Basic Understanding of SharePoint Online

Has your organization recently adopted SharePoint Online or installed SharePoint Server? If so, you're in great company. Over 200,000 global companies and 190 million users rely on SharePoint for connection and collaboration.

Since its launch in 2001, SharePoint has continuously innovated and earned numerous industry awards. A single trial run makes it clear why.

This web-based platform streamlines daily business activities, enhances data management, and helps organizations meet compliance requirements, among other benefits.

If you're new to SharePoint, welcome! Today, we'll guide you through the basics with a quick beginner's guide.

Ready to dive in? Let's get started!

What is SharePoint Online?

Before diving into its detailed features, let's take a high-level overview of how SharePoint functions.

In essence, SharePoint is an online collaboration system designed to help business teams work together. It enables organizations to create intranets for storing, organizing, and sharing business information on a centralized, secure platform accessible through a web browser.

Beyond file sharing and storage, SharePoint provides companies with enhanced control over information access and facilitates workflow automation between business units.

If you're using SharePoint Online, you're operating within the Microsoft Cloud platform. This software integrates seamlessly with other cloud-based applications and can be paired with other Microsoft services, such as OneDrive for Business, through an Office 365 or Microsoft 365 license.

It's crucial to view SharePoint as a platform rather than a single tool, as it supports a wide range of business activities.

Understanding SharePoint Sites

These are areas on the SharePoint intranet where teams can collaborate, search for, and save important information. Employees can invite others to work on a site with them, granting access based on department, location, common tasks, and more.

The advantage of this centralization? Previously, data points were scattered across your organization, residing in various employee inboxes, hard drives, or laptops. Now, they’re all consolidated and actionable.

With authorized access to a site, you can view and access information as it’s saved to the shared platform. You’ll also know where the latest document versions are located and who accessed them last.

SharePoint Search

While SharePoint eliminates the need for cumbersome, outdated filing systems, finding the exact PowerPoint you need among digital files can still be challenging.

That's where the SharePoint search tool comes in handy.

Given the volume of data your company generates daily, the thought of manually sifting through files can be overwhelming.

By simply entering the relevant keywords, the search tool quickly displays the files you need. Whether you're looking for a slideshow, an Excel spreadsheet, an audio/visual file, or a Word document, you can find it instantly.

SharePoint Lists, Libraries, and Columns

The two pillars that form the foundation of SharePoint are lists and libraries. Now that we've discussed how sites function, let's explore how users can organize content within them.

SharePoint Lists

Most often, when your teams create content in SharePoint, they’ll save it in a list.

Similar to an Excel spreadsheet, a SharePoint list consists of headings with rows of data underneath. For example, sales teams might maintain a list of prospective clients in this format.

Why use this tool instead of a simple spreadsheet? SharePoint allows team members to interact with the data in more dynamic and immersive ways, such as:

• Accessing, editing, adding to, or updating the list without starting from scratch

• Linking and synchronizing the data with Microsoft Outlook and individual users

• Organizing timelines and tasks for more efficient project management

SharePoint Document Libraries

SharePoint libraries serve as containers for your teams' individual lists. You can create a separate library for each client, partner, or internal department.

When users click on a library, they gain access to the content and documents related to that specific focus.

SharePoint Columns

When you open your lists and libraries, you’ll see the data organized into multiple columns. How do these work?

Think of these columns as file tags. While their use is more complex, their three main functions are:

• Adding extra information (metadata) to your documents

• Categorizing your documents into lists

• Organizing your documents for storage and search functions

To quickly find your data, it’s helpful to categorize your documents in multiple ways. You can organize them into several columns and assign them to various categories, even if they’re all in one site location.

From there, you can filter, sort, and group the data more intricately, making it easier for users to locate later.

Especially if your company has hundreds or thousands of employees creating, storing, and editing documents, columns can add nuance to how you store this content.

Core SharePoint Site Functionalities

Once the site is up and running, you’ll notice a few core functions available immediately. These include:

• Conversations: A private message board for your team members

• OneNote Notebook: A place for employees to contribute and save ideas

• Documents: Where you’ll store and share documents

• Site Pages: Custom web pages for your teammates

Using a SharePoint Library

From within your site, find the “Documents” tab on the left-hand menu.

Click on the “+ New” button to add files to an existing library or create a new one. If you add an Office file, it will open in the appropriate web app. For non-Office files, you have three options:

• Open and preview it if it’s a web-friendly file type (e.g., PDF)

• Download it to your device and open it with the right program

• Open it in the appropriate web app if you’re using Windows

How does that last part work? Windows and SharePoint communicate, so even if you don’t have the Office suite installed, Windows still recognizes the app to use.

When you access and adjust a file within a library, you can do so simultaneously with others. This simultaneous editing feature is a modern upgrade to the old “checkout” process used by former SharePoint members.

However, you can still “check out” a file to lock editing by others during your session. This way, no one can save a new version of the file while you’re working on it. They can still download and work on it, but you’ll need to press “check-in” before they can save their version.