When is it time to relaunch Office 365 in your organization?

Is your organization using Office 365 in an optimal way?

Teams, SharePoint, Onedrive, Dynamics 365, Flow, PowerApps, Power BI... The possibilities with Microsoft's cloud platform and the tools that come with your license are almost endless. But if you haven't done the groundwork, it's easy to lose control.

More and more companies come to us with the feeling that they are not working optimally with Microsoft's cloud platform. Especially larger organizations with many employees. For example, there may be a lack of uniformity in how to use the services and a clear plan for how the work should be driven forward. Some services take on a life of their own while other services are not used as intended. In this situation, there may be a point in starting over and getting a fresh start.

These are some of the signs that a re-launch of Office 365 in your organization may be in order:

• Staff express that they do not know how to work in the tools.
• You have not brought the business and users on board. Instead of embracing new ways of working, they continue to do what they have always done.
• There is uncertainty about which services should be used for what.
• Your employees feel overwhelmed by all the new services and functionality being launched.

Let your partner lead the way

The first thing you should do is turn to a partner who can show you the way. Otherwise, there is a risk that you will start making selective efforts without a clear plan. Create a roadmap for how you will work with Microsoft's cloud platform in the long and short term. Once the plan is in place, each individual decision can be made with the bigger picture in mind.

Examples of issues that need to be addressed are:

• Which services should be used for what.
• How you will work with the services and why.
• How to share documents internally and externally.
• What your naming standards should be.
• Who has the right to do what.
• How the cooperation between IT and the rest of the business will work.

It is important to have a solid foundation, but you should not forget that this is a work in progress. That's why you also need a plan for how the project will move forward on an ongoing basis. For example, how will you stay updated when Microsoft rolls out new functionality? Here too, your IT partner can play an important role. A good partner should keep up to date with what's happening in the platform and continuously suggest which functions could support your business processes.

Engage your staff

For services to become a natural part of everyday work, it is important to involve and engage staff. Without a solid change process, there is a risk that employees will continue to do what they have always done. The result is that everyone works in their own way, which makes it difficult to get the full value of the services.

Training is an important tool to get your staff on board. With services changing and new features being released all the time, it is no longer enough to hold a training session every three years. Instead, you need to find a way to train your staff continuously and make it easy to find up-to-date information. A good tip is to use portals where you post information and ongoing training on the different services.

To ensure that the projects continue to develop in a good way, it is then important to work continuously to follow up and collect feedback from the business. In this way, you can find out what works well and what doesn't, how the processes are perceived and whether employees want more training. Today, it is also possible to obtain valuable statistics on how the services are used.

The benefit is a more efficient operation

When services are better utilized, the whole operation will be more efficient. The more structure there is, the less time you will have to spend, as everyone in the organization already knows how to work. This also has the effect of improving your onboarding process, which in turn can lead to an easier time attracting new employees. Last but not least, it will be easier to make informed decisions and keep your processes up to date. Hopefully, this will be the last fresh start you need.

Want to know how we can help you get started with Microsoft's cloud services? Contact us here.