Bringing order to the ranks with SharePoint Advanced Management

Microsoft 365 is growing at a pace where files, sites, permissions, and sharing can quickly take on a life of their own if you’re not paying attention. Over time, organizations often end up with hundreds—sometimes thousands—of SharePoint sites that have been used, are still in use, or where no one really knows who owns them anymore. And with a bit of Copilot added on top, this becomes even more critical: poor data quality leads to poor AI quality—it’s as simple as that.

To regain some of that control, Microsoft has launched SharePoint Advanced Management (SAM)—a toolbox for cleaning up, securing, and governing SharePoint and OneDrive. SAM is designed with a focus on three core tasks.

Prevent content sprawl - Content spreading without control

Manage the content lifecycle - Everything from old project sites to outdated sharing

Gain control over access and permissions - Across the entire organization

And the best part?If you have Microsoft 365 Copilot, you already have access to almost all SAM features.

❌ Not included in the SAM package via the Copilot license

Restricted Site Creation

This requires the full SAM license to limit who is allowed to create SharePoint sites.

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Manage content before it manages youContent Sprawl Management

SharePoint Advanced Management helps you identify and handle content that grows without control. Microsoft highlights three core capabilities: site ownership policies, reports, and lifecycle rules.

For example, an inactive site policy can run in simulation mode to show all inactive sites within a given time interval. When switched to active mode, it can set those sites to read only, as in my example. You can also choose to enable an archiving function after a read only phase.For instance: archive sites after three months in read only.

New this year is the ability to get AI insights on policies after they have collected data. These AI insights analyze owners, data, and activity across the sites.

To avoid ending up with ownerless sites, it is also recommended to set up a Site Ownership Policy.In the example below, I have configured a policy that requires a minimum of two site owners. If there are fewer than two owners, a notification is sent to the existing owner and to an administrator.

As with the policy mentioned above, you can choose to set the site to read only and or read only with archiving after a defined number of days.

The final policy you can define is Site Attestation. This policy requires the owner of a defined site to attest that the site is still active within a specified time window, using the same rules and outcomes as the two policies above.

This means that site owners or administrators perform regular reviews to verify and confirm that the site information is correct. This includes whether the site is still needed, who the owners and members are, and the site’s permissions and sharing settings.

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Permissions and sharing

One of the biggest risks in Microsoft 365

Incorrect sharing is one of the most common sources of unintentional data leakage.

SharePoint Advanced Management provides the following controls:

• Permission Insights at site level: Visibility into users, groups, and external sharing.

• Sharing link reports: Identify outdated links, open links, or links shared externally.

• User level permission reporting: Provides detailed insights down to the individual user level.

SAM provides a solid set of reports that offer concrete action points:

• Agent Insights - Shows how agents, including AI agents, use content.

• App Insights - Provides an overview of applications that have access to SharePoint.

• Change history reports - Overview of configuration changes and administrative actions.

• OneDrive account reports - Identifies unused or unmonitored personal sites.

SharePoint Advanced Management is not just another set of buttons in the admin portal. It is the foundation for maintaining control over SharePoint.

Whether you want to clean up before Copilot enters the picture, or simply prevent sites from growing in every direction, SAM gives you the tools that actually get the job done.

Tidiness is not a project. It is a habit.

SAM makes that habit both easier and a little less boring. 👌😎

Bjørnar&AI