As any business leader will tell you, one of the main driving factors for a successful organization is its people. Investing in employees, including giving them the tools they need to do great work individually and through collaborative efforts, influences everything else that makes an organization successful-profits, productivity, growth, and more. Building and maintaining a great company culture is essential, regardless of whether people are physically in a building with each other or not.
Some organizations have embraced fully-remote work environments. Others have seen success with a hybrid model, where employees work a mix of on-site and off-site.
With a positive company culture, workers are more engaged, more productive, and overall happier at work, which has cascading positive benefits that affect every aspect of the organization. But building or maintaining a positive culture in today's increasingly remote working world requires intentional focus-prioritizing connections between different teams, encouraging employees to talk with each other-and using technology to support those connections.
Your organization likely already uses a host of productivity and collaboration tools, like Microsoft Azure, Office 365, Teams, Dynamics, and more. These programs connect with each other to facilitate effective work from an organizational level and even offer some collaborative features for remote or hybrid work enablement. But nothing really ties all those collaborative elements together, and it's often difficult to justify adding yet another piece of software to an already overwhelming tech stack. So what can you do to support collaboration without giving employees another app they need to access and keep track of daily?
That's where Microsoft Viva comes in.
As a full suite of integrated applications, Viva works seamlessly with the Microsoft apps that your employees already use, like Outlook and Teams, by adding functionality right inside of them-meaning employees don't have to juggle multiple apps or windows to enjoy the enhanced communication experience that Viva provides.
This article explores how Microsoft Viva empowers individuals and teams to do their best work through connections by explaining the different applications within the Viva suite and then talking about pricing and licensing.
Let's get started.
As a modern intranet and collaboration platform, Microsoft Viva integrates with the Microsoft programs and applications your organization already uses to help individuals and teams be more productive and efficient with their work while at the same time facilitating connections between employees. It does this by unifying the employee experience across connection, knowledge, purpose, and growth, giving employees more opportunities to be successful.
In other words, Viva takes collaboration features that we often see on social media platforms, crowdsourcing platforms, and Learning Management Systems (LMS) and incorporates these features into existing Microsoft applications. What results is enhanced functionality of these applications at little or no cost to the user, with the benefit of better communication without interrupting workflow. For example, employees can enhance the benefits of Microsoft Teams by using Viva Engage, accessing a full news feed of what's happening in the company without having to leave the Teams app.
Because users don't have to leave the Microsoft applications they typically have open all day every day anyway (such as Teams and Outlook), the additional communication functionality of the Viva suite of apps doesn't get in the way of regular work but instead enhances it.
The Microsoft Viva suite focuses on every aspect of employee engagement and learning with the following applications:
Connections are similar to a company-wide social media network where employees can converse with each other, browse news, and otherwise have a bird's eye view of what's going on across the organization. In addition, leaders can utilize connections to deliver surveys and calls for feedback to gain insight on any topic they choose.
The following features are included in Microsoft Viva Connections:
As the Microsoft Viva Connections platform matures, more functionality will be added over time. The Viva Connections page via Microsoft has the latest features that are expected to make their way to Connections soon.
Engage is an evolution of the well-known Yammer Communities application. For people that already use the Yammer app, the Engage experience will update automatically, but Engage is also built-in to Microsoft Teams.
At its core, Engage looks a lot like existing social media platforms that most people are already used to, like Twitter or Facebook. Short video "stories" are front and center on your feed, and the latest relevant posts can be easily scrolled through just like you would on the aforementioned platforms. This is critical because employees will already be familiar with the experience and be able to interact with the platform easily.
The following features are included in Microsoft Viva Engage:
Insights integrates wellness and productivity into employees' normal workflows, with the aim to help people de-stress, view situations from a more positive perspective, and encourage mindfulness and thoughtfulness throughout the workday.
The following features are included in Microsoft Viva Insights:
Goals helps teams and individuals align to achieve results. By defining priorities and setting out what success looks like, teams and individuals alike can get started with the tasks needed to meet organizational goals.
The following features are included in Microsoft Viva Goals:
Learning acts like a mini Learning Management System (LMS), bringing together courses, resources, and other content from different platforms together within Teams for easy access without affecting workflow.
The following features are included in Microsoft Viva Learning:
Taking advantage of hashtags, Microsoft Viva Topics allows employees to follow and engage with content that is relevant to their work or interests, all within context.
The following features are included in Microsoft Viva Topics:
It's important to note that while the above describes the current functionality of Microsoft Viva applications, it's clear by visiting the product pages for each of the above applications that more features are in the works.
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Microsoft Viva in Microsoft 365 or Office 365 Enterprise |
Microsoft Via Suite Subscription Pricing (without 365) |
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If organizations prefer, they can purchase subscriptions to individual Microsoft Viva applications as needed. Each application is available for USD $4.00 to $6.00 per user per month, with Viva Sales (a separate application) available for USD $40.00 per month.*
*Pricing as of January 2023
Microsoft Viva has different licensing requirements depending on the application being used. The table below highlights how the licensing requirements work:
Microsoft Viva Application |
Licensing Requirement |
Viva Learning |
A license is required to:
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Viva Insights |
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Viva Topics |
A license is required to use this application |
Viva Connections |
Full application functionality is available to all Microsoft 365 or Office 365 enterprise plan users |
Viva Goals |
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Viva Engage |
Full application functionality is available to all Microsoft 365 or Office 365 enterprise plan users |
It's important note that as per the Viva pricing model, organizations have two options:
While the Microsoft Viva suite of applications includes a ton of different functionality, one of the standout features is the Viva Insights application. Specifically, its integration with Outlook. Users of Cortana were used to receiving a daily briefing message in Outlook, giving them various brief insights about their past working habits. Instead of Cortana providing this message, it will now be sent by Microsoft Viva Insights. The content will also be expanded with recommendations for upcoming workdays and weeks.
If you look at Microsoft Viva as a whole, it seems very similar to Intranet technologies that many organizations know and use daily, but with more social media-like components. In this way, some have referred to Viva as a "new take on the old intranet" in that it adds functionality that you couldn't find in your company's old internal Wiki. By connecting with applications that employees use every day and encouraging knowledge sharing and, at the same time, collaboration and communication, it's easy to see why Microsoft Viva is turning heads as a viable new platform that could replace the traditional Intranet.
One of the features of Microsoft Viva Insights is manager and leader insights. These provide information about work patterns so leaders can take action, like identifying when too many after-hours meetings are happening and taking steps to reduce them in an effort to prevent burnout and offer employees a better work-life balance. Rather than Insights being a tool to watch over employees' every move, it's a tool that allows managers to see real data about engagement, efficiency, and productivity so that they can take steps to manage their people better.
Establishing and maintaining connections through community is part of what makes us human. In a hyper-connected online world, we're more connected to each other in some ways but less connected in others. With more and more people working remotely, maintaining that community, that connection, even when people are not physically in the same room, is essential for a positive workplace culture.
The good news is that utilizing technology like Microsoft Viva makes establishing those important connections in the workplace easier than ever before. Plus, the software works seamlessly with the existing Microsoft products your organization already uses and that your employees are already familiar with, meaning that little to no onboarding is required to get started.
Another requirement of using Microsoft Viva is ensuring that your employees have the right access via licensing. Navigating Microsoft licensing optimizations can be difficult and time-consuming for IT teams, especially with the consistent changes. Amaxra can help you choose the right mix of Microsoft licenses so that your organization isn't overpaying for licenses that you don't need.
Contact Amaxra today for a consultation.
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