Proof-of-Concept Project Checklist

This guide is designed by our Product, Implementation, and Sales specialists at Bitwarden to help guide your business in running a PoC of Bitwarden. Bitwarden offers a free trial for Enterprise Organizations, and we're confident that spreading out these steps over that time will help shape a successful PoC.

Day	Action	Key Person	Description	Resource(s)	Duration (hrs)
1	Identify an Organization Owner	Organization Owner	Create a free Bitwarden account for your Organization Owner, who will manage your Organization's settings, structure, and subscription.	Create your Bitwarden Account	0.1
1	Create your Organization	Organization Owner	Create a free Organization on the Bitwarden Cloud. Once created, let us know and we'll upgrade you to an Enterprise trial. If you're self-hosting, this Organization will be used only for billing purposes.	Organizations	0.1
1	(Self-hosting only) Download a License	Organization Owner	If you're self-hosting Bitwarden, a license file enables Enterprise functionality and the right number of seats for your instance.	License Paid Features	0.1
1	(Self-hosting only) Install Bitwarden	Organization Owner / IT Team	Setup your Bitwarden server. We recommend deploying on Linux for optimal performance and lowest total cost of ownership.	Install and Deploy	2.5
1	Add Admins	Organization Owners + Admins	Onboard Admins to Bitwarden, who can manage most Organization structures. We also recommend adding a second Owner for redundancy.	User Management	0.2
2	Create Collections	Organization Owners + Admins	Create Collections, which gather items for secure sharing with Groups of users.	Collections	0.25
2	Create Groups	Organization Owners + Admins	Create Groups, which gather users for scalable assignment of permissions and access to Collections. If you decide to sync Groups and users from your Identity Provider or Directory Service, you may need to reconfigure user and Group assignments later.	Groups	0.25
2	Assign Groups to Collections	Organization Owners + Admins	Assign Groups to Collections, making shared items available to supersets of users. Test the Read Only and Hide Password options.	Collections Assignment	.5
2	Share items to Collections	Organization Owners + Admins	Add items manually or import data from another password management application.	Sharing Import to an Organization	0.25
2	Configure Enterprise Policies	Organization Owners + Admins	Enterprise Policies can be used to tailor your Bitwarden Organization to fit your security needs. Enable and configure desired policies before user onboarding begins.	Enterprise Policies	0.1
3	Add users to Groups	Organization Owners + Admins	Add a set of users to your Organization manually and assign them to different groups. With these users, you'll broadly test all pre-configured functionality in the next step, before moving on to advanced functions like Directory Connector.	User Management Groups	0.5
3	Download Bitwarden Client Applications	All users	All Organization members should download Bitwarden on an assortment of devices, login, and test access to shared items/Collections/Groups and application of applied Policies. If you're self-hosting, users will need to connect each client to your server.	Download Bitwarden	0.5
4-6	Configure Login with SSO	Organization Owners + Admins	Configure Bitwarden to authenticate using your SAML 2.0 or OIDC Identity Provider.	About Login with SSO	1.5
4-6	Configure and test user onboarding with Directory Connector	Organization Owners + Admins	Download, configure, and test the Bitwarden Directory Connector application, which is used to automatically sync users and groups from your existing directory service (LDAP, AD, etc.)	About Directory Connector	1.5
4-6	Configure Directory Connector for production onboarding	Organization Owners + Admins	Execute on using Directory Connector to invite your remaining users to the Organization.	Directory Connector Desktop App	1

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Deployment Best Practices

We've seen a lot of deployments and have found that taking the following actions can positive contribute towards a successful PoC and successful adoption with your users:

Day	Action	Key Person	Description	Resource(s)	Duration (hrs)
4-6	Determine timeline for rollout to first-wave users	Senior Leadership & Security teams	There are lots of different strategies for rolling out Bitwarden. Take things at whatever pace best suits your team.
7	Craft internal messaging about Bitwarden rollout	Internal Training & Managers	Bitwarden provides a lot of resources to help users quickly adopt, check some out on Youtube and on the Help Center.	Youtube Help Center