We’re thrilled to announce the addition of a new role within a Viva Engage community, community experts. A community expert is a member of a community who is assigned by a community admin to serve as a subject matter expert within a specific community. Adding a community expert role to your community ensures additional support and engagement throughout the community. A community expert can mark the best answer, pin posts, and ensure valuable insights and accurate information flow within the community. However, a community expert does not have the ability to manage members, assign roles etc. like a community admin. Once designated as a ‘community expert’, that label will only show within that community.
Note: This feature is available as part of your existing Microsoft 365 licensing. Community expertise is determined by community admins within your organizations, not Microsoft. Microsoft does not have the ability to define a community expert in your organization.
Who can be a community expert?
The role of community experts is to support peers, share valuable insights, and ensure knowledge flows across departments, making information accessible and reliable for everyone. Community experts aren’t limited to high-level executives—in fact, you should seek individuals who are deeply knowledgeable, actively engaged, and approachable. Below is a guide to identify potential community experts, with examples and scenarios to illustrate ideal candidates.
Community expert capabilities today:
- Marking “Best answer”: With the new role, community experts can now mark an answer as the best answer on a question post.
- Pinning/Unpinning a post: Community experts can now pin posts that they want to highlight in a community.
1. Defining an effective Community Expert:
- Subject Matter Expertise: Has specialized knowledge in a field or topic that benefits others across the organization. They can answer technical questions or provide insights into niche areas.
- Active & Engaged: Participates regularly in community discussions, contributing thoughtful responses and guiding discussions constructively.
- Approachable & Helpful: Willing to share their knowledge openly, whether through direct answers or by directing people to the right resources.
- Trusted by Peers: Known within their team or department as a reliable source of accurate information, with a reputation for being insightful and dependable.
2. Examples of community expert personas by department
- Technical (Engineer): Someone who may not be the head of a department but has extensive experience in specific technical stacks (e.g., cloud infrastructure, coding languages, hardware troubleshooting).
- Scenario: A mid-level software engineer, often answers questions related to backend development and cloud computing in a 'teams' chat or via email or even in an Engage community, providing clear explanations and solutions. Their insights are practical and resonate with peers.
- Legal: A non-executive legal team member who has detailed knowledge of compliance, intellectual property, or contract law.
- Scenario: An associate in the legal team within a company has guided several product teams on compliance questions. While they are not in management or a senior level leader, their guidance on data protection protocols has become invaluable across departments. And they are likely to have the most accurate information or help verify what is accurate.
- Communications Management: A mid-level comms lead who excels in crafting messaging strategies, managing internal and external communications, and navigating crisis communications.
- Scenario: A communications manager frequently advises teams on tailoring messaging for key audiences. When the company has faced an issue, they have been involved and instrumental in responding to the crisis and can be trusted to speak on behalf of the organization/team.
- Supply Chain Operations: A logistics coordinator or mid-level operations manager with deep insight into vendor relations, inventory management, or distribution channels.
- Scenario: A logistics coordinator known for their in-depth understanding of vendor logistics and delivery timelines. They regularly share tips on optimizing supply chain processes, helping various departments troubleshoot and improve.
- Facilities Management: Someone with an understanding of facilities operations, maintenance scheduling, or building management systems.
- Scenario: A facilities specialist within a specific office location, consistently advises teams on equipment maintenance schedules and energy efficiency projects. Their practical experience makes him the go-to person for questions on facilities management within that office.
Note: Self-nomination and peer nomination for community experts are currently in progress and coming soon.
Managing community experts
Assignment
Assigning a community expert: Community admins in a community may assign community experts based on their knowledge and the abilities of members in that community.
- In the member panel in the right rail, community admins will see a new section called: “Community Experts.” In this section, there is a link to, “Assign.”
- Once an admin clicks on assign, it opens a modal where the admin may add experts by clicking the “Mark as expert” button.
Removal
Removing an expert: After assigning a community expert, an admin can remove the expert by doing the following:
- Navigate to the member panel in the right rail. Click on the “+” sign in the Community Experts section.
Withdrawal
Withdrawing from the community expert role: After being made a community expert, a user may withdraw from this role at any time by taking the following steps:
- In the member panel in the right rail, click on the number of experts in the community expert section.
- This shows all the experts in that community with the user at the top and an option to, “Withdraw.”
- This then opens a modal that informs the user of the action they are taking. And the user may withdraw.
Community experts play a crucial role in fostering a knowledgeable and collaborative environment, enhancing community effectiveness within Viva Engage. Stay tuned for additional capabilities that will further empower community experts.
Microsoft
