One of the biggest costs of any SharePoint deployment is specific design and configuration. New Zealand ECM specialist Information Leadership has developed a new answer to meeting this challenge for users of its iWorkplace platform. Design Bank launches at the Digital Workplace Conference in Auckland on 31st August.

For the over 70 organisations already using iWorkplace, Design Bank is a freely available collaboration space for them to share design blueprints and connect with other users, enabling them to create better designs as they have been tested and used elsewhere. They are also encouraged to submit ideas for enhanced features for iWorkplace, and development costs can be shared between multiple customers.

Information Leadership Director Sarah Heal says the idea behind the new Design Bank hub reflects Information Leadership’s philosophy that businesses should be empowered to build their own capability and expertise, and encouraged to design and deliver business solutions in-house to ensure they are best fit-for-purpose.

Any iWorkplace customer can use Design Bank. By contributing one or more designs they then get access to all of the resources and designs that are available.

“It’s a win-win situation for our customers that are looking to reduce costs and timeframes, and build their own internal design expertise. They don’t have to worry about paying for individual site designs for different business activities – they can access solutions that iWorkplace customers have implemented and vice versa – saving a lot of expense and time by not having to start from scratch.

“Ultimately, Design Bank enables our customers to get more from their iWorkplace investment. Not only are they able to take advantage of existing design blueprints, but we’ve created a forum for them to talk to other businesses and organisations and share best practice,” says Ms Heal.

With Information Leadership having a strong customer base in science, health, education, local authorities and core government there are many opportunities for solution designs to be reused or repurposed dramatically saving costs and reducing risk.

Solutions that are currently available in the iWorkplace Design Bank include a full intranet design, an IT operations site, a Project Management office, a team management tool, HR recruitment and policies and procedures.

Designs come from SharePoint on-premise, SharePoint 365 and the Revera C-Stack.