On January 25, 2022, Christian Buckley hosted the M365 community’s monthly TweetJam, this time with a focus on Objectives, Key Results (OKR), and the Employee Experience (EXP). Unfortunately, I was unable to participate this month, but I was excited to finally get a chance to sit down and read some of the conversation.
As a reminder, if you’re new to the #TweetJam concept, Tweets are short. Currently, Twitter restricts comments to 280 characters and, where URLs are present, using URL shortening to help get the most out of this limited space. If you jump into the conversation, you may see “(1/2)” in a post, which means the poster needed more than 280 characters, so check out that person’s Twitter stream to see the rest of the message.
#CollabTalk does some great stuff helping organize the hundreds of posts that come through in an hour by breaking up the topic into seven questions and requesting everyone use #collabtalk and A1 where the number matches the question. Good stuff if you’re trying to keep up.
Objectives, Key Results (OKR), and the Employee Experience (EXP)
Below, I’ve curated a small representation of the conversation, but if you want more I highly suggest doing a Twitter search for #collabtalk between January 24 and January 25 – you can also add the answer number (e.g., A1, A3, etc) in your search to see what was specifically said for each of the below questions.
Q1: What are your key employee experience (#EXP) goals for 2022 and beyond?
One of my favorite things about Microsoft’s fouray into the Employee Experience side of the world is that it shines a light on IT’s need to reinvent itself as a solutions provider. This comment, about employee goals not necessarily matching organizational goals, shows an equal light on business’s need to reinvent itself to ensure that it’s providing the right tools for employee success and the right processes for improvement. In 2022, things move too quickly for antiquated “my way of the highway” mentalities, and that means agile companies focusing on employee experience to ensure mission success.
Q2: What is your company’s internal management approach (or culture) for goal setting, objectives, and task execution?
Q3: How does your organization connect the work that people do every day to broader company objectives and outcomes?
Q4: How do you work within (or change) a company culture that is task-focused instead of objective-focused?
This is one of the most common discussions I have with IT departments who are stuck in the past, deploying software but not helping business users understand the value. IT Stands in the middle of a grand scheme: Leadership sets the vision, Staff must know the vision and have the support (tools and processes) to be successful, and IT’s job is to translate the vision and the needs into a technical reality. That means analysts translating on both sides, and it means technologists not just deploying a tool but iterating on those tools to ensure they are providing solutions, despite the almost constant evolution of the requirements in front of them.
Q5: How does / would an OKR (objectives and key results) solution fit into your employee experience plans?
Q6: Does Microsoft’s acquisition of OKR solution provider http://Ally.io alter your plans around Microsoft Viva?
Q7: What feedback would you give Microsoft on their employee experience (#EXP) strategy so far?
The Small Business question is something I hear a lot. Sometimes it is a question of licensing, but others it’s a question of scale. Large businesses are trying to solve not just single business problems but significant scale.
I think this is the most common thing I’ve heard about Microsoft Viva to date: it’s interesting, but is it real? I see some very real potential – it will be interesting to see how it matures, and how quickly.
Wrap
Microsoft’s Employee Experience platform, Microsoft Viva, is an interesting step outside of IT technology and into the world of business solutions. While Microsoft has been pushing “solutions” for some time, now, those of us who have been around since the early days of Windows and SharePoint are equal parts excited and skeptical as we see exactly how deeply Microsoft digs into this new category.
Personally, I find all of the business solutions, from the refresh of Lists to the enablement of the “citizen developer” with the Power Platform, there’s a lot of really cool stuff going on in the Microsoft ecosystem and I’m very excited to be a small part of it.
Great summary, Jay! Going back through the comments always provides great insights that I may have missed during the event. Plus, I’m always interested in seeing how others interpret the signals coming out of Microsoft. Hope to see you at the next one! (Feb 23rd)
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