Publishing and managing company documents

[Basquiat]

I have a general question about managing company policies and other documents across sites.

Using SharePoint online we have a HR site with a “Policies” document library, where for example a personnel policy is stored. We also have site for the Credit department where a credit policy is stored. And a site where a Compliance manual is stored etc. Everyone don’t have access to all the sites, since they are mostly department specific.

We employ a Compliance Manager, it is her job to update all these policies.

My question is; what is the best way to manage these docs and rollout the latest versions to the company?
1) should the Compliance Manager have full access to all these sites’ document libraries. And the others who should have access, have Read access. Enable versioning and so everyone who should have access, will have the latest version?
My concern with this is that the Compliance Manager (who are not the most tech savvy) would have to remember on which site and which document library all the documents she is supposed to maintain is saved.

2) or do I create a site for the Compliance Manager where all the policies are stored in one document library, where only she has access to it. Then we she updates a document, she forward a pdf version to the manager of the relevant department and that manager would upload it to the department’s document library? It feels like this sort defeats the purpose and it would be hard to manage whether all the latest versions are being in use.

3) or is it possible to do option 1 where the documents are saved across various sites’s libraries, but have the Compliance Manager sync all the documents (if it is possible to sync a single document) or libraries to somehow have a central view of all the docs she responsible for? Although I assume her view of that would then be in windows file explorer and not a view from within SharePoint.

4) or am I on the wrong track and there is just a different and way to do this?

[#2]

Kind of depends on audience if everyone can read those policies or just the departments that they are for. If the later I would put them on the sites and just give edit rights to the policies to compliance manager. Compliance manager can then utilize search and just look for the policy easily that was.

If everyone can access the policies then you could either do a library for all policies and provide permission and link to this from a company portal or you can even do the sAme with the documents on each department but have a quick link or global nav menu for policies and just link to them. If the compliance manager has edit rights then they can just use that menu too to get to the files.

As for syncing. Soon if not already onedrive is rolling out a “add to my files” feature where they can just add that files to onedrive and it’s a pointer per say to the original file. Then these files sync with your onedrive client. So it basically lets you selectively add files shared with you or you have access to, to your onedrive as a “linked” file.

[#3]

Hi @Chris Webb 

Everyone will not have access to the policies, so I won't be able to save all the policies in one library.

But from your reply, I gather that you don't think a library (to which only the compliance officer has access) with all the work/editable policies files - where she then distributes a copy of the latest final versions to the various departments - is the right way to go. 

Seems like "add to Onedrive" will be rolled out to all by the end of September. From what I've seen it will apply to folders but not individual files.

Since it is not yet available on my tenant, I guess I'll add a Policies document to sites where applicable. She can then sync those libraries or else maybe tag the docs in a way that they are easy for her to search.

[#4 · Accepted solution]

Power automate is always an option where the compliance manager has their copies and you can setup a flow to copy / replace the policy. Just add the policy URL as a column to their library. Then have for selected item flow where it reads the URL column for the destination of the save file action and then the policies can be modified till ready then published. Little bit of work but not bad if you know flow basics.