Helping customers untangle the Teams sprawl with Orchestry

Intergen has partnered with Orchestry to solve the governance and management issues that have arisen in the wake of Microsoft Teams deployments that have “gone viral” (as Teams was designed to do). This partnership will help Empired’s customers extract more value from their Teams environments while simplifying and streamlining the user experience. This will mean that end users can be more productive and connected to their colleagues.  

The rise of Teams
Organisations have leveraged exceptional value from Microsoft Teams, especially during the pandemic. Teams lets organisations work together more effectively from anywhere, creating a modern workspace that empowers users with unified messaging, calls, meetings and information. 

Unfortunately, the time-sensitive nature of most pandemic-driven Teams deployments meant that governance and management were largely overlooked by many businesses. Over time, this has led to Teams sprawl, where organisations have many more Teams set up than needed. In some cases, organisations have tens of thousands of Teams, many of which are longer required and in some cases, overlap with existing Teams. Access control can be complex, with many different levels of access for different purposes, leading to compliance “gaps” and the very real possibility of information being compromised. 

The governance challenge
When Teams governance is inadequate, organisations face a number of threats, including:  

• security and privacy gaps 
• information not managed in line with compliance requirements 
• duplication of work and corresponding reduction in productivity 

• complex cleaning up of unwanted Teams and Sites 
• diminished user experience, leading to workers finding alternative ways of working 
• rising IT management costs 

Addressing these problems is a complex undertaking. Microsoft Teams does provide some basic level of administration and management and will undoubtedly add more, but there’s more to the picture than just technology. Any governance solution must also address the aspects of people and process, supporting the way an organisation works. Governance solutions should be policy-based, addressing key areas including security, compliance and user experience. Governance solutions may be augmented by technology, to automate the application of policies.  

The Orchestry solution
Orchestry addresses the governance challenge by: 

• changing the conversation from ‘which tool’ to ‘what type of workspace’, reducing the confusion and complexity for business users 
• leveraging the effort expended in creating existing Teams (and SharePoint Sites) by creating templates from them 
• providing consistency and speed through automation 
• managing the entire lifecycle from creation through to archive or deletion 

Orchestry is suitable for customers with existing Teams implementations to address existing sprawl through reporting and automated, rules-based follow-up actions. It is also suitable for those “greenfield” customers who are just about to start – perhaps delayed due to the very real concerns about governance – by offering a better user experience underpinned by automated governance policies, which in turn will help to drive adoption. 

Why did Intergen choose to partner with Orchestry?
Intergen was receiving constant requests from customers to help remediate Teams sprawl and help apply governance to Teams so that they could get maximum value from it.  

Jaen Snyman, solution director, modern work, security, and Azure said, “Orchestry is a pure-play Teams product dedicated to solving Teams governance issues. Orchestry has abstracted the complexity of Microsoft 365 into a streamlined user experience. It also allows the customer to leverage the effort and work they’ve put into building their Teams environment, rather than simply throwing it away and starting from scratch. Orchestry manages the full lifecycle, from user request through to archiving”. 

“In terms of working together, Intergen has strong relationships with the top people within Orchestry, which provides opportunities to provide input and feedback to the Orchestry team. Orchestry welcomes this feedback, which speaks volumes in terms of the team’s engagement with partners.” 

A new dawn for Teams users
IT departments don’t want to spend time cleaning up or managing workspaces – the demands on their time and resources are already extensive. Similarly, business users need to be productive, have conversations with colleagues, collaborate on documents, and achieve results. Orchestry balances the needs of the business with those of IT.  

By working with Intergen and Orchestry, organisations can overcome the costs, inefficiencies, and security risks that come with Teams sprawl. Instead, they can focus on innovation, productivity, and growth. 

To find out how Intergen and Orchestry can help your business tame Teams, contact us today. We’ll start with a no-obligation assessment to develop a holistic understanding of your situation and develop a plan.