Prerequisites for Office 365 implementation experts

When an organization starts with the implementation of Office 365, there is a need for different roles. Each of them puts its own requirements on people to add value for the Office 365 onboarding plus implementation.

Below an enumeration of expertise that I - on personal notice - consider as relevant to help in making Office 365 introduction succesful.

Office 365 / SharePoint Online project lead

• Project lead at minimal 1 medium to large organization that successful transitioned to Office 365 / SharePoint Online
• Familiar with the different stakeholders and their respective stakes/interests in Office 365 implementation project:
  • Business users
  • Security
  • SharePoint Operations
  • Identity Management team
  • Network team
• Office 365 / SharePoint Governance knowledge + practical experience
• Able to setup project planning, monitor the team/project progress, and adjust appropriate in case of issues
• Structured work approach / attitude; yet also goal-oriented / pragmatic
• Clear communication to different audiences on plans, progress and status of the project

Office 365 security expert

• Familiar with the full range of Office 365 Security Controls
  • Access Control
  • Information Rights Management: concepts + implementation
  • Incident Response & Recovery
• Experienced with Office 365 Identity Management + Provisioning aspects
• Familiar with different possible authentication models (username/password, multi-factor authentication via hard- and soft-tokens), and how-to setup conditional access

Office 365 / SharePoint Online implementation + functional consultant

Understand the service on functional level: how to use the functional building blocks, their positioning, their limitations

• At minimal 1 year, demonstrable working experience with setting up Office 365 / SharePoint Online sites + functional solutions
• Familiar with configuration aspects in SharePoint Online
• Familiar with global changes and deviations of SharePoint features / functions on-prem (preferable 2010) versus Online ‘Branding’
  • Lists and Libraries
  • Workflows
• Communicate with business to analyze functional needs, and translate how to deliver on these within Office 365 landscape
• Preferred: hands-on experience within migration from SharePoint on-prem to Online

Office 365 / SharePoint Online technical consultant

• At minimal 1 year, demonstrable working experience with developing custom business solutions in Office 365 / SharePoint Online
  • Client-side and/or Server-side
• Working experience with developing SharePoint Add-Ins (on-prem and/or online)
  • Client-side and Server-side
• Experienced with Office 365 development model
  • Office 365 API
  • Azure Authentication handling (adal.js + OAuth)
  • Azure configuration + deployment
  • PowerShell scripting
• Preferred: practical experience with the new SharePoint Framework (SPFx)