Your Quick Guide to Microsoft 365 Technologies for the Modern Workplace
Welcome to the second of our three-part mini-series on technologies for the Modern Workplace, where we share how to solve common business headaches with Microsoft 365.
You can catch part one here. Here, we show you how to:
6. say goodbye to time-wasting, inefficient meetings
7. help everyone in your company feel like they belong
8. make your employee communications more engaging
9. ensure the right information is shared with the right people
10. get more value from your data
Let's go.
Challenge no. 6: Say Goodbye to Time-wasting, Inefficient Meetings
The average knowledge worker spends nearly a third of their week in meetings. Managed well, meetings are a force for good. Done badly – well, you’re probably recalling some as you read this. *Shudder*
The Solution
Microsoft Teams meeting functionality, which includes audio and video capabilities. In Teams, collaboration begins the moment the meeting is scheduled. Attendees connect on 'persistent chat' to share documents and prepare. Unfamiliar with some of the participants? Hover over their name to see their organisational profile and LinkedIn background.
Useful Resources
- An Overview of Teams for sysadmins.
- Group chat software: Microsoft Teams
- How to Schedule your next meeting in Microsoft Teams and keep everyone on track.
- Hold ad hoc audio and video team meetings with Meet Now
- How to Share your Desktop or Application in a meeting
- The future of meetings – using AI to improve team collaboration.
Of course technology will help make your meetings more efficient, but you know it takes more than this: The 6 Golden Rules of Meeting Management.
Challenge no. 7: How to Help Everyone in Your Company Feel like They Belong
In many large organisations, especially those with multiple locations, employees can feel disconnected from one another and from what’s happening in head office.
The Solution
Use Yammer to connect your employee community in an open and transparent way. Yammer is an enterprise social network that allows you to bridge organisational silos and drive company-wide initiatives. Hold town hall meetings to discuss changes and get in front of concerns. Yammer lets you take questions before, during and after the meeting. Yammer groups are ideal for managing questions relating to a specific meeting or topic. People can join your meetings in person or remotely. Record them for viewing later with Skype Meeting Broadcast or Microsoft Stream.
Useful Resources
- An overview of Yammer – connect and engage people across your organisation
- How to create a public or private group in Yammer.
- How to Add a Yammer feed to a Skype Meeting Broadcast
- Complement the conversation happening on Yammer. Create a communication site in SharePoint Online to share updates and reports etc.
Challenge no. 8: How To Make Your Employee Communications More Engaging
Our brains process video 60,000 times faster than text. This makes video one of the most effective ways to communicate with your employees.
The Solution
Adopt video for internal comms, training, and engaging with remote workers. Town Hall meetings are great for keeping scattered teams connected. Microsoft Stream enables everyone in your organisation to create, discover, and share videos securely. You can integrate Microsoft Stream with collaborative apps like Teams, OneNote, SharePoint and Yammer.
Useful Resources
- Microsoft Stream – engage and inform with intelligent video
- How to add and use a Stream (video) tab in Teams
- How to display a Stream video on the web
Challenge no. 9: How to Ensure the Right Information is Shared with the Right People
Despite the explosion of alternative communication channels, email remains the first port of call for many of us. Creating distribution lists helps ensure the right comms are shared with the correct groups, but this has its limitations. For example, how do you let new members get up to speed by reviewing older emails?
The Solution
Modernise your legacy distribution lists. Groups in Outlook lets you do two things. Firstly, create a shared inbox. It works like a traditional distribution list, except new members can view prior discussions too. Outlook Groups integrates with OneNote (for shared note-taking) and SharePoint (for cloud files). Use a group in Outlook to help your leadership team or direct reports keep up-to-date on core projects. Secondly, use Outlook groups to send a meeting invitation to everyone at once.
Useful Resources
- Create a group in Outlook
- Upgrade your distribution lists to Office 365 Groups in Outlook
- Create and share news on your SharePoint sites
- Copy Cortana in an email and ask her to schedule a meeting: Sheduler
Challenge no. 10: How to Get More Value From Your Data
You’ve probably heard that data is the new oil. Despite this, it’s estimated that less than half a per cent of digital data is analysed and used to enhance business performance.
The Solution
Microsoft 365 includes powerful capabilities to help you make better, data-driven decisions.
Useful Resources
- Turn information into insights
- Turn data into opportunity with Power BI
- Use the Analysis ToolPak to perform complex data analysis
Closing Words
The Microsoft Modern Workplace is your integrated, secure ecosystem. It simplifies life for your users and makes your business agile and scalable. Catch the final part of our mini-series on M365 technologies that support the Modern Workplace.
