Connecting in a hybrid world

COVID learned us to perform work from home. Connecting to colleagues and customers in a hybrid way. HR professionals re-thinking the ideal 'Employee Experience or onboarding'.

And yes, Microsoft re-invented this Employee Experience journey thanks to the MS VIVA Suite

In this Blog post I take you with me on the MS VIVA Connections journey as part of the MS VIVA suite. Centralizing all company communications and actions at one place and a way to differentiate thanks to audience targeting.

In this hybrid way of working there is still a place for authentic communications. Real listening to each other.

Ok let's have a close look at the MS VIVA Connections applications and the steps needed to activate it. First you have to set up a SharePoint site which will play the role as home page.

I've set up following SharePoint communication site.

Secondly you will have to set this site as the default Home site. Therefore go to the M365 SharePoint admin center. Copy the URL and set it as default home site. You can also set this home site by applying a PowerShell command but this setting is more easy.

Next we will set the global navigation pane. Interesting feature as you can target different audiences based on the target audience feature. Great feature in HR onboarding processes ;).

Therefore go to your home site and click the Global navigation option.

Result is that we now have a seperate Global Navigation pane within SharePoint and within the MS Teams App. See the example below.

Next you can also set an interactive Dashboard, being part of the mobile experience and home page. Therefore click the Manage VIVA Connections setting. Within this dashboard you will experience 3 main parts, i.e. dashboard, feeds and resources.

And yes it's card based and here is where the Adaptive Cards will play a role. These cards also being part of the PowerApps application building. Cards can be of type Assigned Tasks, Teams app, Web link,...

Have a play with it and add some cards to your dashboard. Could look like something like this. Also here you will have the option to target certain audiences.

Looking great no, working in a hybrid way and having all information at the finger tips.

Finally we need to allow the VIVA Connections app within the MS Teams Admin Center:

Also, in the Setup policies section you can pin the App as being one of the Apps within the MS Teams bar. And here the final result in MS Teams.

The VIVA Suite some great tooling when aligning on organization communication, OKR's, learning and efficiency in information management.

Have it a try!

Kind regards,

Frank Vanhamel

PowerPlatform & VIVA evangelist