SharePoint Reviews

What makes SharePoint special is that it applies to a wide range of company scenarios; document management, knowledge management, project management, and records management.

When you want to save information, collaborate, or discover information, SharePoint is the first point-of-contact. You can search, use metadata, or access content via business intelligence created as Excel reports or dashboards. You can also access data from PowerPoint presentations, PowerBI, JavaScript. or jQuery.

Since the core structure is based on ASP.NET technology, you can manage simple development projects using standard .NET developers who have no specialization. You are also able to brand the product using HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

SharePoint has benefitted us a lot regarding optimization. We can automate document management, project management, and basic service desk functions.

The biggest value is that you are able to integrate systems using workflow management middleware. You can also use business intelligence to integrate data and display output on a SharePoint page with predefined restrictions applied for separate security groups.

There is occasionally a problem when an organization has several in-house developed systems without any integration connectors, etc. But this is only an issue in some really specific cases.

The allowed size of document libraries and lists, i.e., the number of items allowed, needs to be increased. This was already improved in the latest 2016 version of SharePoint.

Also, there need to be more options to brand solutions without needing developers. This would be good for end users.

I specialized in the implementation, configuration, and branding of SharePoint for about 7+years. I’ve implemented solutions for many customers, large and small, in many architecture scenarios.

Stability is always a big issue, but not from the view of SharePoint itself. It’s more of an issue from the architecture and infrastructure point of view. Many customers implement SharePoint on virtual machines with dynamic memory allocation. VMs have slow disk access speeds that are below recommended specifications.

In these situations, there are always issues with stability, especially regarding search services, etc. For example, if you installed SharePoint on a virtual machine with dynamic memory, it could destroy the farm without any possibility of repairing it. You will then have to reinstall the whole farm. This would really be a big problem in the case of a farm with 10 virtual servers.

Scalability issue are related to the previous question regarding stability.

The main burden of technical support is on Microsoft partners, who implemented the particular solution. If customers want extra support from Microsoft, it is possible I think, but only if they have Software Assurance or an Enterprise Agreement. Even if a customer has one of these, they still mostly use Microsoft Partners for consulting, maintenance, or new projects.

I previously used SharePoint Services 3, SharePoint Server 2007/2010/2013. Now, I am using SharePoint Online 2016 in a hybrid model that has new features and some new innovations. There are many reasons to switch.

The initial setup was really difficult, because we had no experience. But, together with my colleagues, we managed to solve the initial issues. Then, we used specialized consultants to help us. All subsequent implementations, even in our own environment, were successful. There is always some troubleshooting to do, but this is normal.

I advise to really plan carefully before implementing a solution. You need to allocate the correct number of licenses of various types (standard versus enterprise), including the required SQL licenses. Be careful with SQL licensing as many companies get this wrong. Licenses for other systems, for example, AD CALs or terminal server CALs, also need to be considered.

One of the most common mistakes is that a project plan will not take into account the use of features that require an enterprise license to run. For example, if the planners allocate only 50 enterprise licenses and the rest are standard licenses, there may not be enough enterprise licenses for all the components that need them.

My advice is to look around the Internet and find some justification to negotiate with your boss to buy this product. Alternatively, you could go to the cloud as well and create a hybrid model to reduce the cost of infrastructure (using Azure/Office 365).

Also, optimize your business using automation, forms, document management, etc.

• DMS
• ECM
• Collaboration
• Portals
• Search
• BI
• Mobile support
• Business process management
• LOB integration

Global accessibility over O365 increased the collaboration within the organization.

I have used it for more than 11 years.

I have not encountered any stability issues, as such.

There were scalability issues with SP 2013, but MS made some improvements in SP 2016.

Technical support from MS is great, especially in the cloud area.

We were previously using a custom solution that was hard to maintain and there was also lack of user adoption. With SP, we were able to see great improvement in those areas.

Initial setup was straightforward.

Go for O365 plans that have different pricing as per business needs.

From the beginning, I was in favour of SharePoint. However, for customers, we have evaluated solutions such as Liferay, Sitecore, Drupal, etc.

For enterprise global collaboration, DMS, and ECM needs, this is the right platform.

• We can access SharePoint from a DMZ.
• Vendors and other outside parties can work with it easily.

Prior to implementing SharePoint, we accessed our network just via the internet. However in 2013, we implemented it. With accessibility from a DMZ, SharePoint is a good solution for outside access.

It tends to be unstable and slow when accessing different features.

I've used it since 2013.

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The use case is based on internal processes. We want a central place for storing data, documents, and user processes, to automate processes.

In this case, it's a financial program. All customers starting our financial program are automatically created on SharePoint. From there, all the documents that are related to each customer will be stored on SharePoint, and we then use it as a kind of a black box. You put everything in, you do not know where it is. Then we have other applications around it that give you information that you need. Or you can save it and, based on customer information or the kind of document, it knows where to store it on SharePoint.

It manages processes. I personally think a very strong point is that we use it in combination with OneDrive. Now that we have been handed the GDPR law enforcement, in combination with OneDrive, we can synchronize documents or part of a customer's information to a laptop. If they make changes it will automatically be synchronized back. In the case of a lost or defective device, you always have the information. I think this is a very strong point.

It's stable. It's very widely used by companies. Also, the knowledge of the product has improved over the years, and by other companies that support it or are Microsoft SharePoint partners. So if there are problems, there's always a user or company that knows the information or can help you; even with very uncommon problems.

Another strong feature is the search engine. It can search all documents. It can find everything.

We also have our own developers. What we want with SharePoint, we can program it and create many reports, every kind of information needed. Developers can easily create an application for it and display this information.

We are mainly using third-party tools for it, at the moment, for automating processes. In the new version, for 2019, I know that some of the processes are finally in SharePoint. They are a now using third-party tools for it.

Also, the integration with Outlook could be improved.

It's fairly easy to scale. You can just add front-ends to it. Just a little installation and it's done. It's very easy to expand.

Technical support is very good.

The switch was handed to our default supplier of software, in this case, Microsoft. The whole platform we used was based on Microsoft.

It's not a vendor we select, we select a product. After that, we look at the vendor. If the product looks good, promising, and it looks stable - and of course we test it before we go any further with it - then we look at the vendor, especially the support. Then we find other cases, where they have implemented a similar product or feature and ask for their feedback.

A partner initially installed it. That was the start of our use of SharePoint. I believe there was a lack of information or a lack of knowledge on the part of the external party that initiated this project. As our internal IT department has improved, the setup of SharePoint - we migrated to a new version - has improved.

My advice would depend on the use case. SharePoint, for us, is the most suitable because we use mainly Microsoft products. So for us, it's the way to go because the integration is solid. If colleagues have other products, it depends on what they're asking. Look at the best option. It's not that I'm saying, "You have to use this product because it's the greatest." Consider what you need, what you want.

It's very stable. I don't call it a document management system, I call it a multifunctional document system. You can do a lot of things with it. It's just incredible how much. I really like that we have been able to automate a few steps that people had to do. Also, this process was only possible with SharePoint, because of the integration of other Office products. We're using the basic Microsoft suite and integration was a very big part of it.

• Intranet and extranet: We set up a robust and easily maintained intranet and extranet.
• Ticketing and documentation management: We use the content management features and workflows to create ticketing and document management systems. We also make good use of the wikis.
• HR Requests: We built a system within SharePoint that allows you to create a ticket in HR. For example, terminations, job status changes, pay change, and name change. The user opens the form in SharePoint. Depending on what type of action is necessary, the user is given the exact items that need to be completed for the HR action to proceed. After the user completes and sends the form, it copies the department manager for approval. An email is then sent to the various departments to work on it. With terminations, for example, an email is sent to payroll for final pay, to benefits to get the separation paperwork activated, to IT for equipment pick-up, and to others who have a role when someone leaves the company. I know that we can purchase software to do this, but it would have been expensive. Building this within SharePoint took a few weeks and has received many kudos for helping HR actions.
• Moving from folders to storage: We are moving items from the thousands of Windows folders on storage servers to SharePoint for easy management and retrieval using a SharePoint search. All policies are now on SharePoint and are easy to find and view, even with a smartphone.
• Wikis: We are turning department standard operating procedures into wikis for easy management and documentation. We use security so that only those who need to see these documents can access and update them as needed on the fly.

Building workflow systems within SharePoint that allow for corporate tracking of work issues and work items. The intranet was an instant hit with everyone and wikis have been very popular.

Little quirks that make it difficult at times to fine-tune some items. The usual Microsoft items where 90% of the product is great, but that 10% makes little things difficult to work with. It is hard to pin down, but Microsoft has you do things their way, when their way is not the best for our needs.

• Developer code: Some areas of SharePoint require you to have a .NET developer code so that it works correctly.
• Numbering: We have production support tickets that we wanted to number in a certain way. However, SharePoint could not do it until we got our .NET developer to create a workaround for the numbering system.
• Sorting: We needed some sorting done, and this required coding. This additional coding is only about 10% of our projects, but it is still there. Thank goodness we can do that when we need to.

We have used SharePoint for approximately seven years and version 2013 for the last two years. It has been our intranet, extranet, and corporate website for the past year.

It is VERY stable if you follow the recommended settings and read the SharePoint blogs.

We have not encountered any scalability issues.

I would give technical support a rating of 3/5. We had some small issues and called MS tech support, but they were only able to help us 60% of the time before we fixed it ourselves.

We had no other solutions before this one.

With so much online help and blogs, setup was straightforward. We did use a third-party to assist us with best practices. Once the system was up, we were able to support ourselves with no issues.

We have an EA. It was easy to get pricing, but it is difficult to manage.

When trying to use it as an extranet, we found issues with how expensive it is per individual user. We have 15,000 contractors who serve as staff at various locations.

We decided on SharePoint early on.

Use a third-party expert who can help with the initial setup and development. You can then manage yourself once you are up and running.

From my perspective as a developer I would say that the most valuable features are :

• the wide variety of data source connections
• completeness of features
• strong query possibilities (customisation, SQL, MDX, macros)

Each year, managers have to take important decisions about the future based on voluminous reports which took several weeks to produce. Now, these reports have been replaced by a dashboard which is maintained on a daily basis.

• The suite is complicated to set up, complicated to maintain, complicated to work with. Cognos requires a bigger and more skilled centralized BI team.
• Cognos Insight, the self-service, desktop dashboarding and analysis tool designed is not quite at the same level of the competition like Tableau or Qlikview.

We have been using the solution for 19 years.

We have not encountered any stability issues. The version 10.2 we use is very stable.

We have not encountered any scalability issues. The contract between IBM and the organisation covers all the needs we have.

I would rate the technical support at 8/10. I had very few technical support needs but they answer correctly when required.

I am not aware of any previous solutions. I always use Cognos solutions for my BI needs.

The setup was complex. As I work for a large financial organisation, the security matters are very important. For that reason, we had to deploy the different components on many servers in different zones, separated by firewalls. We also had to support the needs for several tens of users for data analysis and a few hundred more users for data consumption.

It's not the least expensive solution in the market but if your needs are great in terms of functionality, number of users and amount of data, it is worth purchasing it.

We evaluated the solutions available at the time. Among others, these were Micro-Level, Business Objects and Hyperion.

I do not think it is possible to implement a solution to the scale of the one we had without the help of knowledgeable Cognos BI resources. Ideally, it is best to hire an expert or one or more good Cognos consultants.

The most valuable features are:

• MS Office Web Apps allow anywhere/anytime access to the apps used, most often for documents.
• The collaboration feature allows multiple people to read and edit documents simultaneously.

• The list feature makes it easy to integrate database information into the same place as documents. It allows exposing of that data to create reports and views within the site for real-time reporting as well as point-in-time views. This is extremely useful.

We created a hang management system with a simple list including views and reports, instead of purchasing a bloated application. We created inventory tracking in the same way.

Instead of switching, this has kept all the information in one place and within one application. It allows easy data exports into other applications.

Latest versions of this product have addressed the functionality issue on non-Windows devices.

I have used this solution for five years.

Occasionally, the SQL database backend would have issues to address regarding maintenance.

I have not encountered any stability issues.

Microsoft provided excellent support.

Prior to this product, I have not used any other solution.

The initial setup was somewhat complex. To get the best results, a farm configuration was needed and many additional components are required to have all the features fully functional.

If possible, consider using what Microsoft offers in Office 365 as it includes all those features plus email. For a smaller organization, it makes a lot of sense and Microsoft will still manage the environment.

We have not evaluated other options.

Try the Microsoft Cloud Services first and implement on-premise only if you really need to.

SharePoint’s most valuable feature is its use for community building. It turns large scores of people into a more cohesive group by creating a central working environment for documents, conversations, knowledge sharing, processes, tasks and content.

We have a variety of use cases internally, but an easy one for everyone to understand is the creation of the “company meeting” slide show. Every two weeks, everyone in our company gets together to hear from each other about the “goings on” in the company. Each area of the business gets the opportunity to present a few slides. In the past, these slides were emailed to a central point and some poor person had to collate it before all staff arrived. Now, with SharePoint and Office 365, all the business areas are able to edit their part of the PowerPoint file at any time, from anywhere. This saves plenty of time, removes embarrassing copy and paste errors, and also gives staff a central reference point after the meeting to catch up on what was presented.

The user interface, although extensible, leaves much to the imagination when compared to modern websites. Companies, like ourselves, are able to transform the front end into anything, but this consulting process sometimes scares off would be clients. Adoption remains a challenge (not really a product fault). Lastly, the workflow remains a kind of ugly sister. Improvements have been made in the form of “flow” (only available on Office 365). But, all in all, companies normally have to invest in third-party tools, such as K2 / Nintex, if they really want to create enterprise-grade workflow processes.

I have been using this solution for 13 years.

We did not encounter any stability issues. In most cases, instability is caused by client or vendor implementation errors.

We did not encounter any issues with scalability. SharePoint actually scales really well as you’re able to add roles and servers to your heart’s content. Office 365 also has a number of clever resource throttling capabilities, which allows administrators to prioritize certain areas over others.

We received excellent technical support. We have no complaints there.

We never tried to implement a solution other than SharePoint.

In the early days 2003, the initial setup of SharePoint was highly complex, but nowadays it has been streamlined a lot. The challenge, however, is not the basic installations. It is creating something that is ready to take advantage of the scalability and other platform benefits without revising the architecture.

More than 75% of our interactions now are with clients that already have Office 365 (which includes SharePoint), so the pricing is normally bundled with that. We do discuss specifics when it comes to the amount of storage included. For on site deployments, clients need to license each server, as well as each client access license (CAL).

As a vendor, our typical scenario is that the product was already chosen, and we are just implementing it. As SharePoint is a platform with many capabilities, plenty of products compete with specific areas of SharePoint, but hardly anyone can offer everything that SharePoint does.

Before starting the project, it’s critical to understand what you want to achieve. Just installing it because IT owns it, will not accomplish your goals. If you have well-defined use case for it, and the solution is geared toward delivering on that ROI, SharePoint is a great fit. Special attention must be given to ongoing adoption and training and it’s critical that you choose your vendor very carefully. Many vendors understand a bit, but only a handful have walked the walk and know the many pitfalls of splash and dash deployments.