From Notepad to SharePoint Admin: My Accidental Journey Into the World of Intranets

If you had told me a few years ago that I’d become the go-to person for SharePoint support at not just one, but two companies, I probably would’ve laughed—and then Googled what SharePoint even was. My journey into the world of collaboration platforms wasn’t planned. It started with a bit of curiosity, a lot of trial and error, and one helpful director who needed a hand posting images—he’s the same one who unknowingly launched my dive into GIMP when he once asked me to edit a photo before I even knew how (a story I share in another post).

A Humble Start With Notepad

Before I ever touched SharePoint, I was writing HTML in Notepad and manually refreshing pages to see if my code worked. I had just enough JavaScript and CSS to make things interesting, but I wasn’t building anything fancy. I was tinkering—learning the basics, breaking things, and figuring out how to fix them.

Eventually, I leveled up to managing my own VPS servers. This opened the door to hosting my own websites and diving into tools like WordPress. I learned how to install it on both Linux desktops and cloud-based VPS instances. Nothing I did was overly advanced, but it was hands-on, and more importantly, it was mine. I didn’t read manuals—I broke things and put them back together. That’s always been my style.

Enter SharePoint (Stage Left)

My real break came thanks to a director at work who frequently asked me to help update our company’s SharePoint site. At the time, I didn’t even have admin access—I was just the “go-to tech guy” willing to figure things out. Eventually, they gave me full admin rights. Suddenly, I had the keys to the kingdom… even though I barely knew what door they unlocked.

Despite the learning curve, I was hooked. SharePoint felt like a messy, corporate cousin of the DIY web I was used to. It was more rigid, but it had its charm—and power. One of the first things I dove into was managing permissions, which in SharePoint is an art form in itself. I quickly realized how crucial access control was, especially in a corporate environment where one wrong click can expose a lot more than just someone’s vacation photos.

From Local to the Cloud

In 2018, our company was acquired. A new name, a new culture, and—lucky for me—a new SharePoint site came with it. Surprisingly, the new SharePoint admin (who’s absolutely amazing and has become a good friend through our SharePoint collaboration adventures) decided to keep my admin rights intact. This gave me a fresh opportunity to support a new group of coworkers, many of whom had never touched SharePoint before.

This version of SharePoint was different. The old one was on-prem—clunky, slow, but familiar. The new one? Cloud-based, sleek, and fully integrated with Office 365. Despite the upgrade, we never fully shut down the on-prem version, so I found myself straddling two worlds: classic and modern SharePoint. It’s been an interesting ride ever since.

Lessons From the SharePoint Trenches

What I love about this journey is how organically it happened. I didn’t go to school for SharePoint. I didn’t sit through hours of formal training. I got my hands dirty, figured things out as they came, and slowly built up the knowledge to be helpful.

Along the way, I became the person people turned to—not because I had all the answers, but because they knew I’d find them.

Final Thoughts

If you’re like I was, staring at SharePoint with no idea where to start, don’t panic. Learn by doing. Try. Fail. Try again. Whether it’s managing permissions, customizing pages, or troubleshooting issues, the best way to learn is often by just diving in.

My path into SharePoint wasn’t planned, but it turned out to be one of the most unexpected and rewarding parts of my IT career so far.