First day on the job stress: A tenant-to-tenant M365 migration and an organization-wide move to Teams
This CIO had his hands full. Not only did he just begin work with a new employer—a global manufacturing and sales organization with a small IT team—but the company had just acquired another operation. He realized he had two critical projects with very little lead time. First, a tenant-to-tenant M365 migration, integrating the acquired company into the parent organization; and secondly, migrating and training the combined 600 users to Teams, before Microsoft retired Skype for Business in two months.
It’s a given. Starting any new job usually comes with some measure of stress. But as this CIO came on board, he encountered a list of challenges that added another level of pressure. The U.S.-based organization had just acquired another company, requiring all the work that goes along with combining disparate organizations, multiple systems, and business practices. Complicated enough, but the company acquired was on another continent.
In addition, the CIO recognized that his new employer had some critical security gaps, along with outdated initiatives and technology.
Know when to call for backup
Faced with these immediate challenges, he got in touch with MicroAge’s Nathan Corrigan.
“There’s no greater compliment I can receive than when an IT leader I’ve been supporting leaves one client organization, and the first thing they do upon landing at a new company is to call me at MicroAge,” says Nathan. “I thrive on knowing that I have provided them with a level of service and value that they want to continue.”
After the CIO laid out his situation, Nathan turned to Kyle Yencer, MicroAge vice president of services and connected workforce. Together, they formed a plan to migrate, update, and educate.
When an end-of-life date is looming, experience counts
“Time was the critical factor here,” notes Kyle. “We had just two months to get the organization and its 600 users migrated from Skype for Business to Teams, get the IT team trained, and provide user training for the manufacturer’s hundreds of global employees.”
“The organization’s IT team is just a couple of people,” says Nathan. “The CIO knew there was no way they would be able to perform the migration and train all of his users. On the other hand, we do projects like migrations every day at MicroAge, so we are well-equipped to step in to alleviate the pressure and take on this kind of project.”
After migrating to Teams, Kyle and his team tackled training both the IT staff and then all the global users.
“We provided our ‘Train the IT Pros’ training, which covers all aspects of the Teams client, including an overview of Teams Admin Center, licensing for M365 and Teams Voice, and best practices,” says Kyle. “We always want to provide our clients with the knowledge and tools to be successful.”
[Related]: The Changes to Microsoft M365 Licensing You Need to Plan for Now
Turning to educate the organization’s 600 users, MicroAge Director of Cloud Services Rick Trujillo worked with the client’s IT and HR teams to schedule a series of Teams training classes. MicroAge emailed day and time options to employees, who chose the class time best for their schedules.
“We set up a site so that each employee could register themselves,” adds Nathan. “Then our Microsoft-certified Teams instructors facilitated the interactive classes—via Teams, of course!”
Tenant-to-tenant M365 migration blends two companies on two continents
After successfully migrating the organization to Teams, the MicroAge engineers integrated the newly acquired offshore company’s Microsoft 365 tenant.
Kyle and his team of service engineers deployed an advanced set of migration tools to quickly and accurately analyze and scope out the parent company’s existing M365 tenant along with the acquisition’s environment.
“These tools significantly reduced the amount of time required to migrate the tenant and allowed us to perform the work with spot-on precision,” adds Kyle. “The tools provide us with detailed insights, which in turn enable us to accurately estimate the number of licenses and the length of time the project will take.”
“The projects continue,” Nathan adds. “Up next is Intune. With such a small team, the CIO is leaning on our services capabilities. He knows we’ve got the expertise, and we move mountains—and span oceans—when necessary.”
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