Tooling for Success: Getting work done

We are all supposed to have figured things out by now … right? It has been over one year since the pandemic hit us and the term ‘new normal’ bandied around. For most of us, the expectation was that this ‘flu’ would quickly pass and we would resume life as we knew it. Unfortunately, we face a different reality, for which many are still trying to find their footing again. I can relate deeply as my team and I have borne the full brunt of the Covid-19 curveballs having invested in the public transport industry that has been one of the most affected sectors, right up there with hospitality. 

First, it was projects going on ice as partners and suppliers figured out what ‘this thing’ looked like for them, and second was figuring out team dynamics as it quickly became apparent that going lean(er) … would be necessary to reduce burn rate and at the same time, try ride the pandemic out. It was necessary to relook the tooling that we had to ensure that remote work, would work :-) 

 Up first was the need to have virtual standups as regularly as we had face-time. We went with the hottest new thing then, well up and until stories of meeting hijacks came to the fore. Understandable that anything new or newish things had its kinks but sometimes you just need peace of mind there and then … there is already too much on the plate to get stressed about. Coupled with the fact that as soon as one hopped out of a meeting, documents, emails, p2p chats, and other business-related collateral started flying across adding to the frenzy of full-time remote work from home where other distractions featured. We needed to press reset for sanity’s sake. 

 This predicament I am sure has and probably continues to afflict many businesses large and small. We found ourselves back at Microsoft’s door with #MicrosoftTeams, which allowed us to check some critical boxes when it came to default secure meetings and seamless collaboration that needed to follow. The familiarity of most of the features and options added to the ease of uptake, as most team members are native to many of the Microsoft Office suite of products. The depth of the Microsoft Teams product offering surprised me, having first only looked at it for the secure virtual stand-up sessions.

 While we are yet to fully utilize its capability for our line of work … not sure it's even possible to cover 100% of the possibilities, I highly recommend that you take a look here - bit.ly/TEAMS_Ke at the options that would add value to you as an individual, SME or enterprise.

 People running with operations, sales, and marketing functions that have high-frequency feedback loops will benefit from the base offering and the ability to connect over 800 other services, into a workspace or workspaces that could eventually become your hub. I particularly like that live events can support up to 20,000 attendees for up to 16 hours, and can imagine FMCG ops that deal with hundreds or even thousands of agents and suppliers or events companies that need to drive activations for brands reaching the same numbers with deep engagement analytics. Another one is the nifty things that can be ‘Power Automated’ on the sales funnel for example leads coming in from social media from something as simple as a comment without one requiring the assistance of a technical person.

 There is one service coming that I know will be a hit with human resource executives in the enterprise class (only because I see other dependencies that many SMB’s may not need or have the budget for), and that is Microsoft Viva Insights. Employees are feeling less connected to their teammates since the move to remote work and I know that sense and feeling of an imminent burnout is like. Viva is all about personal productivity and wellbeing experiences, a gateway to the digital workplace.

 As I said, I can’t cover it all and have also just scratched the surface myself, but the value is there regardless of the size and stage of your business. Peek under the hood and discover what you and your business can leverage to not only survive but also thrive.

 Cheers to our collective success - bit.ly/TEAMS_Ke