{"id":9184,"date":"2024-09-20T09:00:46","date_gmt":"2024-09-20T16:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/insidetrack\/blog\/?p=9184"},"modified":"2024-10-26T15:00:13","modified_gmt":"2024-10-26T22:00:13","slug":"reinventing-microsofts-employee-experience-for-a-hybrid-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/insidetrack\/blog\/reinventing-microsofts-employee-experience-for-a-hybrid-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Reinventing Microsoft\u2019s employee experience for a hybrid world"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"MicrosoftAt Microsoft, we believe our employees are the company\u2019s greatest asset. That\u2019s why, in 2017, we determined that for Microsoft to achieve its mission of empowering every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more<\/em>, we would need to transform the way we do IT.<\/p>\n

Why change?<\/p>\n

We realized that to help our customers transform through technology, we needed to transform the experience for our own employees. The investments we made in a reimagined employee experience enabled Microsoft employees to innovate, create, and collaborate seamlessly.<\/p>\n

Our shift to the Microsoft Azure cloud made us more agile. But even with a forward-looking vision and people-centric investments, nothing could have prepared us for March of 2020, when Microsoft employees globally were sent home to protect their health and safety. The era of hybrid work had begun.<\/p>\n

In this article, we share how we\u2019re making hybrid work, work at Microsoft. Our goal is to help fellow digital transformation leaders learn from our experience keeping over 300,000 people productive, connected, and empowered around the world. It describes our journey from Microsoft IT to Microsoft Digital; how we\u2019re helping Microsoft and our customers thrive in the hybrid workplace across digital experiences, physical spaces, and cultural norms; our investments in AI to revolutionize our IT infrastructure, employee experiences, and corporate functions portfolio; and building and driving adoption of transformative new technologies like Microsoft 365 Copilot, Microsoft Viva, Microsoft Teams, and the Microsoft Power Platform.<\/p>\n

Becoming Microsoft Digital<\/h2>\n

For years, Microsoft IT operated like a traditional IT organization\u2014highly reactive to circumstances and more focused on the technology than the experience. Of course, we cared<\/em> about the experience of our users, but it was mostly outside of our direct control, as we primarily deployed and sustained solutions built by other teams or other companies. In 2017, we adopted a new name\u2014End User Services Engineering\u2014which reflected our transition to a modern engineering organization. Our team was now \u201cvision-led,\u201d focused on building and deploying the right solutions to meet the needs of people<\/em>, not just deploying the latest technology<\/em>. We became proactive visionaries rather than reactive practitioners.<\/p>\n

That transformation culminated with our transition to becoming Microsoft Digital. At the core of that transformation is an obsession with the needs of our employees that transcends tools and infrastructure and extends to the entirety of their daily experience, from the day they\u2019re hired to their eventual retirement. We steward their digital experience through every dimension of their employment, ensuring they have the devices, applications, services, and infrastructure needed to be productive on the job no matter where they are or what they do.<\/p>\n

While our journey to deliver a world-class digital experience for Microsoft employees began years ago, the COVID-19 pandemic unexpectedly enabled us to accelerate the evolution of our employee experience. Grappling with the pandemic gave us time and insights necessary to ensure that everyone at Microsoft has a great digital experience, whether they\u2019re in the office or working remotely.<\/p>\n

Subsequent sections of this article demonstrate how we\u2019re bringing that vision to life for Microsoft\u2019s global employees so they can thrive in a hybrid world.
\n\"Graphic<\/p>\n

Thriving in a hybrid world<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Like most large companies, our shift to remote work happened almost overnight, with impacts to company culture, infrastructure, and processes that have lasted well beyond the end of the Covid-19 pandemic. The implications of hybrid work continue to resonate\u2014from this moment forward, every investment needs to be considered through multiple dimensions of the employee experience: digital capabilities, physical spaces, and culture.<\/p>\n

The sections that follow reflect on our journey at Microsoft across these three dimensions of the employee experience.<\/p>\n

Digital capabilities<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The pandemic and subsequent shift to hybrid work served as an accelerant to our efforts to revolutionize the employee experience for our employees and customers, with Microsoft Viva the centerpiece of that effort. In 2023, breakthroughs in generative AI enabled entirely new ways to support employee productivity, enabling Microsoft Digital to rethink \u201ccore\u201d IT and to reimagine employee productivity with Microsoft 365 Copilot.<\/p>\n

Additionally, other transformative investments in Microsoft Teams, the Microsoft Power Platform, and many other technologies are helping us accelerate the transformation of our employee experience, while a Zero Trust security posture keeps our enterprise safe and secure and our employees productive. More on each of these investments follows.<\/p>\n

Microsoft Viva<\/h5>\n

When millions of people globally left the office to work from home in 2020, it marked a tectonic shift in how employees experienced the workplace and how companies supported their own employees to keep them safe and productive during a pandemic. Among the millions were thousands of Microsoft employees, and our challenges are like yours\u2014how do we stay connected, informed, and motivated as we transition to the new world of hybrid work?<\/p>\n

Despite positive feedback from many employees about the new availability of flexible work options, our CEO Satya Nadella describes a hybrid paradox<\/a> wherein employees want both more flexible work options as well as additional opportunities to connect and collaborate with colleagues in person. And there is also compelling evidence that as employees have fewer opportunities to expand their networks and make new connections, innovation suffers<\/a>. This is where Microsoft Viva<\/a> initially came to market as a single, coherent platform built around the employee. Ultimately, the initial goals were centered around employee connection, wellbeing, and productivity. Now, since Viva\u2019s 2021 launch, that experience has since shifted, rapidly evolving to a present-day focus on business impact and performance, driven by global macroeconomic concerns.<\/p>\n

Microsoft Viva has also introduced several new Viva apps since initial launch, and the Microsoft Viva deployment at Customer Zero now includes extra capabilities in support of the new focus:<\/p>\n

\"Graphic<\/p>\n

At Customer Zero, we are looking forward to new incoming AI-enabled features across the Viva Suite and seeing how these capabilities improve the employee experience. In the interim, we are still capturing employee feedback and sentiment to continue to improve the capabilities across Viva for our employees and customers, and we\u2019re excited for what the future holds for the platform.<\/p>\n