Culture Transformation Takes Time, Teamwork and Technology

One of the most rewarding aspects of my role as Chief People Officer at Microsoft is the work we’re collectively doing around culture change. Each one of our 125,000+ employees plays a key role in actively helping transform our culture, and together, we’ve made some big strides in the past four years. I’ve written and talked about the learnings of our culture change efforts, but as I thought about the “how” behind our efforts, I realized that in addition to the power of our people, technology has been a key lever throughout our journey.

With the size of our global footprint, driving culture change across our many offices remains critical. We use technology tools to supercharge and scale these efforts by connecting each employee to our transformation. With that in mind, I want to share four ways technology can help employees drive culture change. I’ll be back in the next couple of weeks with a second part of this article about how technology can help shape a positive employee experience.

#1—Be present and personal at scale

This is one of the most significant learnings we’ve had—it’s imperative for employees to see and hear from their leaders and to have the opportunity to provide feedback about their experiences. But this can be hard to do on a global scale and in large organizations. For us, one of the biggest force multipliers has been our CEO’s ongoing engagement with employees through technology. Each month he shares a video reflecting on what he’s learned, engages directly with employees on his CEO Connection Yammer page, and holds Town Hall meetings both in person and streamed live online with open Q&As. Employees are engaged in an ongoing two-way dialogue, and because they see and hear from him frequently, awareness and activation of our culture has accelerated.

#2—Connect to collaborate

Employees today participate in twice as many project teams as they did just five years ago. The ability to support dynamic teams and real-time interactions—both locally and globally—is paramount for a modern workplace. Beyond traditional collaboration tools like social networks and email, we’re seeing good traction through a tool called Microsoft Teams. A hub for collaboration, Teams combines chat, files, apps, meetings, and calls all in one place. We’re also using the power of AI to remove communication barriers. Team members can use features such as language translation and transcription to get on the same communication page—so everyone has a voice in conversations and meetings. This open and transparent approach to collaboration is helping us move towards the inclusive culture we want.

#3—Screen in talent

By Screening in, we’re rethinking our old model of recruiting and turning it on its head. Instead of looking for reasons to rule potential candidates out, we look for what’s right and determine if we can succeed together. LinkedIn has certainly helped everyone find talent, and we’re using it to cast a wider net. Through technology and accessibility tools built into Microsoft 365, we’re also able to find and support diverse candidates. And once a new employee is hired, we use Dynamics 365 for Talent: Onboard to make their experience inclusive, affording managers the opportunity to engage with their new employee and introduce them to the team and our culture—all before their first day! Employees feel more involved and included, and we’ve received good feedback from employees who love this high-touch and high-tech approach.

#4—Keep score

While you’re investing all this effort to evolve your culture, you want to make sure you’re measuring your progress. We use MyAnalyics to provide employees with a personal dashboard for their own productivity, and tools like PowerBI with our annual Poll and daily Pulse, to get telemetry on recruiting and retention, as well as organizational heath and employee sentiment. We create data charts and share these visual reports in manager and team meetings. This is particularly powerful in our work toward building a more diverse and inclusive culture. These tools help tell the story and show us progress by highlighting what’s working and where we have room for improvement.

The bottom line

Digital transformation and culture transformation are hard, and they don’t happen overnight. We’ve been on the transformation path for four years and recognize it’s a journey, not a destination. By stepping back and looking at where we want to go, and how technology can help us get there, we’re learning how to use technology to drive change and move our employees closer to the culture we want for our company.

Stay tuned in the coming weeks for four more learnings about how technology can play a positive role in the employee experience.