A Real-World Implementation of a Social Intranet Based on Office 365

Robin SlagmanDerk van LochemUnity Connect Haarlem 2016

Tweet this talk@SynigoPulse | #UnityC16www.synigopulse.com

“The experience is about how we get there, not the landing place.”

Bill Buxton, Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research

Introducing…Robin Slagman• Co-founder, product owner, Office 365 & SharePoint specialist• r.slagman@synigo.nl• @RobinSlagman

Derk van Lochem• Co-founder, architect, full-stack web developer• d.vanlochem@synigo.nl• @derkzz

Tweet this talk@SynigoPulse | #UnityC16www.synigopulse.com

Agenda• Scenario & objectives• Why a social intranet?• User adoption• Functional design

choices• Technical design

choices• Lessons learned

ScenarioNoorderpoort• School for secondary, vocational and adult

education and training (ROC)• 15.000 students, 1.800 employees• Based in Groningen (NL) across 17 schools• Aims to be a ‘learning hub’ for lifelong

learning• Strong community ties

ObjectivesMake our students leadingCreate a better fit with the young generationIncrease the quality of our educationIncrease student satisfaction

Use modern technology to work smarter and save time and money, which will be invested in better education.

Working smarter?Stimulating & increasing sharing, collaboration and communication

Creating a single starting point for any information, no matter where it’s stored

Increase the digital skills of staff and teachers, so they will match the demands of the students

Provide staff and teachers with tools that fit the modern digital world

How?Create one single digitale place where students, teachers and staff:• Meet, collaborate, share and

communicate;• Find everything they need to do their

study or job.

"Give us guidelines and structure, without losing our autonomy and choice"

Office 365

Social Intranet?Automated/derived content• Information from processes• LOB applications

User generated content• Large interaction• Collaboration tools

Managed content• ‘Traditional intranet’• CMS

Integration

Demo

Mobile

User Adoption• Project owned by Marketing &

Communcation, not IT• Defining our users• Workshops, interviews• Keywords: Training,

Communication

Functional design choices

Office 365 Groups, unless…• No more teamsites• Everybody can start a group…

…even students!• No more organizational structure &

nesting• Groups are for collaboration, not for

publishing

Outlook Groups

Yammer• More humble position• Still lack of integration• Used for commenting on news

articles

Delve• Searching for documents• Finding colleagues

Microsoft Teams• Combining Office 365 tools for

modern & agile teams• Another option for collaboration• Another source for

messages/conversations

Technical design choices

7Servers

12K

Unique users / day

Facts & Figures

Transactions / hour

700Dependencies

15

Requests / hour50K

AVG load time / second

1.6

ChallengesDependencies

Many!Impact on third party applicationsFailure of these dependencies

PerformanceA lot of usersA lot of information in a single view!A lot of transactions are processed

To be in controlDeployment processPerformanceLook and feel

Why a web app?

The role of SharePointDocument management!!Collaboration(Groups)Portal configuration

News and KnowledgebaseUmbraco

Complex content structuresEditing contentREST API only

Managed Content

The role of the Microsoft Graph

Apps

Microsoft Graph

Azure Active Directory

On Premise Active Directory

The role of the Azure Active Directory

Uses

Sync

Enrich

Putting it all togetherApps / Website, etc..Pulse apps (Portal, News,

Knowledge base)

Pulse Service

Microsoft Graph

Users Groups Calendar Mail Documents Etc.

Umbraco CMS

News Knowledge base

Pulse API

Peoplesoft Magister Xedule,

etc..

Lessons learned• Don’t forget to train users• Make use of power

users/champions• Make guidelines: what to use

when?• Make users aware of where they

store information• Be carefull with sharing• Make sure your source systems

are filled properly• In the end it’s about the people

Spread the word@SynigoPulsewww.synigopulse.com www.facebook.com/synigo www.linkedin.com/company/synigo

Robin Slagmanr.slagman@synigo.nl @RobinSlagman

Derk van Lochemd.vanlochem@synigo.nl@derkzz