UNICC’s diverse teams go above and beyond the call of duty to seek excellence in everything they do, providing superior service relationships that Clients and Partner Organizations expect and deserve – this was clear in the recent rollout of Microsoft 365 Teams planned and implemented in close collaboration with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).
WIPO, the global forum for intellectual property services, information, policy and cooperation, requested in September 2021 UNICC’s support with the migration and implementation of over 2000 users from Skype for Business (SfB) to Microsoft 365 Teams as the main collaboration tool for the organization.
May I take this opportunity to share my appreciation to UNICC colleagues involved in the Microsoft 365 Teams migration project. Your dedication, commitment and hard work made this project a big success for ITTD and WIPO.
Marina Stavridi, Client Services Delivery Manager, WIPO
The UNICC Messaging, Teams and Skype teams worked with WIPO’s IT Technical Operations unit (ITTD) to collaborate on all aspects of the project, including the deployment of Microsoft 365 Teams application to WIPO workspace endpoints, planning and execution of user migration, decommissioning of the on-premise Skype for Business infrastructure and early life support.
The UNICC Communications and Learning teams provided communication and learning templates such as emails, use cases and How-to guides to support the end-user communications and planning of training activities.
The project took ten months to complete, and all project objectives were met. All Skype for Business users migrated to Microsoft 365 Teams and the Skype for Business infrastructure was decommissioned. This was possible due to the dedication and hard work of the UNICC technical team and the excellent collaboration between UNICC and WIPO.
I would like to thank each of the team members who were involved in the project for their contributions and continued support. A good example of a well delivered project.
Benoit Buisson, Project Manager, UNICC
The project consisted of an upgrade from the Microsoft Skype for Business Unified Communications tool to M365 Teams for WIPO users, including project management, technical resource support and Communications team support for change management and user adoption. Project components served to:
- Define Skype for Business SFB and Teams coexistence and interoperability strategy
- Validate/provision Microsoft 365 licenses
- Validate current WIPO Microsoft environment and network readiness
- Produce the Teams architecture components and implement the defined information security requirements
- Develop formal User Acceptance test plans (capture use cases)
- Prepare IT Staff – Train the trainer sessions (UNICC)
- Ensure user support (on-site, Service Desk, UNICC, Microsoft, etc.)
- Define the user migration groups and phases (pilot, UAT, final migration)
- Define timelines, upgrade batches & users per batch, goals and OKRs
- Prepare WIPO environment and support for Teams upgrade
- Prepare a user readiness plan, consisting of awareness/communications, adoption materials, training sessions and workshops and support activities.
The Teams upgrade environment ensured to:
- Update network infrastructure and firewalls and ensure access to O365
- Verify Microsoft Teams tenant configuration Review & adjust Teams settings, definitions and policies (e.g. Meetings, Channels, Apps)
- Review & adjust security requirements (e.g. Conditional Access Policies, Guest & External access).
WIPO and UNICC then ran a Teams-Only pilot, including piloting the communication plans. Migration to Teams Only was validated, followed by User Acceptance Test, troubleshooting, corrective measures and fine tuning. The environment was reviewed, approved and implemented for the Production upgrade. Users were then upgraded in batches with appropriate communications. Component parts of the upgrade included:
- Setup and configuration of Audio-conferencing features and policies
- Reviewing and adjusting Tenant-wide security policies
- Microsoft Tenant upgrade to Teams Only mode
- Transition to operations
- management handover
- Microsoft 365 health monitoring
- Auditing, reporting and support
- Skype for Business clients retirement
- Skype for Business Environment decommissioning.
This was one of many of UNICC’s Microsoft 365 Teams migration projects. It was delivered in a timely fashion and without major disruption to the business. It was a testament to the professional experience and expertise, cost efficiency and wrap-around, integrated services from UNICC, making this project a big success for both WIPO and UNICC.
