I'm planning on running a blog article or two on deployment planning. The articles will focus not only on the nuts and bolts of deployment planning, but also on the business integration portion--the Policy Taxonomy or Verb Taxonomy I've been blogging about.
By the way, even though I advise against having developer-types develop and plan your SharePoint implementation, I want to make it clear that I LOVE developers! I used to be a developer! My youngest son shows signs of developerism! But again, whatever you do don't let someone who focuses mostly on development be the one to design your installation and deployment plan. It isn't what they are good at usually. I also wouldn't suggest that you have a system administrator develop your code either. Neither is better than the other, but they have clearly defined roles. Administrators are all about creating a firm and stable foundation for your computing environment. Developers are all about safely pushing the envelope and making intelligent changes. Developers aren't bad, it is just that it is best to build a really firm foundation before anyone starts developing cool changes to the environment. So, let the administrator-types build the foundation.
Anyway, when it comes to installation and deployment planning, it is VITALLY important that you first figure out exactly why you intend to implement SharePoint! SharePoint needs to be installed, configured and deployed according to the mission you have chosen for it. If you can't articulate the mission then there is no possible way you can expect your SharePoint team to magically know how to install and deploy.
So first things first-- articulate exactly why you are putting SharePoint into your production environment.
Also, please remember that there are many different kinds of taxonomies... There are template taxonomies, site taxonomies, role taxonomies and so on. The critical taxonomy that I'm advocating in this blog is not any of those. Those are very simple taxonomies to understand and implement. I can blog about it, but those are fairly "cut and dried" taxonomies. The "verb" taxonomy I'm talking about has to do with the policies you want to implement to govern information in the context of SharePoint and even outside of SharePoint. It isn't actually hard to do, but it is very different.
To be honest, "taxonomy" has become quite the buzzword--just like governance. There are many different levels and layers of taxonomy in a virtualized environment, and there are correspondingly different levels and layers of governance. This doesn't mean that other blogs on taxonomy and governance are wrong, quite the opposite. Pay close attention to the various governance blogs out there, but also keep in mind that there needs to be a foundational governance and taxonomy plan that spells out how SharePoint will be aligned with the strategic directives of the organization.
Comments