Over the last two months we have been writing about a number of different solutions that organsations may wish to consider for recording performance appraisal, in light of the e-KSF core contract coming to an end on the 31^st March 2012 – the emerging minimalist approaches, the use of ESR and using Open Source solutions such as Totara. We would now like to turn our attention to SharePoint, which is a powerful and often under-utilised tool that is provided licence-free by Microsoft, to all English NHS Trusts. SharePoint  is already being used across the NHS for managing:

• Appraisal processes and data capture such as for appraisal dates and outcomes.
• Competency profile and job description development and management.
• Medical supervision, appraisal and revalidation processes.
• e-Portfolio using SharePoint My Site.
• Balanced scorecards and organisational objective setting.
• Information Governance tracking and processes.
• Tracking and reporting organisational audit requirements such as CQC, NHSLA, QIPP & Board Assurance.
• HR process management including sickness absence and change of circumstance.
• e-Learning content development, collaboration, management and delivery.
• Internal project management process and documentation (inc. Prince2).
• HR policy development and publication.

SharePoint is often seen as just a document storage or content management system, but more recent versions are so much more than that, moving SharePoint to become a highly configurable, workforce productivity solution and providing an enterprise-wide HR Portal and Workforce Collaboration platform. SharePoint can be configured through forms and workflows to become a bespoke, flexible and cost effective appraisal and learning tool, deployed within your own local network. So whatever your local processes involve we can replicate using SharePoint technology. Reports and customisable dashboards can then help everyone to make better, more timely decisions.

In brief, if you can describe a workforce process and/or the use of a form, SharePoint can be customised to run that process and facilitate that form to capture any required data. When we run a SharePoint enabled performance appraisal project we would typically engage with you on the following steps:

1. Help you to understand and document your processes.
2. Analyse and improve your processes (including forms, accountabilities and sign offs) so that they are effective and lean.
3. Transfer these optimised processes to SharePoint – we can often create first working versions within days of you signing off a process flow.
4. Link existing free or low-cost third party tools to add specific advanced functionality to the SharePoint system.
5. Help you embed these processes via internal communications and training programmes, backed up with robust stakeholder, change and project management.

In its simplest form then your appraisal process could involve the following:

• A single form with configured data fields, accessible on your intranet through SharePoint and/or directly from Microsoft Outlook, with branding and instructions that match your appraisal process.
• Staff can complete the appraisal form, without having to enter another username/password.
• Data is accessible for both managers and staff to comment and sign off.
• Once appraisals are completed they are submitted and stored for future reference.
• Central HR teams can fulfil reporting needs by running key reports.

We primarily like SharePoint solutions because of the control over the processes that the technology affords organisations. In addition the things that we think will make this an attractive solution for NHS organisations are:

• It utilises the historical NHS investment in the Microsoft Enterprise Wide Agreement (EWA) where Microsoft SharePoint & Office 2010 Core Client Access Licences (CALs) are provided free to all NHS organisations in England. The agreement has now come to an end but you still have access to licences that were provided under the agreement. This can help to generate massive cost efficiencies across the NHS.
• It utilises familiar technology for your workforce such as Outlook.
• It utilises single sign-on technology and therefore once you login to your network, you are also logged in to SharePoint and your customised appraisal processes.
• It is a completely configurable approach – SharePoint can be designed to reflect your exact appraisal/development processes and forms, including local branding. If processes need to change, this can be easily configured and managed, allowing you to respond quickly to business needs.
• Your IT department can maintain full control of the system, or we can help you to do this if required.
• Freely available plug-ins can turn SharePoint into a repository and player for e-learning, which will run quickly inside your organisation’s network.
• It can pull in data from other HR and corporate databases and provide you with a great Business Intelligence solution providing, for example, appraisal progress monitoring dashboards for senior managers.

So, in summary, you can cost effectively create and manage your own local appraisal process, with a familiar look and feel of Microsoft technology, give access to managers and staff with minimal login problems, all of which reduce the total cost of ownership of the system.

There are a number of things that you should consider if you are looking at SharePoint to provide a solution for recording performance appraisal (and potentially other business processes). We have listed some key ones below:

• There are resource implications for your own IT Department. Depending on how your organisation decides to use SharePoint, resource will be required to host, maintain and support the solution. However it is normally within the capability of your IT department to deploy and manage SharePoint solutions. Alternatively, we are now Microsoft partners and have two Microsoft Certified IT Professionals for SharePoint  and a number of similar associates for larger and more complex implementations,  who can help with the configuration and ongoing maintenance and support.
• There are some features within SharePoint Server 2010 that require additional licences that did not fall under the Enterprise Wide Agreement. We can advise on this if the scope of your local requirements extends to this level of functionality, e.g. some of the advanced Business Intelligence (BI) functionality falls under the Enterprise Client Access Licence (ECAL), however they are mainly not required and where they are, can be purchased on an ad-hoc basis
• SharePoint is a Swiss Army Knife of a solution – it can be made to do pretty-much whatever you need. So it’s important to be very clear about the aims and detail of the process you want to implement, before you start developing the technology, to avoid scope- and budget-creep. We would of course help you to do this as part of our engagement process.

For more information on SharePoint or to arrange a no obligation demonstration of the possibilities that this technology can provide then please contact us.

About Shaun Wilde

Shaun is our Director of Workforce Technology and has worked with Think Associates from its earliest days back in 2004. He has a specialist interest in learning technologies and in particular e-learning development, Microsoft SharePoint, and cloud-based e-learning. As a dual qualified Chartered HR & Microsoft Certified IT Professional he focuses on developing technology solutions that enable workforce productivity in the context of HR, Learning & Development. Shaun has a MBA from Manchester Business School and is a NLP Master Practitioner.

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