Microsoft 365, set up for confidential work

Why the default setup falls short

Microsoft 365 out of the box is built for convenience. Anyone can share a file with an outside address, old sign-in methods stay on, and every staff member can often see every folder. For an office that holds client matters or patient charts, those defaults are a risk. We tighten them without making the system hard to use.

What we configure and manage

• Email: Exchange Online with strong spam and phishing filters, shared mailboxes for intake, billing and the front desk, and SPF, DKIM and DMARC records that make your domain harder to forge in a wire-fraud attempt.
• Files by matter or patient group: SharePoint and Teams libraries arranged around how you actually work, whether that is by case, closing, client or department, with permissions limited to the people on each one.
• External sharing controls: links to outside parties expire, can require sign-in and are logged, so you can see who opened a closing packet or a discovery file.
• Encryption and labels: sensitivity labels and encrypted email for documents that should never be forwarded in the clear.
• Sign-in security: MFA, conditional access that blocks risky sign-ins and legacy authentication turned off.
• Intune for laptops and phones: new machines configure themselves on first boot, company data stays separate from personal apps and a lost phone can be wiped.
• Licensing: the right plan for each role. We often find offices paying for premium licenses nobody uses, or missing the security features they need.

Working away from the desk

Lawrenceville work rarely stays in one building. Attorneys move between their office, the Gwinnett Justice and Administration Center and client meetings. Physicians and therapists split time between practice locations and the hospital campus. Project managers along Hwy 316 spend more time at job sites than at desks. Microsoft 365 handles that well when it is configured with care: files available on any managed device, Teams for quick questions and meetings, and no reliance on a VPN that drops halfway through a hearing.

Retiring the server in the back room

A lot of small offices on and around the Square still run a server bought when the firm was half its size. It holds the shared drive, a few user accounts and perhaps an accounting database. It is out of warranty, it sits in a closet with no cooling, and if it fails the office stops. Moving those files to SharePoint and OneDrive removes that single point of failure.

Some software still belongs on a server. Certain case management, practice management and accounting products run best locally or in a hosted environment. We check each application with its vendor, recommend where it should live and plan the move in stages after hours, with a tested way back if something goes wrong.

Records you may need later

Law firms and medical offices sometimes need to show who accessed a document and when, or to hold email for litigation. We set up audit logging and retention policies that match your needs, and we can help you search and export records when a request comes in.

Ongoing care

Microsoft changes features and default settings often. We track those changes, review your secure score and sign-in alerts, handle new hires and departures and adjust licenses as your team grows or shrinks. When a new associate or nurse starts, their laptop is ready with the right access on the first morning.

Moving from Google or another platform

If your office runs on Google Workspace or an older hosted email service, we can move you with email, calendars and files intact. For 10 to 50 users, most moves take a few weeks of preparation and a weekend cutover, so staff leave on Friday on the old system and start Monday on the new one.

Questions about microsoft 365 & cloud