New Fiscal year for Microsoft comes with new announcements.
Yesterday I saw a blog post from Chris McNulty, Sr. Product Marketing Manager for SharePoint and Office 365 at Microsoft, on “Support update for SharePoint 2010 workflows in Microsoft 365.” I also saw an article in the support pages of Microsoft titled “SharePoint 2010 Workflow Retirement.” Undoubtedly this will create major disruptions to any and all customers that have been using SharePoint Online 2010 (aka Classic / Legacy) Workflows. The impacts will take effect in 2 phases:
- Starting August 1st, 2020, SharePoint 2010 workflows will be turned off for newly created tenants.
- Starting November 1st, 2020, Microsoft will begin to remove the ability to run or create SharePoint 2010 workflows from existing tenants.
It’s worth noting right here that SharePoint 2013 workflows are not too far away from this demise as well, though not as severely impacted:
- Starting in November 2020, SharePoint 2013 workflows will be turned off by default for new tenants.
Customers that elect to continue to use SharePoint 2013 workflows may continue via a PowerShell script that Microsoft will provide which will activate the SharePoint 2013-based workflow engine for tenants as requested.
Impact to Independent Software Vendors (ISV’s)
For ISV’s that have built their platform around SharePoint 2013 workflows or provided wrappers that used as the underpinning SharePoint 2013 workflows, will most certainly also be affected and I think that may be one reason why Microsoft is providing this ‘out’ to allow SharePoint 2013 workflows to continue. The ISV’s will need time to refactor, adjust and update their offerings. In the coming days, I will be reaching out to ISV partners to ascertain their roadmap for change based on this recent announcement.
What Does This Mean for You?
It’s not all doom and gloom, but there will be significant effort in the next few months. There are things that you can do on your own, but I would recommend that you work with your System Integration partners such as Withum on charting a proper course within this month as August 1st is literally weeks away.
Steps you can take on your own include running the SharePoint Modernization Scanner, which among other things will tell you just how many classic/ legacy workflows are in use. The output of the utility provides an Excel report from which customers will get output to show:
- Distribution of legacy workflows across SharePoint 2010 and SharePoint 2013 workflows
- Which sites and lists use legacy workflows
- Power Automate (Microsoft Flow) upgradability score which gives you some understanding on how suitable the workflow in question may be upgraded to Power Automate.
Please note, that this may not be as easy as it looks. The tool does require some work to install and configure and permissions may require you to set up an App in Azure Active Directory and grant levels of access to your Farm that may require expert advice and considerations. That’s where we can help.
The Clock is Ticking. What Should You Do Now?
If you are skilled enough, pull down the tool, go through the steps and read the report generated. Chart a plan of action for migration and effectuate it as soon as possible. I would then suggest an iterative migration strategy that takes into account the level of complexity of the workflow as well as opportunities for improvement, after all, it makes no sense taking an old and decrepit workflow that you know you need to improve from one environment to the next or one platform to the next to be precise. Time in this case is not on our side, if you need consultative help, my team and I are available to provide an assessment and guide you through all of this. While the path to modernize your workflow is not as straight forward as it looks, there are plenty of options available:
- Microsoft 365 Power Automate, Power Apps and Azure Logic Apps, if you want to stay in the Microsoft platform.
- Nintex Workflow Cloud may be a good path if you are already using Nintex for Office 365.
- Other platforms such as Webcon BPS with integrated, form, database and workflow engine.
- Other ISV Tools or third-party solutions.
Reach out to us online to schedule a complimentary assessment.
Digital and Technology Transformation
Additional Resources:
Support update for SharePoint 2010 workflows in Microsoft 365
