Creating effective SharePoint department sites

Top Tips For an Effective SharePoint Department Site

Over the years, our team of SharePoint Developers have worked on a number of department sites for our clients. We've picked up plenty of best practice tips that will help you create an amazing team site or hub site. Here are some things to consider when building a new SharePoint site to get the best out of the department site template: Navigation Arguably, building a simple, clear and effective hub navigation is the most important part of any SharePoint team site. Because the site will likely have plenty of collaborators and team members using it, it's crucial to keep the navigation as organised and structured as possible. Organise Content Strategically Organise content in a way that is intuitive and easy to navigate. Group related documents, tasks, and resources into categories such as projects, departments, or topics. Make sure to use consistent navigation menus to help users easily locate what they need. Include sections like "Documents," "Announcements," "Tasks," and "Calendar." Use headers (H2, H3 and H4 tags) to divide your team site content as you wish - it helps keep sections readable and makes your pages more visually appealing. Folder Structure To keep information organised and to keep workflows as streamlined as possible, we recommend avoiding too many folders and keeping the structure simple. Our team can help with creating a custom folder structure for your organisation to help keep everything in an easy place for your team to access. Our team can create a modern intranet site that offers a range of navigation and organisation options, so you can create pages and sections that are only visible to specific department members. Overall SharePoint Site Structure Your department site will likely sit in an overall organisational structure with other SharePoint hub sites, team sites and other Microsoft integrations. There are intelligent search functions within SharePoint, but with lots of potential end users across your company you might find some information gets lost if users don't know what to search for. Enable Collaboration Features Set up co-authoring for documents to allow team members to collaborate in real-time on documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. You can add tools like discussion boards, team chats (integrated with Microsoft Teams), and announcement lists to keep everyone informed and engaged. Automate Workflows Create automated processes using SharePoint’s workflow tools to streamline repetitive tasks, such as document approvals, task assignments, and notifications. This ensures efficiency and consistency in managing workflows. Integrate with Microsoft Power Automate to automate complex processes that span multiple systems or platforms. Add Images (within reason!) Adding images can be a great way to attract users to your site, and are also a common navigation tool for dividing sections. You can add carousels or slideshows of the department team and communities to drive engagement, or add infographic images to enhance information. Avoid large images that don't change periodically, since users are likely to start scrolling past entire sections if they think information hasn't been updated. Encourage User Adoption Obviously, your SharePoint department site is only effective if it's useful for your team. Offer training sessions or guides to help team members understand how to use the site effectively - Valto's team of specialists can offer tailored training to get the best out of your site. Regularly solicit feedback from users to make improvements based on their experience and evolving needs.