This post continues on the Power Platform Admin Essential Checklist and focuses on the “Manage” pillar.
MANANGE
Managing Power Platform involves ensuring a structured environment strategy that defines purposes, regulates access, and aligns with governance policies. It requires meticulous attention to security, compliance, and licensing to safeguard data and control costs effectively. Additionally, a well-defined development lifecycle, including version control and change management, facilitates the creation, testing, and deployment of solutions, enabling organizations to harness the full potential of Power Platform while maintaining control and efficiency.
The following aspects must be covered as a part of the Power Platform management:
Assigning Power Platform admins is essential for maintaining security, governance, and effective management of the platform, ultimately helping organizations maximize the benefits of Power Platform while minimizing potential risks.
Learn why assigning admins is important.
User management in Power Platform involves various tasks and responsibilities to ensure that users have the appropriate access and permissions while maintaining security and compliance.
User management is a critical aspect of Power Platform administration, as it helps organizations maintain a secure, well-organized, and efficient environment while enabling users to leverage the platform’s capabilities effectively.
What are the main aspects of the user management? Read here.
Establishing a license assignment strategy is important for optimizing costs, ensuring user adoption, and governance. The most common license assignment strategies include assigning licenses manually, bulk license assignment, group-based licensing, and by request (and approval).
Read more about different ways to assign licenses here.
A Power Platform environment strategy encompasses the planning and structuring of environments within the Power Platform ecosystem, defining their purpose, scope, and governance. It also includes guidelines for development, testing, and deployment processes to ensure a well-organized and controlled environment for creating, managing, and maintaining Power Platform solutions. Read more here.
Dataverse for Teams is a low-code data platform that allows users to create custom apps, bots, and flows in Microsoft Teams using Power Apps, Power Virtual Agents, and Power Automate. When a team owner adds this capability to their team, a Microsoft Power Platform environment with a Dataverse for Teams database is created and linked to their team.
To manage Dataverse for Teams environments, you can use the Power Platform admin center. Read more.
Many customers wonder how can Power Platform be made available to their broader business and supported by IT? Governance is the answer. It aims to enable business groups to focus on solving business problems efficiently while complying with IT and business compliance standards. The following content is intended to structure themes often associated with governing software and bring awareness to capabilities available for each theme as it relates to governing Power Platform.
Tools
The Power Platform is a suite of tools that enables users to build custom business applications and automate workflows. The following are some of the main Power Platform management tools:
Power Platform Admin Center
This is a unified portal for administrators to manage environments and settings for Power Apps, Power Automate, Power Pages, Power Virtual Agents, and customer engagement apps (such as Dynamics 365 Sales, Dynamics 365 Customer Service, and Dynamics 365 Marketing).
PowerShell cmdlets
These offer a way to automate both management and monitoring tasks using PowerShell. These cmdlets can be used in a sequence to automate multistep administrative actions.
Management and Admin Connectors
These offer the ability to use the platform’s own tools to manage and monitor itself. Part of the released available 275+ connectors and approval process capabilities are five admin-specific connectors you should be familiar with.
Azure security capabilities in Power Platform
These provide secure and governable assets. Prioritize speed and maximize organizational knowledge without compromising security.
The Microsoft Power Platform CoE Starter Kit is a collection of components and tools that are designed to help you get started with developing a strategy for adopting and supporting Microsoft Power Platform, with a focus on Power Apps, Power Automate, and Power Virtual Agents.
Why assigning admins is important?
Security: Power Platform can handle sensitive data and critical business processes. Having designated administrators ensures that proper security measures are in place, such as managing user access, permissions, and data protection.
Governance: Admins play a key role in enforcing governance policies. They can control who can create apps, flows, and automations, ensuring that these resources align with the organization’s standards and compliance requirements.
Monitoring and Maintenance: Admins are responsible for monitoring the platform’s health, performance, and usage. They can proactively address issues, maintain optimal performance, and troubleshoot problems when they arise.
User Support: Admins serve as a central point of contact for users who need assistance with Power Platform. They can provide guidance, training, and support, helping users leverage the platform effectively.
License Management: Admins can manage licenses and subscriptions, ensuring that the organization is using its Power Platform resources efficiently and cost-effectively.
Customization and Configuration: Admins can customize and configure the Power Platform to meet specific business needs. They can create custom connectors, data sources, and solutions tailored to the organization’s requirements.
Risk Mitigation: By assigning admins, organizations reduce the risk of unauthorized access, data breaches, and non-compliance with regulations. Admins can enforce policies to mitigate these risks effectively.
Resource Allocation: Admins can allocate resources efficiently, preventing overuse or abuse of Power Platform resources, which can impact performance and costs.
What are the main aspects of a user management?
User Provisioning and Onboarding: This involves adding and setting up new users within the Power Platform environment, including assigning licenses, roles, and access permissions.
User Access Control: Managing user permissions and controlling their access to specific Power Platform resources, data, and functionalities.
Security Groups: Organizing users into security groups or roles to simplify permission management and ensure consistent access control.
Multi-factor Authentication (MFA): Enforcing MFA to enhance security by requiring users to provide multiple forms of verification during login.
License Management: Ensuring that users have the appropriate licenses and subscriptions for the Power Platform components they need, while optimizing license usage.
User Monitoring and Auditing: Monitoring user activities, tracking changes, and maintaining audit logs to ensure compliance, security, and accountability within the Power Platform environment.
What's the license assigning strategy for Power Platfrom?
Assigning licenses for Power Platform should align with your organization’s specific needs, roles, and licensing options. Here’s a general strategy for assigning licenses for Power Platform:
Understand User Roles: Identify the distinct roles and responsibilities within your organization that require access to Power Platform, such as app creators, administrators, data analysts, etc.
License Types Evaluation: Familiarize yourself with the available license types for Power Platform and their specific capabilities, usage rights, and costs.
Match Licenses to Roles: Assign the appropriate license types to each user role based on their specific needs and responsibilities within the organization.
Evaluate Licensing Costs: Assess the overall licensing costs associated with each license type and user role to ensure alignment with your budget.
Use License Bundles: Consider bundled licensing options or Microsoft 365 plans that include Power Platform licenses for cost-effective solutions that meet your requirements.
Monitor License Usage: Regularly track license usage to ensure that assigned licenses are aligned with user activities and remove licenses from users who no longer require them to optimize costs.
Security and Compliance: Implement security measures, such as role-based access controls, to protect against unauthorized access and ensure compliance with data protection regulations.
Training and Support: Provide training and support tailored to users’ roles and licenses, ensuring that they understand how to effectively and responsibly use Power Platform.
Environment strategy considerations
Here are six key considerations for a Power Platform environment strategy:
Scope and Purpose: Clearly define the purpose and scope of each environment, specifying whether it’s for development, testing, production, or other specialized needs.
Security and Access Control: Implement robust security measures, including role-based access control (RBAC), to regulate user access and permissions within each environment.
Governance and Compliance: Establish governance policies and compliance standards to ensure that environments adhere to organizational rules, industry regulations, and best practices.
Development Lifecycle: Define and document the development, testing, and deployment processes for solutions within each environment, emphasizing version control and change management.
Licensing and Cost Management: Carefully manage licensing costs by assigning appropriate licenses to each environment and regularly monitoring usage to optimize spending.
Environment Lifecycle: Plan for the creation, duplication, archival, and retirement of environments as organizational needs evolve over time, ensuring efficient resource allocation.
Managing Dataverse for Teams
You can manage the data governance policies for newly created Dataverse for Teams environments by selecting one of these approaches:
- Create a policy spanning all environments except selected ones
- Keep the available connectors in this policy limited to
- Create a policy specifically for Dataverse for Teams
You can also manage the following settings and actions for Dataverse for Teams environments:
- Licensing and restrictions
- Environment lifecycle
- User access to Dataverse for Teams environments
- Dataverse for Teams environment settings and actions
Please note that Dataverse for Teams is included as an entitlement with standalone Power Apps, Power Automate, Power Virtual Agents, Power Pages, and Dynamics 365 licenses. Trial licenses can be used to license users in Managed Environments, with the restrictions specific to these types of licenses. To learn more about Managed Environment licensing, see Licensing and Licensing overview for Microsoft Power Platform.
Setting up Power Apps and Power Automate admin and governance can be a complex and challenging task, with various aspects like user management, security, compliance, and environment management requiring careful consideration. To establish a robust foundation and avoid potential pitfalls, it’s advisable to seek the expertise of professionals who specialize in Power Platform administration and governance.
Technomancy experts can help your organization navigate the intricacies of these tools, ensure best practices are followed, and tailor solutions to specific business needs, ultimately facilitating a smoother and more effective deployment of Power Apps and Power Automate within the organization.
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