.
The client's internal project team, initially unresponsive, required some effort to be involved in the creation and, above all, in the personalization of the intranet.
In addition, the processes were based on strict policies and a specific approval system for each change to be made to the infrastructure. Even the initial analysis required time and attention, due to the widespread nature of the existing digital ecosystem, full of branches that were difficult to map.
Nevertheless, with method and team spirit, the project was successful and the customer was finally able to successfully digitize their activities and services, experiencing first-hand the importance of the cloud and an intranet centered on users.
Choosing the cloud means making an investment in the future of your company. Not an abstract future, mind you, but a future made of more modern technologies, simpler processes, safer data and people who are freer to work wherever they want, with greater productivity and well-being.
The migration to the cloud, and in particular to Microsoft 365, makes it possible to achieve all of this. Let's talk about a platform that combines in a single environment:
With Microsoft's cloud, there's no need to manage physical servers or worry about updates and compatibility between different systems, because every component of this ecosystem is already set up to be accessible, reliable and consistent.
In addition, it is an ecosystem built around people's work: SharePoint, Teams, OneDrive, Outlook... each application communicates with the others, simplifies collaboration and reduces the time needed to carry out daily activities.
The SharePoint Online intranet is the starting point in this transformation.
From a simple document portal, the intranet based on SharePoint Online has become the heart of the digital workplace where you can find everything you may need in the company: news, initiatives, internal resources, HR services, procedures, applications and more.
This intranet is the gateway to a digital workplace in the cloud.
Inside, the brand's identity is reflected in the interface design and the user experience makes the difference between a system that works and one that is actually used. Even security is no longer a burden, but a strength: Microsoft invests billions of dollars every year to protect customer data, offering advanced solutions for information protection, access management and regulatory compliance.
Speaking then of costs, the use of a cloud solution allows for more transparent and sustainable management, as you pay only for what you use.
The migration from SharePoint On-Prem to SharePoint Online was successful and was completed with the creation of a new intranet, equipped with custom functionality to meet the needs of all staff without compromise.
We immediately received positive feedback from the customer and users, who quickly adopted the intranet as a daily work tool.
Since the portal became active, company offices have experienced improvements in the way in which information is distributed and exchanged between colleagues belonging both to the same team and to different departments.
We will continue to monitor the performance of the intranet together with the customer, to ensure that its functionalities always know how to meet the company's needs.
The Modern Work team specializes in developing and integrating custom solutions across the entire Microsoft 365 ecosystem. We design native applications for Microsoft and Azure platforms, and we implement business processes that maximize the return on investment in Microsoft 365.
