Microsoft 365 is one of the platforms that many companies have been moving to in the wake of the pandemic as they work to improve business technology flexibility. The platform offers multiple tools in one place designed to power a modern “work from anywhere” workforce.

As of November 2020, approximately 139,977 companies in the UK were using Microsoft 365.

In addition to needing to adopt all-cloud workflows to accommodate remote teams, one of the challenges that business owners have had is how to track their productivity. Things change when everyone is not in the same office, and you can’t just walk by someone’s desk to see how things are going.

How do you know that employees are connecting and collaborating? How do you know they’re using the most efficient workflows or aren’t being slowed down by sluggish hardware?

Microsoft has brought out a tool designed to provide insight into those questions and many others dealing with workplace efficiency – Microsoft Productivity Score.

What Does Microsoft Productivity Score Do?

Microsoft Productivity Score offers a roadmap for productivity of both people and technology. It identifies areas where employees can be improving their workflows by collaborating and using best practices. The tool can also identify device issues that might be slowing a team down.

The tool scores eight different areas of productivity with a top score of 100 points each. If there are any areas of improvement needed, Productivity Score will point those out to help companies using Microsoft 365 before more efficient and productive.

The scoring system looks at these areas:

• People Experiences:
  • Communication
  • Content Collaboration
  • Mobility
  • Meetings
  • Teamwork

• Technology Experiences:
  • Endpoint Analytics
  • Network Connectivity
  • Microsoft 365 Apps Health

Within each of those areas, you’ll get detailed reporting on specific actions. For example, in the Communications scoring area, there is a report related to use of email attachments versus linking to online files (which is more efficient).

Using a report like this can let you know you need to encourage more employees to use cloud links rather than file attachments when sharing documents via email.

Image Credit: Microsoft

Where Do Productivity Suggestions Come From?

To make productivity suggestions, Microsoft relies on best practices from multiple studies. Such as a Forrester study showing that sharing content in the cloud instead of emailing attachments can save up to 100 minutes per week.

Another study cited is that when people use online meeting tools effectively, they can save up to 104 minutes per week.

Using Productivity Score to Boost Your Team’s Efficiency

You can find Productivity Score in the Microsoft Admin Center and it can be accessed by those with one of the following roles:

• Global admin
• Exchange admins
• SharePoint admin
• Skype for Business admin
• Teams admin
• Global Reader
• Reports Reader
• Usage Summary Reports Reader

Once you open the tool, here are the areas that can be reviewed to help understand current activities and gain insights on how to improve them.

Communication

Communication is looking at how your organisation finds and shares information. Here you can fine tune things like how easy it is for your team to find the files they need.

You can also see how they are communicating to see where you may need to encourage more interaction to boost morale and a feeling of unification even if employees are working in different locations.

Content Collaboration

Here you can gain insight into how your team is collaborating on cloud content and see if employees are saving to the cloud for anywhere accessibility or lacking collaboration.

Mobility

Is your team effectively using Microsoft Teams and Outlook for file use and access across all platforms? Are they making full use of the cloud capability of the platform for mobility?

Meetings

These metrics help organisations understand the types of meetings people are having and how effective their meetings are. It also looks at best practices, such as whether or not follow up information is being sent after a meeting to help solidify what was discussed.

Teamwork

Is your team using shared workspaces effectively, like SharePoint Team sites? This area looks at things like use of group mailboxes and Microsoft Teams to collaborate and share ideas.

Endpoint Analytics

This technology metric looks at endpoint health and performance and whether a device may need actions taken to improve its efficiency.

Network Connectivity

This area of the tool identifies any problems with network connectivity that could be slowing your team down and provides ways to remedy the issues.

Microsoft 365 Apps Health

Learn if employees are using the most updated version of their Microsoft 365 apps and whether apps are being properly updated for security patches, etc.

Get a More Efficient Cloud Environment that Boosts Productivity

NMX IT Solutions has cloud experts that can help your Thames Valley area business with Microsoft 365 efficiency boosts and customisations that can power a productive team.

Contact us today to schedule your consultation! Call 01628 232300 or reach out online.