Five Ways to Boost Your Productivity

When the world changed in March 2020, companies and employees alike had to tap into their resilience and adapt quickly to the new normal.

Remote work came into our lives and it looks like it’s here to stay.

Lots of people also took this time to familiarize themselves with Microsoft 365. This tool has all your favourite productivity apps, but it also helps you stay connected with your team so you can make headway on your projects from the peace and quiet of your home.

Here’s an overview of all the ways Microsoft 365 can help you and your remote teams be more productive.

Become a Teams pro

Make sure your employees are comfortable using Teams—it’s the gateway to Microsoft 365 that makes it easier than ever for employees to work together.

Microsoft Teams has advanced functionality that makes for more engaging interactions than those on other platforms that have become popular during lockdown.

In addition to having access to the usual tools for audiovisual communication, file sharing, and team building, your IT team can use Microsoft Teams to develop applications tailored to your company’s productivity needs, and even incorporate artificial intelligence.

Keep a close eye on things

Microsoft Planner is a powerful tool that helps you keep track of your team’s assignments and manage projects.

It helps boost productivity among remote employees because it allows you to create task boards that pair automatically with Microsoft Teams.

Planner is set up like a regular production schedule and can be accessed directly by everyone on the project so they can track their progress and meet deadlines.

Plus, Planner makes it easier than ever to collaborate remotely, even if you’re nowhere near your computer. Simply add a new task card from your mobile device and everyone on your team will receive an instant notification to let them know of any changes.

Build strong ties with your teams

Social media platforms make it easy to communicate, but they’re not always geared towards businesses, especially when it comes to security, content ownership, and data protection.

Enter Yammer, the social networking service designed for businesses and integrated with Microsoft 365. Yammer lets employees keep in touch professionally, ask questions related to work, organize activities, and build community. It reinforces their sense of belonging to the company.

Employees can use this more informal but fully secure communication space to monitor media, share noteworthy articles, and talk about internal issues. It’s also a space for intrapreneurs to share ideas. Unlike on public social media platforms, you remain in control of the content and discussions.

Yammer helps your team members build ties, even when they’re working remotely.

Make sure your teams are secure, wherever they are

When you have remote workers, it’s always a good idea to come up with a strategy for authorizing access to shared files.

It may seem like a simple thing to do, but there are a number of pitfalls managers often overlook. Who is allowed to access which documents via Teams, OneDrive, and Sharepoint? What level of authorization does each employee have?

The Azure portal integrated with Microsoft 365 makes it easy to create security groups by region, user, or department.

You also have access to Microsoft 365 activity logs so you can see whenever someone accesses, modifies, or downloads sensitive data.

Get the most out of Outlook

The new version of Outlook has become the gold standard of user-friendly interfaces and productivity—and it’s now fully integrated with Microsoft 365.

It’s the perfect tool to organize your professional and private life, manage your schedule, and use your time wisely when working on your own or with others. Spend some time getting reacquainted with Outlook—it’s worth it!

At a time when remote work is the norm and your teams are looking for ways to stay productive, Microsoft 365 is the solution.