SharePoint policy management limitations: an honest assessment

We often get asked by potential customers if they can use SharePoint straight out of the box for effective policy management. It’s a good question and often gets asked from a number of different stances:

• Investing in SharePoint: when organisations choose to invest in Microsoft 365 then compliance teams will inevitably want to know if SharePoint is enough for compliance and can see future potential to use it.
• Little to no policy management in place: some teams have no structure in place for policy management and have been replying on email threads and shared drives. They now want to get their house in order and are looking to see if SharePoint (already being used for other areas of document management) offers an option for a more intentional approach to policy management.
• SharePoint already in use: there are already teams who are using SharePoint Online to store and distribute their policies but have reached the SharePoint policy management limitations of what they can achieve using SharePoint straight out of the box. They may have added some workflows using Power Automate, but it still isn’t enough. The majority of organisations we speak to are in this camp.
• Looking for a new policy management solution: sometimes compliance teams want to transition from an existing policy management solution which might not be fit for purpose and want to see if SharePoint is a viable option.

So, is SharePoint enough for compliance?

The answer is no. SharePoint straight out of the box is not policy management software, and it is not enough. However, it does have some features that help with compliance and policy management.

What SharePoint does well for policy management

SharePoint policy management limitations: What it cannot do without significant configuration or customisation

The ‘we’ve configured SharePoint to do it’ scenario

Many organisations have responded to these gaps by building custom Power Automate flows or even introducing custom development. Others have assigned someone to chase reviews by email and track these using a spreadsheet; this approach is highly inefficient and time-consuming.

The SharePoint policy management limitations of custom-built processes are numerous:

• they are dependent on the people who built them and that might be an external agency you no longer work with or an in-house person who has left.
• they can produce significant technical debt and a high maintenance overhead.
• they do not scale.
• they rarely produce the kind of audit trail that a serious regulatory inspection requires.

When SharePoint policy management is possible

SharePoint alone is likely workable if your organisation has:

• fewer than 50 employees.
• a small and relatively static policy library (under 20 documents).
• no serious regulatory exposure requiring formal employee attestation.
• IT resource capable of building and maintaining the configuration and workflows needed.
• a named owner to keep an eye on everything.

When you need to move beyond SharePoint

However, SharePoint policy management is unlikely to be possible for companies that don’t meet the above criteria. If you are already using SharePoint for policy management and you’re experiencing any of the following, then it will be worth looking at other options:

• Your compliance team is spending significant time chasing reviews and attestations that should happen automatically.
• Policies are lapsing unnoticed because there is no automated review cycle.
• You cannot answer ‘has everyone who needs to acknowledge this policy actually done so?’ without building a spreadsheet.
• You are preparing for an audit and cannot easily produce the evidence needed.
• You have grown beyond the size where manual tracking is manageable.
• There is no culture of compliance and policy management is not being taken seriously by stakeholders.

What Microsoft 365-native policy management looks like in practice

A Microsoft 365-native policy management solution like Xoralia has the advantage of using all the SharePoint features that support policy management but then it also fills all the gaps that come with using SharePoint Online out of the box.

A robust policy management solution built for Microsoft 365 should deliver:

• Easy access to policies from the tools that employees are using every day - Microsoft Teams, a SharePoint intranet, Outlook and Microsoft Search.
• The ability to acknowledge policies from Teams and SharePoint, as well as via mobile devices.
• Compliance dashboards that are built in Power BI.
• Flexible workflows to support policy lifecycle management including regular reviews and approvals.
• Policy owners and employees receiving notifications through Outlook.
• Use of existing Entra ID groups for targeting and notifications.
• No data leaving your Microsoft 365 tenant.
• Data residency aligns with your existing policies that already apply to your Microsoft tenant.
• Granular access to support watertight security policies.
• Automation at scale.
• And more!

SharePoint vs dedicated policy management software