We all miss our old, trusty global navigation. But there’s good news, Hub sites can help us get back consistency in our intranet navigation. Let’s find out what Hub sites are, what they aren’t, and how we can best leverage them in modern architecture.

1. Rethinking Intranet
NavigationJoy T. Apple
PAIT Group
jtapple@paitgroup.com
@joyofsharepoint

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3. Event sponsored by
Martha Castiglia in
Loving Memory of Tom
4282 Esplanade Court,
San Diego, CA 92122

4. Rethinking Intranet
Navigation
Hub Sites for the Modern World

5. Joy T. Apple
Modern Workplace
Strategist
Service Adoption
Specialist
@joyofsharepoint
• 11+ years working with SharePoint and
other Microsoft products & technologies
• Farm Administrator
• Trainer
• Consultant
• Published author
• SharePoint Administrator’s Pocket Guide
from SAM’S Publishing
• Validation and Technical editing on several
Microsoft Press books
• Host of the Joy of SharePoint webinar
series

6. We’re Used to Thinking This Way…
The “home page” would
be the top-level site of
our intranet site
collection, with
department sites being
subsites.
All subsites inherit the
top-level site’s navigation.

7. Our department sites would have had their own subsites, representing the various depart teams.

8. Giving Us
Something
Like This

9. The Pros and Cons
• Global/inherited navigation
• That’s all I got
Pros
• Everything in one content database
• A LOT of broken permission
• No clear view of all our sites from Central Admin
• Did I mention the broken permissions?
• Navigation still had to be manually adjusted in certain sites
• Re-orgs/Moving subsites was a nightmare
Cons

10. Or Maybe We Did It This Way
Every department site is a separate site collection. Each intra-department team gets their own subsite.

11. One site Collection Per Department. Better,
but…
No global navigation
between site
collections.
Had to manually configure
for each.
Broken permissions
within the site
collection
No true view of all our
sites in Central
Administration
But hey, being able to
organize site collections
into different content
databases was great.

12. Modern SharePoint Calls
For Modern Architecture.
It’s time to un-nest our sites!

13. The Challenge
of Flat
Architecture
GONE ARE THE DAYS OF SUBSITES
INHERITING NAVIGATION FROM
PARENT SITES.
EACH SITE IS ITS OWN, STAND-
ALONE SITE IN THE ARCHITECTURE.
THIS CAN PRESENT US WITH THE
CHALLENGE OF RE-THINKING HOW
OUR INTRA-DEPARTMENT SITES
WILL BE STRUCTURED AND RELATE
TO EACH OTHER

14. Corp.
Home Site
Help
Desk
App
Support
Exchange
Security
Information
Technology
Manufacturing
Finance/
Accounting
Human
Resources
The idea of flattening or un-nesting
Our site structure can make it seem like our
sites are just “out there” somewhere, floating
around.
I assure you that this isn’t the case. They’re
still contained within the confines of our
tenant.

15. In Fact, They’re More
Like Lego Blocks.
Sites are now built to be modular!
We can move them around as
needed, and not be built into a
corner.
Gone are the days of living in fear of
a re-org!
Gone are the tangled knots of
broken permissions between
subsites.

17. I get it, but let’s be real…
global navigation was
always a bit of a myth.
We always had to go add
links manually
somewhere in our
environment.

18. Enter Hub
Sites
Hub sites enable sites that are
related by topic, or scope to
be joined to a central “Hub.”
Sites are not nested under the
Hub site, they’re associated
using Hub functionality.

19. To Be Clear,
a Hub site is
not a type of
site.
It’s a feature.
Either a communication or team site can be “hubified.”
There are 2 types of modern SharePoint
sites
Communication
sites
Team sites

20. What We Get
With a Hub
Site
Consistent
navigation
• Not “global,” but
close!
Consistent
branding
Focused search
results
Content rollups
• News
• Events
• Associated Sites
• Highlighted
content

21. What We
Don’t Get With
a Hub Site
Remember: Every time you go to a
different /sites/ you’re crossing
into a new security boundry
Inherited permissions
Each site continues
to have individual
site permissions
Why? Because each
site is a site collection
Announced at Ignite 2019 – Centralized permissions management for Hubs & their joined sites

22. Not Necessarily This
We’re not trying to create a hub for
every possible grouping of sites
HR Hub
site
HR
Comm
Site
HR
Team
Site
Finance
Hub
site
Finance
Comm
Site
Finance
Team
Site
IT Hub
site
IT
Comm
Site
IT Team
Site

23. More Like This
Projects
Hub
Project
Site
Project
Site
Project
Site
Project
Site
Consider a hub for:
• Shared Services sites
• Manufacturing plants
• Projects
• Dept/Teams with multiple locations
(and a site per location)
Anywhere where the architecture is
wide in similar topic/scope, use a hub
site to unify.

24. How PAIT Does It Identify areas where the architecture has a central focus but requires
several sites for teams/groups and permission requirements

25. Keep in Mind
We can’t join a hub site to another hub site…
But we can fake it! Yay!

26. Use Your Navigation!
SharePoint navigation is editable. Place other hub site links in the primary or home page navigation so it’ll be “global.”

27. Add Home Page Links
Wherever Needed
So yes, we are having to
manually add links here and
there.
But haven’t we always had to;
even with Global Navigation?

28. Let’s Make a Hub
To the Admin Portal!

29. Registering Hub Sites
• Any site in the modern SharePoint admin
portal can be registered as a hub site. You
can even designate who can associate sites
with a hub.

30. Managing Existing Hub Sites
• Existing Hub sites can be renamed under Edit hub site settings
• Hub site managers can also be edited
• Existing Hubs can be unregistered
• Joined sites will be un-joined

31. Modular, like
Legos
The end result is we now have modular site structure. It’s practically impossible to
build ourselves into a corner.
Need a landing page for a group of people and their sites? Register a hub.
Don’t like a particular hub? Unregister it.
Have a re-org and some sites now report to other departments? Unjoin from one
hub and rejoin to another, as needed.
…just like Legos!

32. Platinum Sponsor
Gold Sponsor
Silver Sponsor
Web Sponsors
Thank you to our Sponsors!
Raffle Prize Sponsor Venue Sponsor

33. Event sponsored by
Martha Castiglia in
Loving Memory of Tom
4282 Esplanade Court,
San Diego, CA 92122

34. Joy T. Apple
jtapple@paitgroup.com
@JoyOfSharePoint