Determine objectives for sites

Applies To: Windows SharePoint Services 3.0

Topic Last Modified: 2016-05-06

In this article:

• Identify primary objectives for sites

• Identify primary environments for sites

• Worksheet

Before you can design your sites based on Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, you need to identify what you want to accomplish. This article helps you identify some primary objectives for your SharePoint sites and consider the environments in which the sites will be used.

Identify primary objectives for sites

SharePoint sites are flexible and can help you accomplish many different things. However, to have a useful and successful site or group of sites, you need to be able to focus the sites on some primary objectives. That is, you need to know what you are trying to accomplish with a site before you can design it. For example:

• Do you want to communicate with others in your organization by posting bulletins or announcements and gathering feedback?

• Do you want to foster team collaboration by giving team members a place to share ideas and work on projects together?

SharePoint sites can assist with both of these objectives. If you have multiple objectives, you might best be served by creating multiple, possibly interrelated, sites. However, you can have multiple objectives for a single site. If you are limited to a single site, organize the site so that users looking for the communication point can find it right away, and users looking to share information and ideas or store documents know where to start.

Review the following objectives. Consider which of these objectives most closely align with your needs for each site you are designing.

Document storage

Document storage and workflow are key functions of many sites, even sites that are primarily used for communication or collaboration. However, sometimes you might need a dedicated document storage site for your organization. Whether you require a special site for document storage depends on many factors, such as how many documents need to be stored, how many people are contributing documents, who needs to act on the documents, and so on. You will have time to explore how to structure document storage later in the planning process. For more information, see Plan document libraries (Windows SharePoint Services).

Document storage sites or document storage sections of other sites often include the following features:

• The ability to check documents in or out, track changes to documents, and keep multiple versions of documents.

• The ability to route documents for approval or through specific processes before publishing them to a larger audience.

  Note

  Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 includes a workflow capability that you can use to create a custom workflow process to route documents for approval.

• The ability to tag documents with metadata, so that documents can be more efficiently sorted and managed.

Communication

A communication site helps you broadcast information to a group of people and collect information or feedback from that group. Communication sites are primarily concerned with distributing information, data, and documents to other people. For example, a large organization might have a central site for broadcasting organization-wide information about policies or events (such as a human resources site or a company events site).

Many communication sites are also used for gathering and sharing information. For example, a community bulletin board is primarily a communication site. People in the community come to the site to read items and to post items for others to read.

Communication sites often include sections for:

• Describing, publicizing, or announcing an event or other information.

• Viewing calendar or event information.

• Reading documents or editorial articles.

• Posting or uploading information or documents.

Collaboration

A collaboration site helps members of a team or organization work together. Collaboration sites are primarily concerned with sharing information and documents, generating ideas, responding to other people's ideas, and tracking progress toward a goal.

Collaboration sites can vary depending on the team type, size, complexity, or objective. For example, a small team that is working on a short-term project (such as organizing an upcoming event or planning a new product launch) has different needs than a larger team (such as a research department in a manufacturing company or the editorial staff in a publishing company) that is working on a series of long-term projects. Members of an organization working together to organize an event (such as a charity event) or to encourage participation in the organization (such as a community or school organization) have their own unique needs.

Collaboration sites often include sections for:

• Sharing information and data.

• Sharing documents.

• Sharing calendar or event information.

• Generating ideas and discussing ideas about a project.

• Adding, assigning, and tracking tasks.

Identify primary environments for sites

To effectively plan your sites, you must identify for which environments the sites are intended. Internet sites often have very different objectives and requirements than intranet sites. For example, for an Internet site that you use to market a product, you typically do not restrict who can view the content, but you tightly control who can add content to the site. Conversely, for an intranet site meant for team collaboration, most users contribute content and very few users just casually view the site. For some environments, the size of your organization might influence your choices. For other environments, the mix of users interacting in the environment might influence your choices.

Consider which of the environments described in the following table are applicable to your sites.

Worksheet

Use the following worksheet to determine objectives for sites:

• Site objectives and environments worksheet (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=798133&clcid=0x409)