Published 25 April 2023
Say hello to 5 new Microsoft Viva updates.
We know, keeping up with updates from Microsoft each month can be hard to digest, so this month we are bringing you the top 5 updates from Viva that we think will have the biggest impact. As always, if you have any questions about any of the updates you read about, please get in touch about how we can help you implement change into your business.
1. Viva Goals: Changes to administration pages
What’s new?
Changes are coming to members of organisations and teams that are listed in the admin pages in Viva Goals.
In March 2023, Microsoft rolled out a feature that allowed Viva Goals team admins to add an AAD group as members to a team. As part of this feature, organisation admins can also add multiple groups as members to an organisation. As groups can now be added as members of an organisation/team, Microsoft will soon be launching an updated members listing page that will list both individuals and groups as members of an organisation or team.
Why is this important?
- At the organisation level: If a user in the search results is already part of the organisation, the more options button will also let admins perform actions such as assigning admin role, changing user type from observer to regular and vice versa, removing a user and deleting a user. If a user is not part of the organisation, the more options button will let admins add the user to the organisation.
- At the team level: If a user in the search result is already part of the team, the more options button will let team admins make the user a team admin or remove the team member from the team. If the user is not part of the team, the team admin can then add the user to the team.
When is it coming?
Rollout will begin in mid May and is expected to be complete by late May.
2. Viva Goals: Usage report
What’s new?
A new report will be made available to help you understand how Viva Goals is used within your organisation. The new usage report in the Microsoft 365 admin centre will provide metrics on the number of active users including trial and paid licenses and platform distribution (Teams, Slack, Azure DevOps, and Web) with the ability to view 7/30/90/180 day timeframes.
Why is this important?
Using the Viva Goals usage report, admins will be able to view metrics for how people in your organisation are using Viva Goals and in which platforms. Admins can assign the available licenses in their tenant to individual users based on their usage and license requests, via the Microsoft admin centre. Once released, you can view Viva Goals reports by going to the Microsoft 365 admin centre-> Reports > Usage > Viva Goals.
When is it coming?
Rollout will begin in late May and is expected to be complete by late June.
3. Microsoft Viva: Display connected topics on people profile cards
What’s new?
Wouldn’t it be nice to learn more about what topics someone is an expert on? Coming soon, Viva Topics will integrate with the information that appears on the profile for each person.
Why is this important?
When you select someone’s name or picture in Outlook or other Office web apps, you can find information on topics they are connected to on their profile card. Users with Viva Topics or Viva Suite license will see this new capability in their profile cards for OWA and SharePoint webparts.
When is it coming?
Rollout will begin in early April and is expected to be complete by late April.
4. Viva Engage: Web version of Viva Engage admin centre
What’s new?
The Viva Engage admin experience currently available within the Teams application will soon be available within the Yammer web version (soon to be renamed to Viva Engage) for Microsoft Viva customers.
Why is this important?
All functionalities that are currently available within the Viva Engage admin centre in the Teams application will be released in the web version, and access to these admin experiences will continue to honour the role permissions in place.
Note: There is no action required at this time as this update will be enabled automatically. Resources to learn more about the Viva Engage admin centre and all the functionalities offered can be found here. For an overview on the entire new admin experience that was released in February, check out this blog.
When is it coming?
Rollout will begin in late April and is expected to be complete by late May.
5. Viva Engage: In product announcement
What’s new?
We are thrilled to share the exciting news that the rebranding of Yammer and all its surfaces is nearly complete! The Yammer website, the SharePoint and embed integrations, as well as the Power Automate integration rebranding will take place during the last week of June of 2023.
Why is this important?
The rebrand will soon be complete! The good news is that there will be no impact to the existing profile, posts, bookmarks, etc. All rebranding updates don’t require additional actions; changes will be automatic. Outside of branding changes, there are no changes to the features, capabilities, and investments for Microsoft 365 customers. You will continue to experience and benefit from all the powerful features of Viva Engage just as you did with Yammer.
To ensure all users are fully informed and engaged in this stage of the rebranding process, we have developed an exciting in-product announcement plan that will provide key information at specific moments.
Our announcement plan is tailored to specific audiences, and it’s structured into two phases: prior the website rebranding and on the website rebranding date.
As shared in previous posts, to help make the transition as smooth as possible, we have also created a rebranding toolkit that includes a range of templates, logos, and other resources to help communicate the change. It can be found – here
When is it coming?
Rollout will begin in late March and is expected to be complete by early April.
We release a monthly Microsoft Viva updates blog at the end of each month here.
