The challenge
Many sites, one directory to leave behind
The client is a Canadian multi-site retailer. Its sites ran on an on-premises Active Directory, with mail and files in Google Workspace and more files on local file servers. The group wanted all of it in Microsoft 365, with every workstation joined to Microsoft Entra ID and managed in Intune.
A retail site can't close for a migration. Each site has its own staff, its own devices, and its own printers. Moving them all at once would have put every site's cutover on the same weekend. Moving them in waves of one or two sites meant the method had to be repeatable, so each new wave was a known process rather than a new project.
Our approach
BITSUMMIT built the foundation first, then moved the group in waves of one or two sites, each wave with its own cutover weekend.
The foundation before the first site
Intune came first: configuration, compliance and Windows Update policies, a Conditional Access structure, and Autopilot, tested on test devices and then on a group of pilot laptops. The team also planned how user profiles would carry across the move, so people would keep their own profiles after the move.
Change management was built alongside the technology. That meant a change request template, a change management plan, a rollback plan, a risk log, and email templates. End users got training materials, quick reference guides, video training, and a self-training guide for the move from Google Workspace to Microsoft 365. A user training dry run was also held as the rollout continued.
The same weekend, site after site
Each site followed the same pattern. User accounts were created in Entra ID and Microsoft 365 from a list the client's IT team provided. Up to four data streams then ran in parallel, ahead of the cutover:
- Gmail to Exchange Online
- Google Drive to OneDrive
- Google Shared Drives to SharePoint document libraries
- The on-premises file server to SharePoint
Final delta syncs ran before the mail records changed, so recent mail and files were in Microsoft 365 when the site switched over. Then the DNS and MX records were cut over and email flow was checked.
Devices moved the same weekend. BITSUMMIT prepared a script for each user that removed the workstation from on-premises Active Directory and joined it to Entra ID. On the later waves, the client's IT team ran the scripts, with BITSUMMIT on remote support through the weekend, fixing enrollment and Intune policy issues as they came up and checking that profiles and applications came back. Printers were set up in Universal Print.
The week after
Every cutover had support behind it. Post-migration support followed each cutover weekend. The final wave closed with a review of post-cutover status.
The outcome
- Sites moved in weekend waves. Each left on-premises Active Directory and Google Workspace for Entra ID and Microsoft 365, in waves of one or two sites, each wave with its own cutover weekend.
- Up to four data streams per site. Mail and personal files at every site, plus shared drives and file server content where a site had them, landed in Microsoft 365 before the mail records changed.
- Devices joined to Entra ID during the cutover weekend. Per-user scripts moved each device, run by the client's IT team on the later waves, with BITSUMMIT on remote support.
- A method the group could repeat. The same pattern of accounts, parallel syncs, cutover weekend, and follow-up support carried from wave to wave.
A move like this is easy to describe as a tenant change. The work was doing the same weekend well, again and again, at sites that still had a business to run.
Other teams have left on-premises identity behind in different ways. See how one organization retired its on-premises directory, and how another moved its mail and files off Google Workspace. More on our modern workspace practice.
Running more than one site on an on-premises directory? Book an Entra ID migration review. We'll look at your sites, your devices, and your cutover plan with a senior engineer.
