The Microsoft Modern Workplace Blog

A blog about all things Microsoft, Modern, and Work

Viva Learning — 31/05/2023
Enable Viva Learning — 22/02/2023
Enable Viva Topics — 09/02/2023

Enable Viva Topics

Reading Time: 10 minutes

This is the first in a series of blogs on how to enable the different modules of Microsoft Viva. So, this article I want to do a bit more of a deep dive into Viva Topics and how you can actually enable or switch on Viva Topics. Let’s look into the background of what Viva Topics is, how to enable it from a tech perspective, the people you need to make the most out of it, the governance and security required around it and then a brief summary.

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Use PowerPoint Live — 06/12/2022

Use PowerPoint Live

Reading Time: 5 minutes

Just a short blog post today with a quick tip on how to use PowerPoint Live and importantly the Teams Presenter View. In the last couple of months I’d need another pair of hands to count how many times a presenter has not managed to share the correct view of their PowerPoint presentation. Either they are sharing their desktop and have not gone into the slide show or they don’t know where that pesky button to switch to presenter view is, There is a tip at the bottom of this blog as to why you may not be able to find this elusive button. The audience gets the below view instead of the nice shiny presentation you’ve worked hours on, and they can even see the really important notes you’ve put into the presentation but don’t actually want the audience to see.

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Viva Insights Effective Meetings — 25/10/2022

Viva Insights Effective Meetings

Reading Time: 4 minutes

Ever join, or even schedule your own meeting and find the following?

  • There is no agenda?
  • There are 10 or more people in the meeting with only about 2 or 3 of them actually saying anything or contributing at all?
  • The discussion just has no focus, goes off on tangents and half the meeting is wasted discussing something entirely irrelevant?
  • You all leave the meeting wondering why it happened and what the next steps are?

If you answered no to the above, then stop reading all your meetings are perfect, have a gold star. If you answered yes to any or all of them then read on as Viva Insights has 2 new features that can help combat this.

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Microsoft Viva is Expanding — 22/09/2022

Microsoft Viva is Expanding

Reading Time: 5 minutes

Hopefully you managed to watch the “Empowering Your Workforce in Economic Uncertainty”. There is certainly a lot to unpack from it.

I found some of the stats very interesting and what Microsoft are coining as “Productivity Paranoia” was a key take away it shows that “87 percent of employees report they are productive, yet only 12 percent of leaders say they’re confident their employees are productive in hybrid work.”

But what does this mean and how can Microsoft Viva help? Leaders need to create clarity around what work is most important and listen to what their employees need to make the biggest impact.

With that Microsoft has unveiled a few new Viva modules and features that are coming out and I’ve given a very quick overview of some of them and a short thought on what I like about each one.

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Inclusion and Diversity within the Employee Experience — 02/08/2022

Inclusion and Diversity within the Employee Experience

Reading Time: 5 minutes

I had a really interesting chat with a colleague the other day and he mentioned a really interesting feature of Microsoft Viva Topics and how it can help inclusion in the workplace. This got me thinking about Microsoft Viva and the various methods each of the different modules can help from a diversity & inclusion perspective.

Any and every employee experience platform should really have inclusion at the very heart of what it does as its such a fundamental element of a really standout experience for your employees.

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Microsoft Viva Topics Demo Part 1 — 19/07/2022
Viva Insights Inspiraiton Library — 07/06/2022

Viva Insights Inspiraiton Library

Reading Time: 2 minutes

If you use Viva Insights with any regularity you will probably have come accross the relatively new feature within it called the “Inspiration Library”. This is a handy little feature that’s currently rolling out in preview mode. Much like a famous fence coating company the inspiration library does exactly what it says on the tin. It’s used to give you inspiration and ideas on how to better serve your employees and company or you as an individual.

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New Microsoft Viva Module – Ally.io — 10/05/2022

New Microsoft Viva Module – Ally.io

Reading Time: 4 minutes

Back in October 2021 Microsoft acquired Ally.io – you can read about it here. What does this mean for the Microsoft Employee Experience platform (EXP)? It means we will be getting a new Microsoft Viva Module based around OKR (objectives and key results). Microsoft state it will “help revolutionize how organizations use technology to bring deeper connection to work, purpose and results in the hybrid world.” Firstly, lets explain some of this and then share some thoughts on its uses and how it could integrate into Microsoft Viva.

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