Yammer is a platform designed to be used at the organizational level, and therefore it is necessary to have an organization-wide vision and engagement plan for Yammer. Without this, it will be difficult to manage the Yammer network, and users will take Yammer for granted without getting seriously involved in its implementation. In this chapter, we will learn how an organization can remain engaged on Yammer by defining a vision, developing guidelines on how departments can use Yammer, and creating a Yammer steering committee, with its responsibility being to improve Yammer adoption.
Define Your Vision
Why do we need Yammer?
What is the purpose of using Yammer?
How will Yammer transform our work culture?
How will Yammer help employees and the organization?
How do we make Yammer part of the organization’s business goals?
How do we make sure Yammer is accepted by the entire organization?
How will Yammer complement the organization’s strategy and values?
Example Vision Statements
The following are examples of vision statements you can ponder as you define a vision statement for your own Yammer network. The vision must short, clear, up to the point, and easy to understand.
Example 1
“Yammer: Transforming the way we work”
Builds crystal-clear communication: A platform to facilitate two-way communication and consistent delivery of news and information to the entire organization
Drives collaboration between projects: Increases productivity by facilitating collaboration based out of different geographical locations
Knowledge-Sharing Culture: Yammer allows an easy way to share knowledge between peers and colleagues in different regions and to learn from them. Employees become well informed.
Accelerate work: Drives innovation on Yammer by giving employees ability to share ideas and solutions linked to business transformation.
Example 2
“We create a safe and open collaboration platform for easy sharing of company data and news between employees to improve efficient execution of our strategies as part of our culture of performance.”
Example 3
“One Place for Employees to Learn, Connect, and Collaborate”
Example 4
“We’re utilizing Yammer to provide a community for the team to collaborate, connect and share on business related activities”
Collaborate seamlessly on projects.
Reduce duplication of work through better access to resources.
Harness the knowledge and power of our collective group.
Stay abreast of changes occurring throughout the team.
Learn and grow through intrinsic knowledge consumption.
Easily access information and updates from anywhere.
Example 5
“Transforming the way our department connects with each other, works together on tasks or projects, communicates with leadership, and streamlines processes for efficiency and clarit y.”
Welcome to the ENGAGE Framework for Yammer
E: Explore your business
N: Navigate implementation
G: Get sponsorship from management
A: Add business value
G: Gauge success
E: Evolve it
E: Explore Your Business Using Yammer
You should explore which business processes can be socially enabled. Social is all about keeping your people at the center of your business. It is a way to connect people and information in the most efficient way. Working socially will help people discuss business issues more freely, work in a collaborative manner, and develop connections with like-minded people.
Define the goals for which you want to use Yammer. You may want to use it to transform your working culture or to create knowledge-sharing communities or as a social intranet. Identify a clear purpose and build your vision statement so that you are in a position to measure the business value of Yammer.
Once you define your goals, identify how each department can use Yammer effectively. Identify department processes, find areas or use cases where Yammer can fit, educate people to use Yammer in those areas to achieve benefits, and finally measure your success. Areas such as daily meetings or daily task list email communications could be replaced by Yammer. Not only this, but also ask people to use Yammer to make their work innovative and exciting .
N: Navigate Implementation with Yammer
Navigate rollout. Build an implementation plan for Yammer covering how you are going to implement it. Identify Yammer champions and use their help for implementation. Target teams that can adopt Yammer and use their example to convince other teams. Identify challenges and risks and develop a mitigation plan to fix them.
The Yammer implementation plan grid
Phase 1: Quick wins
Start simple and easy. Start with quick wins that are easy to implement and result in a big change that creates a big business impact.
For example, have an all-hands meeting with the CEO and ask people to sign in to Yammer at reception, offering a reward to do so.
Phase 2: Low-hanging Fruit
These are easy-to-implement actions that have less of a business impact. However, these activities are easy ways to bring people to Yammer and keep them engaged.
For example, send a mailer to all employees with Yammer announcements. Discover new Yammer champions in this way.
Phase 3: Social Transformation
This phase is challenging, but if you implement it then you will experience transformation in your organization with Yammer.
For example, hold events such as YamJams and YamChats and run campaigns.
Phase 4: Fool’s Gold
The activities in this phase are good but are difficult to implement and have very little business impact.
For example, do not expect change overnight. Allow people to post non-business-related content in dedicated groups.
G: Get Sponsorship from Management for Yammer
Your Yammer sponsors should include a business executive and the Yammer community. It is recommended that the executive remain engaged on Yammer with at least four posts per week. Posts could be thank-you messages, status updates, or questions. The community manager should encourage people to talk on Yammer by posting interesting tweets or links, @mention-ing Yammer champions for their expert advice, and reporting important updates.
In a top-down approach, buy-in from sponsors is very important; otherwise, there will be challenges to allowing your Yammer network to grow organically. Sponsors are a source of inspiration for Yammer champions, and in a situation where Yammer adoption in fact goes down, it is the team of sponsors who will bring life to the network with their posts and engagement. If sponsors and executives are playing a part in the Yammer implementation, then it makes more sense for the user community to participate, and it becomes a serious asset to your organization.
Tactics
You cannot change a company’s culture overnight. You need a serious approach in order to change the work culture and gain buy-in from your company executives. You need to have some great tactics in place to encourage the shift to Yammer.
Migrate email chains
When an email communication is started, ask sponsors to say, “Let’s continue this discussion on Yammer to get more ideas and to not flood mailboxes.” Get this email in a public Yammer group and participate in this group. Such an idea is effective mail chain is using an email distribution list.
Inspiration
Ask your sponsors to identify employees with great work and tap them to share their work on Yammer and contribute new stories. Ask your leaders to build a Yammer army!
Persistence
Be smart in promoting Yammer in your organization. Promote Yammer through email signatures, ads on the intranet, referencing Yammer in posters used for campaigns, and displaying Yammer animations in your office reception area. Some CEOs have given up using emails and the phone and are using Yammer to collaborate with employees, as they find it very useful to know what is happening in their organization. Take help from such leaders in order to be persistent in your implementation.
A: Add Business Value
Activate Yammer users with education. Make Yammer part of learning and development. Ensure Yammer is part of the onboarding program so new joiners know about it. Use Yammer for branding top teams, projects, and leadership teams, which will trigger user engagement so people will be part of different Yammer groups.
Run a campaign on Yammer, organize worldwide brownbag Yammer sessions, send a mailer on Yammer to all employees, host webinars with the help of Yammer champions , and stick Yammer posters in areas where you have a lot of people going in and out. These different methods will help you increase the number of Yammer users and reap its benefits.
G: Gauge Success
Gauge your success by measuring and monitoring the progress of your Yammer network following your launch by using Yammer campaigns, education, and user engagement. You will get a clear idea on the collaborative behaviors of different users and how they consume information.
Organizational Metrics
Before plotting on the ENGAGE grid, it is necessary to have your vision and goals defined. At this point, you can see how far you have come and what remaining goals remain for you to achieve. First, you need to look at adoption at the organizational level.
Total number of conversations
Total number of messages
Total number of new groups created
Total groups that have the maximum members
Total groups have the maximum messages
User who has the most followers
User who has the most conversations/replies
The preceding set of Yammer analytics will give you some idea of your Yammer network and where it is heading. These statistics can be produced via a full data user export from Yammer. Such an export can be requested by a verified Yammer admin or Office 365 admin. Also, these analytics can be built by using social media analytics tools integrated with your Yammer network.
Opportunity Metrics
Opportunity-level metrics will help to demonstrate the tangible business value of your Yammer network. Share use cases to demonstrate how quickly Yammer helped you to find a solution to a problem, what your savings are after using Yammer , and how many reusable solutions you have created using Yammer. You can highlight many such cases to demonstrate the tangible benefits of Yammer.
E: Evolve It
Now we arrive at the end of the framework, where it is time to evolve what we have done so far in our Yammer journey. Go back to the framework, identify activities you planned to implement, think about whether you can add something to make it innovative or if you want to modify it to keep it simple. Listen to your users—they are your customers and will bring life to your Yammer network. Learn from your mistakes and build best practices. Demonstrate the business value of Yammer using opportunity and organizational metrics. Make leaders part of the Yammer journey. Educate users and continue to create Yammer champions that will make difference to your network.
Awesome Ways to Become a Social Enterprise Using Yammer
The desire to become a social enterprise with Yammer implies that you are looking for a change that will deliver value to your business. Being social means that this change will revolve around people and their behavior. In addition to the change you are looking for, you will also face a tremendous amount of pushback coming from people; however, you need to be persistent. When you say your enterprise has gone social with Yammer, it means people use Yammer in their day-to-day work, the use of emails or email distribution lists has been minimized, people find it easy to connect with like-minded people through Yammer, people are able to share content with their global teams, and there is strong management support for Yammer. Not only this, but Yammer also gets embedded into departments such as knowledge management, learning and development, internal communications, and customer relationship management. This means the people behind these processes rely upon Yammer for their work. Let’s see in detail how different departments can use Yammer effectively.
Department: Executives
Drive innovation by encouraging people to participate.
Get best possible feedback on company policies or on leadership views or opinions.
Using Praise feature, show appreciation for top performers in the organization.
Create a digital transformation using Yammer.
Get connected with people across different geographies.
Participate in YamJams and YamChats.
Create private Yammer groups for collaboration between leadership teams .
Department: Sales
Using @mention, involve experts in your sales conversations and maintain momentum throughout deal process.
Use Yammer to share lessons learned from customers.
Host YamJam (brainstorming) sessions to come up with new customer proposals.
Share Customer References using Yammer.
Announce new-customer wins.
Get faster answers from Yammer while responding to RFP (Request for proposal).
Build connections for cross-selling of products and services.
Department: Delivery
Create a Yammer group for new hires to make them feel comfortable asking newbie questions.
Host training videos and process documents for new joiners.
Share key documents, such as use cases, functional specification documents, reusable solutions, and process documents (such as incident and change management).
Project Yammer conversations on the walls as a feed fall (earlier known as a Yamfall) to supercharge your delivery teams.
Host YamJams to find solutions to customer problems
Celebrate wins on Yammer by sharing your customer story and team photograph .
Department: Marketing and Communication
Brand people, processes, and projects on Yammer. Build brands using Yammer.
Publish marketing collaterals on Yammer.
Publish important news and announcements on Yammer and capture people’s reactions.
Live report an event on Yammer.
Collaborate with people and find new topics on which to create intranet articles.
Use Yammer to run internal campaigns and get maximum reach.
Facilitate initiatives such as an expert connection program on Yammer.
Department: Research and Development
Encourage collaboration between cross-functional and cross-product teams.
Plan product launch to discuss trade-offs and set priorities.
Manage Agile product development across geographies.
Maintain continuous communication with sales and marketing teams to get faster feedback and share product updates.
Create Yammer groups to assess competitive products and share market-research analysis and the results of user acceptance tests (UAT).
Pilot new product discussions on Yammer, with ideas coming from employees and customers.
Department: Human Resources
Involve your organization in refining hiring strategies.
Create a buddy referral program on Yammer.
Use Yammer to post internal and new jobs.
Create collaboration between different recruitment teams.
Get feedback on HR policies and use Yammer to create new policies and renew existing ones.
Use Yammer to give full coverage of your fun activities.
Use Yammer to make announcements, such as about the launch of a new employee benefit program, renewing healthcare policies, and answering the annual employee survey.
Department: Finance
Maintain transparency in your financial projects or initiatives by providing continuous updates on Yammer.
Encourage people to invest in shares by demonstrating benefits.
Create private groups for discussing budget planning between different finance teams.
Publish your monthly spreadsheets.
Publish policies related to buying new goods and services and to renewing contract and rate cards.
Post your company’s stock-performance information on Yammer (which is already on public websites).
Department: IT
Use Yammer as a social helpdesk to address end-user queries and concerns along with those of Yammer users.
Showcase your latest IT products, both hardware and software; demonstrate its benefits.
Use Yammer to educate and get feedback when rolling out new IT products.
Share your IT market standard, certification achieved (ISO27001, SAS70), and security standards so people will know your levels, and address any queries linked to their deliveries.
Make all your internal apps go social by using Yammer APIs with your legacy technologies.
Department: Legal
Use Yammer to educate and address queries related to data privacy and client information security.
Publish updates and share information on new rules and regulations, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), German worker’s council, and trade unions.
Use Yammer to educate people on intellectual property matters such as copyrights.
Make use of Yammer to report infringement seen or experienced by end users on the work floor.
Educate on legal requirements linked to cloud technologies such as Software as a Service (SaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS).
Define a Yammer Steering Committee
Behind every successful Yammer network there is a committed team of individuals from a cross-section of the organization that monitors the progress of your network and brainstorms new ideas for growth. This team is called the Yammer steering committee, which we will explore in this section.
As you review each of the roles, keep in mind that engagement guidelines indicate the estimated number of required hours per week that the resource should commit pre- and post-launch. Depending upon the size and makeup of your organization, it is possible for some of these roles to overlap or to have one team member fill multiple roles.
High-level Overview of Each Role Within Rollout Team
Role | Responsibilities | Pre-Launch Est. Hours/Wk | Post-Launch Est. Hours/Wk |
|---|---|---|---|
Project Manager | Oversees the entire launch and rollout process | 10 | 2 |
Business Owner | Provides guidance, approval, and support throughout the rollout | 1.5 | 0.5 |
Community Manager | Manages daily network activity and events; provides guidance and best practices | 15 | 10 |
Executive Leader | Actively communicates the overarching value Yammer will bring to the company | 1.5 | 0.5 |
Group Leaders | Evangelize Yammer throughout business units; involved in use-case development | 3 | 1 |
Power Users | Help CM provide guidance and training to users and manage objection handling | 2 | 3 |
Education Lead | Plans and delivers Yammer training sessions for users and new hires. | 4 | 2 |
Communication Lead | Oversees the development, approval and delivery of companywide comm.’s. | 5 | 2 |
HR Manager | Helps integrate Yammer into HR processes and manages HR related groups. | 2 | 1 |
Technical Specialist | Oversees all technical aspects of the rollout, including integrations. | 10 | 1 |
Project Manager
Focus | Planning and execution of the rollout |
Department | Project Management |
Summary | Oversees entire network rollout, from pre-launch project planning and assignments to deployment Experienced in successfully managing an enterprise-wide initiative or program |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 10 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 2 hrs/wk |
Qualifications | Strong interpersonal, leadership, and motivational abilities Results-driven problem solver Detail oriented, excellent time management Social-media savvy, Yammer advocate |
Responsibilities | Define project scope, goals, timeline, and milestones and review with other stakeholders. Assign responsibilities to rollout team and clearly communicate expectations. Ensure coordination of network launch, communications, and end-user engagement activities. Coach, mentor, motivate, and supervise project team members and resolve rollout issues/conflicts. |
Work Social | Create a Rollout Team group within your network and invite other rollout team colleagues to collaborate. Use the group to keep tabs on the rollout project plan and timescales, share status updates, and delegate responsibilities. |
Business Owner
Focus | Project ownership and guidance |
Department | Executive Leadership |
Summary | Provides guidance, approval, and support throughout the rollout Influential leader who understands and actively communicates the business value of the network |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 1.5 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 0.5 hrs/wk |
Qualifications | Ability and authority to facilitate cooperation and lead people toward meeting the organization’s vision and goals Authority to directly influence spending on technology vendors Innovative visionary who encourages new ideas and cutting-edge technology, tech/social-media savvy Decisive—makes well-informed, effective, and timely decisions |
Responsibilities | Own and allocate budget to Yammer and rollout; sponsor integration into other business applications. Review and provide approval of rollout plan and processes. Articulate value proposition/ROI among executive team. Author and deliver communications to build awareness and encourage adoption. |
Work Social | Use the Yammer All Company group to keep members informed about the organization’s vision and goals for being a social enterprise. Create an Executive Team group to collaborate with other executives on company-wide initiatives and strategies . |
Community Manager
Focus | Network facilitation |
Department | Corporate Communications/Social Media Strategy |
Summary | Manages day-to-day network activity and helps project manager with rollout execution Well connected, authoritative, and has experience in communication, technology, and social media |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 15 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 10 hrs/wk |
Qualifications | Well-connected, enthusiastic, and engaging professional who understands internal company structure and culture Social media/networking expert and Yammer advocate Multi-disciplinary and capable of motivating/influencing diverse stakeholder groups Has ability to effectively communicate business value/ROI to various stakeholder groups, including executives |
Responsibilities | Champion Yammer to new and existing users; serve as a role model and community support. Participate in training preparation and delivery, communication development, and distribution. Encourage engagement to optimize network value; provide best practices on network etiquette and usage. Manage Yammer events and awareness campaigns; compile support resources into a Yammer 101 group. |
Work Social | Actively engage with members in the network, respond to unanswered posts, and share conversations to appropriate groups. Create and upload support resources to Yammer help group, answer how-to questions, and provide tips, tricks, and product updates. |
Executive Leader
Focus | Ownership and guidance |
Department | Executive Leadership |
Summary | Plays an essential role in championing Yammer throughout the organization Influential leader who understands and actively communicates the value of the Yammer network |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 1.5 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 0.5 hrs/wk |
Qualifications | Innovative visionary who encourages new ideas and the use of cutting-edge technology Collaborates across boundaries to build strategic relationships Yammer advocate who is tech/social-media savvy |
Responsibilities | Encourage Yammer usage and emphasize that it is supported for the organization. Articulate value proposition across executive team. Serve as a role model in the community. Participate in a network-engagement event to help launch effort. |
Work Social | Deliver the introduction to Yammer communication as part of the network launch effort. Use Yammer as a platform to issue future company-wide announcements and updates, such as QBRs, earnings summaries, etc. Take advantage of the Yammer feed to keep a finger on the pulse of the organization. Periodically “like” posts that are appealing to encourage continued good conversations/collaboration in the network. |
Group Leaders
Focus | Engagement and adoption within business unit |
Department | All departments/business units, management level |
Summary | Identify how specific departments and teams will use Yammer Evangelize Yammer across teams and encourage active participation and engagement |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 3 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 1 hr/wk |
Qualifications | Superior interpersonal skills; well-connected, influential, and respected among peers Understanding of and ability to navigate departmental operations, information environment, organization, and culture Strong listening and mentoring skills Management support and bandwidth to actively participate and fulfill leadership responsibilities |
Responsibilities | Serve as a liaison between end-user community and rollout team. Articulate Yammer benefits and value across business units. Deliver department-specific communications and guidance on Yammer usage. Identify opportunities to streamline business processes with Yammer. |
Work Social | Create Groups for your department, business unit, or team to collaborate with one another, discuss team initiatives, and projects. Create specific project-focused Groups, upload relevant files, and keep track of assignments and progress with Word Online . |
Champions or Power Users
Focus | Awareness and engagement |
Department | All departments, staff level |
Summary | Build Yammer awareness, understanding, and engagement throughout the community Enthusiastic and knowledgeable about enterprise social and eager to grow the network |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 2 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 3 hrs/wk |
Qualifications | Tech/social-media savvy Enthusiastic and forward thinking Thought leaders who are eager to participate in making the network a success |
Responsibilities | Evangelize the Yammer network and the value across teams. Build awareness through informal communication channels. Support community manager in launch activities, awareness campaigns, and engagement events. Assist in welcoming new users by providing guidance and best practices. |
Work Social | Use a group to have ongoing discussions about network activity and brainstorm ideas to boost engagement and adoption. Assist community manager by encouraging participation and directing users to appropriate groups and reference materials. |
Education Lead
Focus | Training |
Department | Learning and Development, Human Resources |
Summary | Establishes a thorough understanding of Yammer and its intended use among end users Manages and delivers all training content creation/customization |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 4 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 2 hrs/wk |
Qualifications | Experienced in multi-channel training development and delivery Ability to plan and coordinate with a diverse group of people Highly organized and detail oriented; excellent verbal and communication skills Tech/social-media savvy |
Responsibilities | Review resources available in the Office 365 Customer Success Center and customize to meet internal standards. Coordinate logistics for all training activities; regularly conduct and supervise Yammer training sessions. Integrate Yammer training into the new hire onboarding process. Use the Yammer 101 group for training resources and collect feedback. |
Work Social | Use a Yammer group to develop and organize ongoing training initiatives and programs, including Yammer training, and provide employees a place to ask questions/seek assistance with training. Integrate Yammer with other training and performance-management applications that are being used. |
Communication Lead
Focus | Awareness/understanding |
Department | Corporate Communications |
Summary | Oversees the development, approval, and delivery of company-wide communications related to the rollout Strong working knowledge of internal communications best practices |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 5 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 2 hrs/wk |
Qualifications | Demonstrated success in developing and implementing corporate communications for a variety of audiences Experience using social media tools and approaches as part of communication strategy Outstanding writing, proofreading, and editing skills; excellent verbal communication skills Authority to approve and deliver corporate communications; strong working knowledge of communications best practices |
Responsibilities | Work closely with other members of the steering committee on rollout communication strategy. Customize communication materials to meet any internal guidelines. Ensure timely delivery of all pre-launch and launch communications. Position Yammer as a primary corporate communications channel. |
Work Social | Use a Yammer group to issue company-wide announcements and newsletters and respond to questions/feedback. Use a Yammer group to share news and articles related to the organization/industry . |
HR Manager
Focus | Business-process integration |
Department | Human Resources |
Summary | Responsible for integrating Yammer into existing HR processes Creates and manages all HR-focused conversations/content on the network |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 2 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 1 hr/wk |
Qualifications | Experience in managing all HR functions, including recruitment, onboarding, performance/benefits Ability to plan and coordinate with a diverse group of people Highly organized and detail oriented; excellent written and verbal communication skills Tech/social-media savvy |
Responsibilities | Review current HR processes and identify opportunities for Yammer integration. Identify opportunities to use Yammer to gain employee support and feedback for HR initiatives. Proactively manage all HR-focused groups on Yammer. Assist rollout team in drafting the Yammer Usage Policy. |
Work Social | Create a Yammer group for employees to access necessary HR documents and ask questions about policies. Create a New Hire group with relevant onboarding materials to manage new personnel. Introduce new hires to the rest of the organization via the All Company group. |
Technical Specialist
Focus | Technical setup and support |
Department | IT |
Summary | Oversees all technical aspects of integrating Yammer with existing business applications Has the authority to make high-level IT decisions |
Time Commitment | Pre-Launch: 2 hrs/wk Post-Launch: 1 hr/wk |
Qualifications | Deep understanding of internal technical architecture and integration opportunities, including AS Sync and SSO Experience with managing IT support teams and authority to make IT decisions affecting large audiences Social-media savvy/Yammer advocate |
Responsibilities | Review all Yammer integration and technical guides available in the Yammer Success Center. Identify and involve all required IT personnel. Work with community manager and project manager on integration timing/logistics. Communicate any technical issues or queries to the Yammer Support Team. |
Work Social | Create and design a Technical Support group on Yammer to answer questions and provide support related to IT infrastructure. Redirect users who submit tickets through traditional channels to submit queries through Yammer and utilize uploaded guides. |
Build a Team of Champions
Spreading Enthusiasm
They are your eyes and ears throughout the organization, letting you know about successes and objections.
They are your worker bees, helping to disperse information, answer questions, and encourage daily Yammer use.
How to Find Champions
Attend department meetings.
Send an email to a group distribution list.
Host a brief information session during the lunch hour.
Ask influential leaders and well-respected colleagues.
Make personal appeals.
Ask your Customer Success manager to run the Influencer report and share the results.
What Do You Do with Your Champions?
Set up a Champions group on your network.
Share with them the network strategy.
Ask them how they want to help the company reach network goals.
Define roles and responsibilities.
Agree on a series of small, achievable goals just for the champions to work on.
Communicate regularly on Yammer and meet every other week.
Generate Executive Engagement
Getting the C-Suite Social
Employees look to executives for leadership and guidance.
Executives who show their support for collaboration and transparency can lead their organization toward innovation.
How to Build Executive Engagement
Identify leaders who have already expressed an interest in social media or in Yammer.
Gauge their support for Yammer directly or through intermediaries.
Offer 1:1 training.
Work with your CSM to identify and share executive use cases.
Routinely share Yammer success stories.
Coordinate a YamJam to connect leaders directly to employees.
Ideas for Executive Engagement
Demonstrate corporate vision and mission
Flatten organization
Engage employees
Enable other leaders to lead more effectively
Why: Understanding the challenges that the grassroots are facing
How: Reaching out to the people and asking for their feedback
What: Using Yammer announcements and posts
Why: To understand employee behavior and reactions
How: Dialogue with users
What: With Yammer announcements and posts
To be a good leader, you need to understand the challenges that your employees are facing on a daily basis. To do so, you have to reach out to them and periodically ask for their feedback, and that could be a daunting task, especially in big companies. Yammer announcements and posts are the most straightforward and easiest way to achieve this task.
As a leader, you are keen to understand what feelings employees have for the company, what their expectations are, and what their challenges are. By using Yammer announcements for major news and Yammer posts that ask for feedback on policies, you can understand expectations, and a lot of other benefits can be achieved.
Why: Improve your efficiency, increase your influence in the company
How: Sharing knowledge and ideas, collaborating in real-time
What: Yammer content creation in pages and conversations, files sharing, replies
Why: Key to Yammer success
How: Assisting Yammer users and collaborating
What: With continuous posting
We all want to improve our efficiency at work and at the same time increase our influence among our colleagues. Now, you do not have to choose between one or the other: you can share your knowledge and ideas and collaborate in real-time to get a lot of velocity while being visible to the whole company. Yammer allows you to create content in pages and conversations and engage with anyone (yes, also with the CEO) at any point in time.
Yammer champions are key to any Yammer network. With their advocacy, change-management challenges can be mitigated to a large extent. Yammer champions should shoulder responsibility in a way similar to community managers in order to take the Yammer network to the highest level.
Summary
We have learned different things in this chapter, such as building a vision for your Yammer network, educating various departments on how they can effectively use Yammer, forming a Yammer steering committee that contains various roles and responsibilities, finding Yammer champions, and running executive engagement.
This chapter contains end-to-end information on how an entire organization can remain engaged on Yammer, and if you follow some of the exciting ideas shared here, then I must confess that you will make a great difference in your Yammer user engagement levels.