Discover what you hold. Understand what it means.

Most organisations have more information than they realise — and more risk than they know. Our Information Audits & Discovery service reveals the truth about your data estate, so you can make confident, informed decisions.

It starts with discovery.

Information Audits and data Discovery

The challenge: You can’t manage what you can’t see

Information sprawl is one of the biggest threats to operational efficiency, compliance and decision-making. Legacy systems, unstructured repositories, shadow IT, inconsistent naming conventions, poor permissions, duplicates — and no clear map of what exists, where it lives, or what risk it carries.

Lack of visibility leads to audit failures, costly migrations and underused technologies.

Why it matters

Key Capabilities & Deliverables

  • File and data inventory with location, age, format, and ownership mapping
  • Duplicate and redundant content identification
  • Permissions and access mapping for governance readiness
  • Metadata and classification insights (manual or automated)
  • Structured reporting for leadership, IT, and compliance teams
  • Prioritised risk and remediation recommendations
  • Migration readiness assessments
  • Integration with retention and information lifecycle planning

Strategic Benefits

Continous improvement is the key to realising your investment.

Clarity
Know exactly what you have, where it is, and what it means
Risk Reduction
Identify and mitigate exposures around sensitive, outdated, or over-permissioned data
Compliance Readiness
Prepare for regulatory audits with clear, structured information mapping
Migration Confidence
Plan cloud moves, platform upgrades, or restructures with precision
Cost Efficiency
Remove digital waste and reduce storage, licensing, and infrastructure costs

Our change led approach

🤝
Engage
Stakeholder interviews and business context mapping to align on risk, scope, and goals.
🧭
Assess
Content inventories, scans, and sampling to surface metadata, structure, duplication, and access.
📊
Implement
We deliver structured findings, actionable insights, and risk-ranked recommendations.
🗂️
Embed
We support forward planning across governance, retention, migration, and security.
🔄
Support
Ongoing monitoring, re-audits, or integration into your IMaaS subscription for continuous visibility.

Case Studies

EHRC SharePoint Intranet2025-09-17T15:12:28+00:00

EHRC SharePoint Intranet

Environmental Insights Platform2025-09-01T13:43:18+00:00

Environmental Insights Platform

Transforming student and employer engagement2025-07-15T16:31:17+00:00

Transforming student and employer engagement

Cardo Group – AI data capture2025-04-04T15:18:59+00:00

Cardo Group – AI data capture

Health and Safety portal2025-03-05T15:18:01+00:00
Construction worker using Incident management software

Health and Safety portal

Construction company2024-05-14T13:52:48+00:00
SharePoint Project Sites and Site Provisioning case study

Construction company

Vickery Holman2024-05-21T10:50:39+00:00
Email routing solution with Power Automate and Sharepoint

Vickery Holman

Marine Academy Plymouth2024-03-28T15:54:57+00:00
Marine Academy Plymouth Revision management

Marine Academy Plymouth

Oil and Gas Climate Initiative2024-04-30T09:51:47+00:00
OfficeLabs casestudy OGCI

Oil and Gas Climate Initiative

Frequently asked questions

What is an information audit?
An information audit is a structured assessment of your organisation’s data estate. It identifies what information you have, where it lives, who has access, how it’s used, and what risks or value it presents.
Why is information discovery important before migration?
Discovery helps you avoid migrating redundant, outdated, or risky content. It reduces costs, shortens timelines, and ensures you only move what’s valuable — while surfacing governance or compliance issues early.
What systems or repositories can you scan?
We can assess content across file shares, SharePoint (on-prem and Online), Teams, OneDrive, legacy systems, cloud drives, and other structured or unstructured sources depending on access and tooling.
Can you identify sensitive or personal data?
Yes. We use a combination of automated tools and content sampling to identify potential personal, financial, or regulated data types — helping you address compliance obligations such as GDPR or internal risk policies.
Will this disrupt our users or systems?
No. Our audits are non-disruptive and read-only. We work closely with your IT team to ensure performance is unaffected and access is controlled securely.
What happens after the audit is complete?
You’ll receive a structured report with clear recommendations. We can then support migration, classification, retention, or governance improvements — or integrate findings into your broader information strategy.
Is this part of your IMaaS service?
It can be. Discovery can be a one-off project or a recurring part of an Information Management as a Service (IMaaS) subscription — giving you regular visibility and continuous improvement insights.

Client Results

Case Example: Pre-Migration Discovery for Investment Firm

A multinational investment firm was preparing to move to SharePoint Online but lacked a clear understanding of their existing data estate. OfficeLabs conducted a comprehensive information audit across network shares, SharePoint 2013 and legacy archives.

📈 Result: Over 40% of content was identified as redundant or low-value, reducing migration time and storage costs significantly while surfacing governance gaps in HR and operational folders.

Smarter information management for regulated industries

 

We help legal, financial, public sector and housing organisations optimise their information. Reducing risk, increasing efficiency and ensuring compliance with AI-powered automation and data governance solutions.