What exactly does sprawl in Microsoft Teams mean?
Sprawl is a collective term referring to several aspects in Microsoft Teams:
Teams rooms:
- Anyone can create Teams teams
- Duplication of Teams teams
- Unused Teams teams
- Obsolete Teams teams
- Deserted Teams teams
- Test Teams teams
- Too many channels
- Anyone can create channels
- Goal of the channels is unclear and not communicated
Too many apps:
- Apps not approved by the company
Cluttered document repository:
- Duplication of files
- Outdated files
- Inconsistent directory structures
- Untagged files
Management of user access:
- Especially from external users
- Rights and permissions according to security criteria
Identify what causes uncontrolled growth
Creative wildness out of curiosity
Often the introduction of a collaboration platform arouses employee curiosity and playfulness. Acceptance is high, but private and public spaces, channels, chats and SharePoint Site Collections are created in an uncoordinated manner.
Sprawl due to lack of guidelines
Without corporate strategy regulating Microsoft Teams use, uncontrolled growth is inevitable.
Lack of knowledge about Microsoft Teams usage in the company
Employees need clear communication about:
- How the collaboration platform is to be used
- Which rules apply
- Which processes and workflows to follow
- Which templates exist
- Which contact persons provide support
Well hiding is duplicating
Teams Rooms created as private rooms cannot be found by other employees. This leads to identical or similar rooms being created multiple times, and synergies go unused.
It ain't over till it's over — Lifecycle Management
Projects end, but this marks the beginning of another phase for IT. Archiving project rooms, withdrawing unnecessary access, and keeping documents safe according to retention periods requires clear processes. The challenge: How does IT know when a project completes? How is removal of unneeded rooms ensured while maintaining availability of needed ones?
What problems does sprawl cause?
User acceptance
All employees should find the collaboration workplace helpful. When users cannot navigate effectively, feel unsure about choosing channels, or cannot locate private rooms, platform acceptance drops rapidly. The platform becomes seen as an annoying crutch rather than a communication hub.
Reduced productivity
Reduced acceptance results in reduced productivity across the organization. Unstructured collaboration platforms significantly limit IT department productivity. From installation to maintenance and archiving, administrative tasks increase. The IT department often becomes a bottleneck, causing unproductive waiting times.
Security risks
Authorized access should be guaranteed both internally and externally. In reality, access rights are defined at project creation but become unclear during projects and especially afterward. External user access is frequently lost sight of, opening doors for unauthorized access.
More than a third of the respondents described cooperation with external users as difficult, and in companies with more than 5,000 employees this figure was as high as 39%.
Immense administrative effort
Containing organic growth within a framework guaranteeing security and productivity poses major problems for IT. On average, effort for authorization, creation, restructuring and archiving is 8 hours per team room. Effort increases linearly with external user numbers. Starting with 250 team rooms, this corresponds to a full-time IT position dedicated to combating uncontrolled growth.
What does sprawl in Microsoft Teams actually cost?
From a business perspective, IT resources and resulting costs can be quantified precisely. Estimate team room numbers and use these empirical values as guidance:
| Task | Min hours/Teams room | Max hours/Teams room |
|---|---|---|
| Approval process | 0.25 | 1 |
| Creation | 0.25 | 2 |
| Restructuring | 1 | 3 |
| Archiving | 0.5 | 3 |
| External User Management | N/A | N/A |
| TOTAL | 2 | 9 |
When maximum freedom exists, creation and approval effort is relatively low, while restructuring and archiving quickly reach specified maximum values — sometimes exceeding them — when uncontrolled growth occurs.
External user management brings considerable ongoing costs. Collaboration with external users frequently ends, requiring their removal from respective team rooms. Effort rises linearly with external user numbers, accounting for massive operating cost proportions.
Permanently defeat sprawl — how to
1. Analysis
If collaboration platforms haven't yet been introduced, careful analysis of various uses and use cases can counteract uncontrolled growth from the start. Clear guidelines emerge regarding user freedom and necessary standards. Identify available resources and knowledge holders among native Microsoft tool experts.
2. Convert the guidelines into processes and templates
Once company rules for creating team rooms and document structures are defined, make them available through templates. This unifies and standardizes collaboration platforms across creation, maintenance, and lifecycle end.
3. Automation
Every automated process ensures compliance with pre-defined standards, prevents human carelessness, and relieves IT staff of up to 3 hours per team room.
Automatable processes include:
- Creation of teams rooms
- Creation of channels in Teams rooms
- Adaptation of Team SharePoint Site Collection based on templates
- Provision and integration of apps
- Individually adjustable metadata
- Role-dependent access rights
- Flexibly customizable approval processes
- Management of external users
- Provision of sensitivity and retention labels
- Automated keywording
- Complementary AI-based keywording
Conclusion
Sprawl extends across spaces, channels and apps in the Microsoft Teams collaboration platform. Lack of strategy, guidelines and processes encourages uncontrolled growth and hinders productivity.
Automating governance rules according to company-specific standards with a preventive Teams governance solution prevents uncontrolled growth long-term, ensures productivity, and significantly minimizes business risks. Suitable tool selection depends largely on company-specific requirements and industry specifications.
Frequently asked questions about sprawl in Microsoft Teams
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What does sprawl in Microsoft Teams mean?
Sprawl is a collective term referring to several aspects: Teams rooms (anyone can create them, resulting in duplicated, unused, obsolete, deserted, or test rooms, too many channels, and apps not approved by the company), a cluttered document repository (duplicated, outdated, or untagged files and inconsistent directory structures), and the management of user access, especially from external users.
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What problems does sprawl cause?
Sprawl reduces user acceptance (employees cannot navigate effectively and see the platform as an annoying crutch), reduces productivity across the organization and in IT, creates security risks through unclear external access, and causes immense administrative effort. Starting with 250 team rooms, the effort corresponds to a full-time IT position dedicated to combating uncontrolled growth.
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What does sprawl in Microsoft Teams actually cost?
From a business perspective, IT resources can be quantified: effort per team room ranges from 2 hours (minimum) to 9 hours (maximum), covering approval, creation, restructuring, and archiving. On top of that, external user management increases linearly with the number of external users and can account for a massive proportion of operating costs.
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How can you control sprawl in Microsoft Teams?
Three measures help: analysis of the various uses and use cases to establish clear guidelines on user freedom and standards; converting the guidelines into processes and templates to unify and standardize the platform; and automation, which ensures compliance with pre-defined standards, prevents human carelessness, and relieves IT staff of up to 3 hours per team room.
