Viva Insights is part of Microsoft Viva, a platform focused on Digital HSE (Insights, Glint and Pulse), training (Learning) and engagement (Engage, Connections and Amplify).
Viva Insights offers insights at three levels
Personal insight for you as an employee
Departmental insights for you as a manager
Organizational insight for you as HR/Managing Director/HSE
Historically, Viva Insights has been seen in several environments as a bit silly and a "meditation and fun" thing, fortunately we have come a long way and Viva Insights has become a very good tool for structuring the workday, and not least protecting your free time.🎣
Personal insight
Employees receive private, personalized feedback that helps them understand work patterns, improve well-being, and increase productivity. Examples include recommendations to block out time for breaks and focused work between meetings and other work sessions. One of the strengths of Insights is that you can set up "quiet time" across Outlook&Teams and devices in one interface
In addition to this, you can choose to set up fixed lunch blocking, focus time, reflection exercises, etc. The example below shows my schedule for focus time, Viva Insights takes into account other calendar events and the plan you set up here is then practiced according to "best effort" based on other events in your calendar.
Another clever feature is "Virtual Commute" which gives you a summary of your workday and reminds you to pack your bags to get home. The feature gives you a status of your day, tasks you haven't completed and a little update on the next day's tasks.
Departmental insights
Managers gain insight into work habits and patterns for their department*, such as regular after-hours work and dealing with overload. These insights help managers balance work/life balance within their team.
(*Based on the "manager" field in Entra ID. You can also upload your own defined groups via .csv. If you choose the .csv path, you can create a fictitious organizational structure for testing purposes, for example based on a POC group)
Department Insights : Managers can gain insight into their department’s work patterns, including working hours, meeting workload, and collaboration. This can help identify areas where the team may need support or adjustments to improve efficiency.
Trends and challenges : Viva Insights helps managers identify trends and potential challenges in the team. For example, it can show whether the team is experiencing high stress levels or whether there is a need for more focus time. Here, you can typically look at trends now towards Christmas and before the summer holidays when the work pressure often increases to deliver the last thing before going on holiday. As a manager, you will get an overview of "working hours" at a higher level.
Feedback and Recognition : The tool encourages leaders to provide regular feedback and recognition to team members. This can improve team dynamics and increase engagement.
Data-driven decisions : Using data from Viva Insights, managers can make more informed decisions about resource allocation, workflow, and team structure.
Organizational Insights
Managers gain insight into how work culture impacts employee well-being and productivity. They can use the recommendations to identify opportunities for improvement that can improve and increase digital health and safety and efficiency.
Work Patterns and Productivity : Organizational insights give managers a snapshot of work patterns, including work hours, meeting workload, and collaboration. This can help identify areas where the organization can improve efficiency and reduce time waste.
Wellbeing and balance : The tool can identify trends that affect employee well-being, such as high stress levels or work-life imbalance.
Collaboration and Engagement : Viva Insights analyzes collaboration patterns and can provide recommendations to improve team dynamics and engagement. This may include suggestions on how to foster more meaningful interactions and collaboration.
Data-driven decisions : Using data from Viva Insights, organizations can make more informed decisions about resource allocation, workflow, and organizational structure, helping to optimize operations and support strategic goals.
Privacy
Viva Insights is designed to protect employee privacy and support compliance with local regulations, including GDPR. It is not intended to enable employee evaluation, tracking, automated decision-making, profiling, or monitoring. Viva Insights comes with predefined report templates and metrics, however, it is important to mention that these can be customized to fit your organization's needs and meet any requirements that may arise. ( Custom metrics in Viva Insights | Microsoft Learn )
There was previously a requirement of a minimum of 10 unique users to be able to retrieve data at department/team and organizational level, this has now been changed to 5 as a default, but can be changed to the desired number.
An example of customizing Metrics
Find base metric : To customize a metric, start by finding the existing metric you want to use as a starting point. This is done while building a query in Viva Insights (Requires Insights Analyst role in Entra ID)
Cloning : Once you have found the metric, you can clone it using the "Clone" function. This creates an identical copy that you can modify.
Customize settings : In the metric editor, you can customize the settings for the cloned metric. This includes choosing which types of collaboration you want to measure, such as meetings, emails, chat, and calls.
Examples of customization options
Collaboration types : You can choose to measure different types of collaboration, such as the number of emails sent, the number of emails read, the number of chat messages sent, and the number of meetings attended.
Filtering : You can also define and filter which types of collaborations to include in the metric
Minimum number of users
Minimum group size : Viva Insights requires a group to consist of at least five people to generate insights. This ensures that data is adequately anonymized and protects privacy.
Advanced Insights : For advanced insights, at least ten people in your organization must have Viva Insights licenses
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