Migrating Your Intranet from Jive to SharePoint Online

Jive once reigned supreme as the preferred intranet platform; at the time, it offered a range of unique features to help organisations store files and connect team members. However, in recent years, organisations have shifted to Microsoft SharePoint Online for its superior collaboration capabilities and enhanced document management tools. Many organisations also treated the move as an opportunity to start fresh with a brand-new intranet, leaving behind the clunky, outdated, and unnecessary parts of your Jive environment. Let us take you on a Jive to SharePoint journey.

If you’re planning to migrate from Jive to SharePoint Online, there’s some steps you should take to ready your organisation for the big shift. Having completed hundreds of migrations from various sources to SharePoint, we have a unique understanding of the end-to-end process. So before you start dragging the entirety of your current intranet from A to B, we recommend you check out the steps for planning a successful page-to-page intranet migration below.

What Is an Intranet Migration (and why is it unique)?

Intranet migration is the process of moving the content of an existing intranet from one platform or technology to another. It involves transferring the content of each page of the existing intranet site to the new platform and ensuring that the new pages are linked and organised in the same way as the original pages. This is important for several reasons:

Users of the intranet site are likely to be familiar with the existing content and structure of the site. Moving content to a new platform or reorganising the site can cause confusion and frustration for users. By maintaining the same or similar content and structure, users can quickly adapt to the new platform and continue using the site as before.
By transferring the content of each page to the new platform, organisations can ensure that all of their important information is retained. This can be particularly important for organisations that rely heavily on their intranet for knowledge management or other critical functions.
Some organisations are required to maintain specific records or data for compliance purposes. By transferring all content to the new platform, organisations can ensure that they are in compliance with relevant regulations and requirements.
You can refresh to look and feel of your intranet, change the navigation and structure, but still keep all the current content. This is important as it could greatly reduce the amount of time it takes for you to design, build a launch a new SharePoint intranet.

However, there needs to be some care taken in this process. When you read and follow Step 1 (see below), you’re likely to discover pages that can and should be deleted, rewritten, or restructured.

Step 1 – Assess Your Current Jive Environment

Before you start the migration process, it’s essential to assess your current intranet. Start by determining the size of your Jive Intranet.

The size of your intranet can vary, from small installations designed for a single team or department to large installations that serve an entire organisation with thousands of users. Its important to know, not just in terms of file size, but also the number of pages, documents and videos. When migrating from Jive to SharePoint Online, understanding the size and scope of the Jive instance is essential to ensuring a successful outcome from you are transferring/building your new intranet.

Step 2 – Create Goals and Structure

Once you’ve assessed your Jive environment, it’s time to plan your migration to SharePoint Online. Create a project plan that outlines the goals of your new intranet, as well as timelines and milestones you want to hit along the way. Determine the scope of your migration and the migration approach that will work best for your organisation.

Step 3 – Choose Your Method for Jive to SharePoint Migration

When it comes to migrating an intranet from Jive to SharePoint Online, there are several methods you can use. You may opt to manually migrate your data, or have a specialist automate the process, or a combination of both. While using a migration tool can save time and effort, manually migrating your data can provide more control over the process – especially if you’re writing your own script using SharePoint API (which is available to anyone). Ultimately you should choose the method that suits your organisation’s needs, budget, and resources.

Step 4 – Consider Intranet Design

Intranet design plays a critical role in a Jive to SharePoint Online migration for several reasons:

User Adoption: The success of your migration ultimately depends on how well your users adopt the new platform. An intuitive and visually appealing design can make it easier for users to navigate and find the information they need, increasing their adoption rate.
User Experience: Intranet design affects the user experience (UX) of the platform. A well-designed intranet can improve UX, leading to increased productivity and user satisfaction.
Branding: A well-designed intranet can also help maintain brand consistency across all internal communications, creating a cohesive and professional image for your organisation.
Content Organisation: Effective intranet design can help organise your content in a way that makes it easy to access and use. This is especially important during a migration, as it can help users find their way around the new platform.
Customisation: SharePoint Online provides several customisation options that can help you tailor the platform to your organisation’s needs. Intranet design plays a critical role in this customisation process, helping you create a platform that meets your specific requirements.

Step 5 – Prepare Your SharePoint Online Environment

Before you start migrating data, it’s crucial to prepare your SharePoint Online environment. Create the necessary structure, metadata, navigation and permissions., that you will need for your migrated content. Make sure your users have the appropriate permissions to author content, and the right people have the ability to publish it to the entire organisation.

Step 6 – Prepare the Necessary Training

After you’ve migrated your data to SharePoint Online, it’s essential to train your users on how to use the new platform. SharePoint is distinctly different to Jive in several ways; it is more streamlined but comes with a host of new actions and tools to master.

Confidence and comfortability will be the key factors to ensuring your workforce embraces the change, and this can be achieved through adequate education. In our experience, training = buy-in – the more effort you put into getting your workforce on board with the change, the more likely they are to embrace the change.

Here are some training methods we’ve found to be effective with our clients:

Provide introductory training sessions to familiarise your staff with the basics of SharePoint Online. This can include topics such as navigating the platform, uploading and downloading files, and setting up alerts.
Offer role-based training to employees to help them understand how to use SharePoint Online to perform their specific job tasks. For example, train finance staff on how to use SharePoint Online to manage financial records, or train HR staff on how to use SharePoint Online to manage employee records.
Offer self-paced training resources such as video tutorials, online courses, and user guides. This will allow staff to learn at their own pace and revisit the training resources when needed.
Encourage staff to use SharePoint Online on a regular basis to become familiar with the platform’s features and capabilities. This can include using SharePoint Online for collaboration, file sharing, and document management.
Provide ongoing support to staff, such as a dedicated help desk or user community where they can ask questions and receive assistance. This will help staff feel more comfortable using SharePoint Online and increase their adoption rate.

The first steps in the journey from Jive to SharePoint Online

Migrating your intranet from Jive to SharePoint Online requires careful planning and execution. It’s essential to assess your current Jive environment, design the new intranet environment, and choose the right migration method. By following these steps, you can ensure a successful move to SharePoint Online, and your organisation can enjoy the benefits of a modern intranet and collaboration platform.

This article is the first in a series we’ll be releasing about the intricacies of migrating from Jive to SharePoint Online. If you’re new to Propelle, you can stay up to date with the next articles by connecting with us on LinkedIn or shoot us a message to learn more from one of our SharePoint Online experts.