Time was, not so very long ago, that SharePoint was the belle of the Microsoft ball, and every team was doing their best to find a way to bolt their application onto SharePoint. In recent years, things have definitely changed. Microsoft 365 became Microsoft's new darling and while SharePoint still plays a significant role, it has been increasingly relegated to the back-office as other applications like Flow and Teams have offered a modern interface or replaced key SharePoint functionality.
For folks who've worked within enterprise SharePoint and now making the conversion to SharePoint Online, these changes can seem quite jarring. The bad news is that admins and information workers will need to learn new/better ways to do the things they've always done. The good news is that there are significant benefits to making the switch, including simpler methods, less effort, and powerful new abilities.
To help people making the switch from classic to modern SharePoint, we created the following list of common uses for classic / enterprise SharePoint circa 2010-2013, along with their modern 2019 equivalents in Microsoft 365.
| What we need to do | How we used to do this | How to do it now | What's in it for us? | What systems outside SharePoint are involved? |
| SharePoint Planning and Administration | ||||
| Driving end-user adoption | Struggle to get users to accept complexities of SharePoint; Lots of training; Canned responses to common objections |
Introduce users to Teams as the new one-stop-shop and a convenient window into SharePoint and Outlook | Overcome negative impressions of SharePoint without sacrificing its power | Office 365 Groups; Teams |
| Plan SharePoint for multiple departments in a large organization | Use a single Site Collection and add sub-sites; the root site becomes the launchpad | Each business unit, department, or Team are given their own Site Collection with a Modern Site, which may include Teams; Unify the experience using a Hub Site as the launchpad | Aligning site architecture with Modern SharePoint enables use of modern features and integrated management of site security across the org; Non-hierarchical structures are much easier to re-arrange if needed later | Office 365 Groups; Teams |
| Manage security / permissions for SharePoint sites | Create security Roles and add SharePoint users to each Role | Create Office 365 Groups to manage membership; use Teams + SharePoint Team Site or add the 365 Group to "classic" SharePoint roles | Less complex security; can be managed from O365 Admin Center; Teams can self-service their own membership | Office 365 Groups; Teams |
| Audit SharePoint Access or Changes | Enable Versioning; Enable SharePoint Audit Logs; Manually collect the logs on a regular basis |
Versioning enabled by default; Configure Security & Compliance to enable audit logs across all events; grant access to reviewers |
Visibility across all of MS365 not just SharePoint; Logs are less difficult for humans to read; Alerts can be configured for suspicious behaviors; No more manual log collection activities |
Admin Roles in Azure AD (RBAC); Security & Compliance Admin Center |
| File Sharing | ||||
| Share files with coworkers | Create a SharePoint Team Site and Document Library | Create a Team, which creates the SP Site and Library behind the schemes | All the benefits of SharePoint without the complexity; Better collaborative space | Teams |
| Share files with people outside the organization | Create SP Site and Library; Invite External User(s), jump through flaming hoops to get it all working | Create a Team and invite Guests -OR- Create an Anonymous Guest Link to a specific Document | Guest access to Teams user experience is greatly simplified; People can edit documents without creating/using any account; Lowered data leak risk |
Teams; Security & Compliance; Azure AD (in background and optional) |
| Work on documents with others in real-time | Upload it to OneDrive for Business or SharePoint and make sure the settings allow real-time collaboration | Upload to Teams (properly configured SharePoint site is in the background) and open it directly from there | No need to jump all over different apps or websites to work in a document with your team | Teams; OneDrive for Business (optional); |
| Stay focused on work, while handling multiple documents / apps | Create lists-of-links in SharePoint pages or OneNote Notebooks | Use the immersive reader in Teams; Create tabs in Channels for common apps |
Less jumping around all over the place; When you come back to it, the reminders are there |
Teams; OneNote (app) |
| Offline or Remote Access | ||||
| Access documents from home or while travelling | VPN into the office; E-mail files to yourself; Sync using OneDrive for Business (e.g. My Site, SP Workspace, SkyDrive, etc.) |
Access SharePoint Online, Teams, or OneDrive for Business from any location using apps or web browser; Admins specify Conditional Access Policies to prevent data leaks and ensure security compliance |
Reduced need to sync files to local drives; Secure access from anywhere, without need for VPN; Lowered data leak risk |
Teams; OneDrive for Business; Conditional Access Policies in Azure (requires EMS / MS365) |
| Work with files when there's no Internet connection | E-mail files to yourself; Sync entire SP Library or My Site using OneDrive for Business; Use of 'shadow IT' like Dropbox |
Choose which OneDrive for Business documents you need to Sync to the local drive; Sync directly to a SharePoint / Teams Library |
Takes up less room on local storage; Faster sync; Lowered data leak risk |
Teams; OneDrive for Business; |
| Organization-wide Communication | ||||
| Develop an Intranet | Enable Web Publishing on one or more site(s) and create Pages for content | Create Modern Communication Sites, one for each department | Functionality is simpler compared to Publishing framework; Sites use modern responsive web design |
Office 365 Groups |
| Share team events or contacts on a web page | Create Events or Contacts lists in SharePoint | Create a mail-enabled Modern Site based on an Office 365 Group; Events and Contacts live in the group's data in Exchange and are surfaced in SharePoint | Overcomes lack of integration between Outlook and SharePoint that was a big problem in older versions | Office 365 Groups; Exchange Online |
| Share Video or Other Media | Select a streaming service and paste embed link into Content/Script Editor Web Part on a SharePoint Page. | Host video in Stream; Classic approaches still work; Embed the media in OneNote, Teams, or Modern SharePoint. |
Stream curates Videos and Channels with little effort; Maintain control of internal content; Seamless integration in overall 365 experience |
Teams; Stream (Video); |
| Project and Task Management | ||||
| Choosing a task management platform | Struggle to decide which of several places should keep task data: SharePoint, Project, Planner, Outlook, or PowerApps | Use whichever tool fits your skills and project management style; End-users see and track tasks assigned to them using To-do |
Single pane of glass for GTD that unified several different data stores; Managers can organize in whichever system makes the most sense for the project at hand |
Office 365 Groups (for Planner); Project Online; Exchange Online; Power Apps (Dynamics); To-do (app) |
| Planning your day | Manually gather tasks from various places and establish priorities for each day | Use To-do to choose 3 to 5 daily priorities, while keeping track of approaching deadlines | Each day is a new day; Avoid feeling overwhelmed by endless lists of tasks that stretch into next year; Reduce the need to check in with others about what got done |
To-do (app) |
| Quick and dirty to-do lists | Create a Tasks List in SharePoint and start creating tasks | Either SharePoint Task List or Planner Plan are both okay for rapidly organizing tasks | Integration with To-do; Planner has a much nicer interface, better features; |
Office 365 Groups (for Planner); To-do (app) |
| Manage complex, structured projects | Create a Project Site in SharePoint PWA | Basically the same approach as always; Optionally, use Flow to sync with Planner Plan | Integration with To-do; Other integrations are possible |
Project Online; To-do (app) |
| Build task management into business apps | Complex custom approaches, many involving code | Use the Task entity in a PowerApps CDS application | Integration with To-do; Supports complex business flows and forms; Mobile apps included |
Power Apps (Dynamics); To-do (app) |
| Reporting project status | Manually collect task information from wherever it is stored on a regular basis | Use built in UI to show progress / status; Use Flow to automate task report generation; Use Power BI to present tasks in dashboard form |
Reduce or eliminate unnecessary meetings to keep everyone on the same page; There are more options for work-saving automation of routine status updates / reports; |
Office 365 Groups (for Planner); Power Automation (Flow); Power BI |
| Business Forms, Processes, and Reporting | ||||
| Make a form for people to enter or track data | Create a List in SharePoint; optionally, customize it in InfoPath | For simple things, SharePoint Lists can still be used; use a combination of Forms, PowerApps, Flow for more complex needs | Modern tools work better with mobile devices; Advanced tools integrate better with systems both inside and beyond MS365; Newer tools are easier to use, troubleshoot |
Forms; Power Apps; Power Automation (Flow) |
| Manage or automate a business process | Create a SharePoint workflow and house data in SharePoint Lists | Create automation in Flow; house the data in SharePoint, Dynamics, or elsewhere | Flow is significantly easier to use than SP Workflow; There is better integration across all MS365 and third-party tools like WordPress, Salesforce, etc. |
Power Automation (Flow); Power Apps (optional); Dynamics (optional); Any other integrated apps |
| Report on information stored in SharePoint | Complex solutions involving SQL Server Reporting Services, PowerPivot, or custom code | Create Flows to copy information to a spreadsheet, e-mail it, etc.; Connect SharePoint to Power BI; |
There are significantly more options now; Easily cross system boundaries (e.g. SharePoint + other data); It's possible for business users to develop their own extracts / reports with limited help from IT |
Power Automation (Flow); Power BI; |
| Collaboration and Meetings | ||||
| Have a quick chat | Send coworker IM in Skype for Business / Lync / Communicator | Chat with individuals, multiple users, or within a Channel in Teams | Chat history is captured server-side; Preserve institutional memory organized by topic (Channels); Find past conversations easily using search |
Teams |
| Impromptu meetings | Use the S4B user's personal meeting link | Use "Meet Now" in any Teams channel | No need to go digging around for special links; quickly transition from group chat to voice / video meeting | Teams |
| Scheduled meetings | Create Skype for Business meeting in Outlook | Create Teams meeting in Teams or Outlook | Can automatically invite everyone in a Team; | Teams; Exchange Online |
| Preserve Organizational Knowledge | ||||
| Retain knowledge / events that happen outside of documents | Configure retention policies and e-discovery in Exchange and SharePoint; Accept the limited range | Configure policies run e-discovery within Security & Compliance; Set user permissions within the Admin Center |
Teams chats are automatically retained and searchable; Admins can specify if users are permitted to edit or delete their messages; Retention now includes Teams conversations and call history in addition to e-mail and SharePoint backed information |
Teams; Security & Compliance; Exchange Online |
| Wrangle prolific (and often unnecessary) use of e-mail attachments | Manually upload docs to SharePoint and share links with others; Create e-mail enabled SharePoint sites |
Attachments for e-mail enabled 365 Groups are automatically preserved in SharePoint; Use Flow to send your received attachments to OneDrive |
Maintains single version of the truth; Find that attachment when you need it; Safely delete e-mails you don't need so your mailbox stays small and fast |
Exchange Online; Office 365 Groups; Teams; OneDrive for Business; Power Automation (Flow); |
| Record meeting minutes (or notes) | The appointed note-taker can take notes by hand or record the meeting in OneNote. | Host the meeting in Teams, turn on recording, publish the record to enable transcript and closed captioning. | Fewer steps needed; Designated note-taker no longer required (although an editor will be helpful since the transcription isn't perfect) |
Teams; Stream (Video) |
| Keep and organize unstructured information | Store OneNote files in OneDrive for Business; Activate the Notebook feature of a SharePoint Team Site |
Use the Notebook that is created automatically within each Team's SharePoint site; Embed the Notebook as a tab within Teams Channels |
Fewer steps are needed to integrate different MS365 apps; Old approaches also still work |
Teams; OneDrive for Business (optional) |
| Create internal documentation | Draft lengthy written docs with screenshots; Record a meeting in Skype for Business or your favorite tool, save it to local drive, upload it to a streaming service of your choice. | Host a Teams meeting, turn on recording, and walk-through and discuss the process; Use phone camera to document things IRL; Use the recording as reference for written docs. |
No need to process or upload lengthy and large video files - they are sent directly to Stream; No need to upload to a streaming service, unless you intend your video to be for public use. |
Teams; Stream (Video) |