September 2019 – Monday morning, 9:30am. Great, MS Teams is installed – the next step towards a digital workplace, #letsdothis. Excited, Max starts the new program. He is motivated and wants to start working on the new project immediately. But where are his colleagues? How can he message everyone at once? And where should he share the project folder? In the meantime, Mike starts a conversation about the past weekend in the company-wide chat. First GIFs are already being shared. #pling. Here comes a round mail from Karen, who hasn’t heard of MS Teams yet. #saywhat. The first project meeting via MS Teams will already start in an hour. But how does it work? Slowly, Max is getting anxious. #thoughtthatmaybedifferent.
We say: Let’s do this better.
With MS Teams, Microsoft offers a new form of digital workplace that combines various tools and documents within a single platform. This way, great increases in efficiency and transparency can be achieved. However, the challenge of a successful introduction into the corporate context is growing, due to the diverse application possibilities. This creates the need for a structured implementation, within which the existing teams and corporate culture are coordinated with the components of MS Teams. The implementation not only offers the transfer to a digital working world, but also the chance to rethink and reorganize teamwork.
As such, we were pleased to have the opportunity to help shape this process for one of our customers. MS Teams had already been technically installed and was being used by teams. However, a company-wide, accompanied implementation had not taken place. Due to low requirements regarding structure and authorizations for use, a confusing and inefficient landscape of different teams had developed very quickly. This ultimately also influenced the motivation of the employees. A company division wanted to counteract this uncontrolled growth and therefore brought us on board.
We focused on the conceptual introduction of MS Teams and developed a systematic cooperation model for MS Teams within four phases with different focuses together with a task force.
Phase 1: Alignment
What expectations does the sponsor, the task force and the employees have for the new platform? How is team work currently being organized? Which concrete requirements must MS Teams be adapted to and where can MS Teams simplify or increase efficiency? These and other questions were clarified during the first implementation phase and later used as a basis for the new collaboration model.
Phase 2: Design
During the design phase, we developed a collaboration model for MS teams based on the daily needs of the employees, considering the analysis of the current situation. Together with the task force we also developed a code of conduct and reached agreements on the sensible use and integration of other tools. This was intended to provide guidance on the use of MS Teams and to provide more structure and organization.
Phase 3: Execution
Subsequently, the structure developed was implemented by the task force – with the support of CPC (i.e. setup the teams, channels, add users etc.).The focus was especially on the task force’s ability to act independently, so that adjustments can also be made autonomously in the future.
Phase 4: Enablement
The final phase was to raise awareness and understanding of MS teams among all employees. We held training sessions on the functions of MS teams that includedtips and tricks to make everyday use of the platform easier. We provided the sponsor, the task force and the department members with a handbook with all relevant information regarding their new team work with MS Teams. This handbook consolidates the output of the project and recommendations on what measures they could apply in the future to boost the use of MS Teams in a sustainable way. Overall, it is important to create security and motivation in dealing with MS Teams and to continuously develop the concept!We are looking forward to the opportunity to support further firms with their structured implementation of MS Teams and their a new phase of teamwork!