Visualize people and teams with Org Explorer in Outlook

Microsoft

 

Office Insiders on Windows,

Joyce Lin, a Program Manager on the Microsoft 365 People Experiences team, wrote this blog post to introduce you to the new Org Explorer app in Outlook for Windows.

 

As many organizations move into a more remote-friendly work model, being able to contextualize work relationships has become increasingly important. Org Explorer for Outlook helps you visualize and explore your company’s internal structure, work teams, and individual roles.

 

Many of us are also interacting with new colleagues for the first time through email or online chat. Org Explorer can quickly supply you with vital information about their title, group, manager, peers, and more, and aid you in developing strong working relationships.

 

A.-Full-UI_Org-Explorer_800px.jpg

 

Find out how it all works, right here

 

Cheers,
Nathan


Office Insider Community Manager


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17 Replies

Hi @Nathan_Pfeifer and @Joyce Lin  - Other than being part of Office Insiders, is there anything else that needs to be enabled at the tenant level for this to work?

We've been unable to make it function - the image below is what everyone in our tenant experiences.  We've had no luck with support since it is in preview (Outlook support says it is a problem with Exchange, but have no docs or contacts to help triage further), but are happy to debug with anyone who may know how to troubleshoot this issue.

AdrianHyde_0-1631209954591.png

 

Hi @Adrian Hyde, thank you so much for reporting this. We investigated the issue and deployed a fix over the weekend. Do you mind restarting Outlook and trying again to see if it's working now? Thanks again for trying out Org Explorer!

Bingo - everything is working now...thanks!
I'll start poking around and check it out. thanks again.

Another question for you @Nathan_Pfeifer / @joycelin !

For us, we just started to see the numbers show up on the right side of each contact that shows the # of direct reports.  But there is also another number shown that says "x total" - we have not been able to figure out what this number means....can you shed some light?

Thanks!

@Adrian Hyde Great question! "x total" is the number of total reports someone has, not just the people who report directly to them ("x of direct reports"). So if I had 2 people reporting to me, and each of them has 2 people reporting to them, I would have "4 total / 2 direct reports." Is there another way that we can phrase it so that it's clearer?

@joycelin is it possible to control the contact information that is displayed? We would like to show someones work landline number and their mobile number.

@RichieA325 Thanks for your feedback. We only support one phone number at this time (the first one that's associated to the user), but we are working on bringing in richer profile information beyond what you see on the screen today. I've noted down your use case as something we need to keep in mind. Thanks again!

@joycelin  I agree with Richie here.  The data already shows in Teams and Outlook People pane, so why not have it show here?  Quite a lot of our users have both a landline and a mobile, Org Explorer is a great tool for me to now tell users where to find out contact information, but it's missing mobile numbers!  Yet if I carry on showing them Teams 'Organisation' and Outlook People, both numbers will show.

 

Not sure if it makes any difference but we are on-prem AD syncing to Azure AD with AADC.

Thanks @LukeFP for the feedback! We are working to bring in the same kind of rich profile experience you see in other places in M365, and more contact info from AAD is a part of that. We hope to get this out as a quick follow after the initial release.

What information is required behind the scenes to have the Org Explorer functionality? I have made sure Manager fields are filled in, but am having limited success in displaying the information.

 

I have not been able to find any resources or help documentation around this feature, so anything you could point me to would be appreciated.

@Greg_Sultana, thanks for reaching out! Would you mind opening a support case in Outlook Win32? Click on Org Explorer tab, then click on Help > Contact Support to open a case. This way, we can look at your exact setup and troubleshoot more effectively.

So according to the O365 Monthly Enterprise Channel Release Notes. The Org Explorer was released with version 2205. Well I have installed 2205 but I dont see the Org Explorer in Outlook.
The Coming Soon Try It now button, is also not working. I can toggle it but nothing happens, and when I click ANYTHING else in Outlook it toggles back off.

Hi @alex_ha19, sorry for the trouble here. It seems like something is off with the Coming Soon toggle. Would you mind opening a support case within Outlook so the team can take a closer look?

@joycelin just wanted to add my support for this request.  Would be great to have some flexibility on controlling what information is shown here.  Thanks!

@Nathan_Pfeifer  -  Noticed that this is no longer available in Outlook. Is there another place to find a full org chart?

@Nathan_Pfeifer - Our users have stopped seeing the Org Explorer app in Outlook as well.    I am the Office 365 admin and cannot find this app.  It is still available?

Hi @daviscraigs - Thanks for trying out Org Explorer. The app is no longer available in Outlook for preview as of last month. We will make a new announcement when it's becomes available again.