Cloud
Cloud & Microsoft 365
Your Microsoft 365 tenant was probably set up years ago, in a hurry, by somebody who has since moved on. It has been running ever since, and nobody has looked inside it.
Who this is for, and what it fixes
Microsoft 365 was set up years ago by somebody who has moved on, and nobody has looked at it since.
If one of these sounds familiar, this is usually the right conversation.
- Your tenant was configured a long time ago and never revisited.
- You are paying for licenses and are not certain who is using them.
- Your staff work from more than one location and it shows.
- You are still running a server that only exists to hold files.
What you get out of it
- Your staff reach their mail and files from wherever they are working.
- Licenses match the people you actually employ this month.
- Somebody leaving is an offboarding routine, not a scramble for access.
- What is in the tenant is backed up, which Microsoft does not do for you.
What we do about it
We start by opening it up and telling you what is in there. Almost every tenant we inherit has licenses nobody uses, sharing settings nobody chose, and at least one account belonging to somebody who left.
Then we configure it properly. Security defaults, multi-factor authentication, sensible sharing, and a backup, because the data in your tenant is your responsibility rather than Microsoft's, which surprises most people the first time they hear it.
If you are moving to the cloud rather than tidying it up, we plan the migration around your working week. Mail, files, and the applications your business runs on move in an order that keeps you operating, and we tell you in advance which weekend will be inconvenient.
What is included
Tenant review and cleanup
What you are licensed for, what you actually use, and what is configured in a way you would not have chosen.
Migration
Mail, files, and applications moved on a schedule built around how your business runs, not around ours.
Identity management
Entra ID configured properly, with multi-factor authentication and a real process for people joining and leaving.
Microsoft 365 backup
Independent of the tenant. Retention policies are not backup, and the difference matters on the day you need it.
License optimization
You would be surprised how often a tenant is paying for a tier nobody is using. We check, and we tell you.
Ongoing administration
New starters, leavers, permissions, and shared mailboxes, handled as part of your agreement.
How it works, step by step
- We look at the tenant you already haveLicenses, mailboxes, sharing settings, and who has administrator rights. There is almost always a license being paid for somebody who left.
- We tidy the configuration before we move anythingMulti factor authentication, conditional access, and sharing rules first. Migrating into a badly configured tenant just moves the problem somewhere newer.
- We migrate in an order that fits your weekMail, then files, then the rest, planned around when your business can least afford a distraction, and reversible at each stage.
- We manage it and back it up from then onLicense counts reviewed rather than renewed on autopilot, and a real backup of what lives in the tenant.
Backup is your responsibility, not Microsoft's
Microsoft keeps the service running. What happens to your data inside it, including a file somebody deleted three months ago or a mailbox emptied by someone who should not have had access, is on you. Retention policies help and they are not a backup. This is the single most common gap we find in an inherited tenant.
Common questions
How is this priced?
Two parts, and we keep them separate on purpose. Microsoft charges per user for the licenses, and we charge for managing the tenant, also per user.
Migration is a project and is quoted once we know how many mailboxes and how much data are moving.
How long does a migration take?
It depends on how much data you have and how many applications touch it. A straightforward mail and file move for a company of 30 people is usually a few weeks of preparation and one weekend of cutover. We will give you a plan with dates on it before anything moves.
Will our staff lose access while it happens?
The plan is built to avoid that, and the disruptive steps land outside working hours. We will tell you honestly which parts carry risk and what the fallback is if a step does not go the way we expect.
Can we keep some things on site?
Yes, and sometimes you should. A line-of-business application that runs badly over the internet, or equipment that has to sit next to the machine it controls, belongs where it is. Cloud for everything is a slogan, not a plan.
Often paired with
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