By John Mighell, Sr. Product Marketing Manager, Viva Learning Marketing Lead
As we continue to speak with excited customers about the potential for Microsoft Viva Learning to transform learning within their organizations and industries, the critical role that partners play in enterprise learning has been reinforced. Customers in the Viva Learning preview regularly emphasize the importance of aggregating access to content from a variety of sources and bringing it all together into the flow of work with Microsoft Teams and Microsoft 365. We also rely on partners to drive successful Viva Learning deployments and adoption. That’s why we’re excited to announce our next wave of Viva Learning partnerships at Microsoft Inspire 2021!
We know employees greatly value access to a rich library of learning experiences. In fact, here at Microsoft our data shows that access to learning opportunities and organizational support to continually invest in skills is as important as a competitive salary for many of our recruits. (Read more about how Microsoft is using Viva internally.)
In order to enable that rich learning library, we’re building Viva Learning as an extensible platform – enabling connections throughout the learning ecosystem so users can easily discover, share, recommend, and learn from content libraries across the organization. You may have seen the partnership announcements we’ve already made with Learning Management Systems like Cornerstone OnDemand, Saba, and SAP SuccessFactors and with content providers like Skillsoft, Pluralsight, Coursera, or edX.
Today we’re thrilled to announce the next set of Viva Learning partnerships with EdCast, Harvard Business Publishing, Go1, Josh Bersin Academy, Infosec, OpenSesame, Udacity, and Udemy. Together we’re excited to put people at the center and learning at the forefront with Viva Learning.
But don’t just take my word for it; let’s hear from our latest additions to the Viva Learning family:
“As a longtime partner of Microsoft’s--with successful integrations and deployments with Microsoft Teams and Microsoft Office--EdCast is now excited to partner and integrate with Viva Learning. Our longstanding commitment to provide learning in the flow of work and delivering the best-in-class employee experience (EX) platform has extended across many digital workspace platforms and G2000 companies. We are thrilled to continue our partnership with Microsoft on our Viva and Teams integrations and in rolling these solutions out to our joint customers and prospects.”
- Karl Mehta, CEO, EdCast
“We are excited to make our learning experiences accessible through Microsoft Viva. This will enable clients to learn in the flow of work and access the most critical ideas and learning experiences shaping leaders today and tomorrow.”
- Ian Fanton, Executive Vice President, Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning
“We believe employee learning experiences should be frictionless. Microsoft Viva Learning removes barriers to employee learning by delivering learning where employees are spending their day - in Microsoft Teams. Since Go1 also removes barriers to finding and accessing learning by bringing together hundreds of world-class providers in a single place, it's a perfect partnership.”
- Andrew Barnes, CEO, Go1
“Viva Learning is a prime example of ‘learning in the flow of work.’ This new offering leverages Microsoft’s massive corporate footprint by bringing learning to the work tools people already use every day. We’re excited to integrate the Josh Bersin Academy’s content with Viva Learning; the integration will expand the ability for HR teams to collaborate, share information, and discuss topics important to their work. We look forward to continuing our partnership with Microsoft and helping our members discover how Viva Learning can further increase the value of our courses and resources.”
- Josh Bersin, Global Industry Analyst and CEO of The Josh Bersin Company
“Now more than ever, employees play a critical role in applying cybersecurity knowledge and skills to protect organizations from cyberthreats. We're excited to offer this seamless integration with Microsoft Viva Learning, equipping employees at organizations worldwide with access to Infosec’s award-winning, cybersecurity training library. This new partnership brings experiential, role-based training resources into existing Microsoft workflows to make upskilling and reskilling easier than ever before.”
- Jack Koziol, CEO and Founder of Infosec Institute
“Our partnership with Microsoft Viva Learning allows companies to curate the perfect list of courses for every learner, all while in the flow of their work.”
- Don Spear, CEO & Co-Founder, OpenSesame
"Udacity's mission is to train the world's workforce in the careers of the future. By partnering with Microsoft Viva Learning, we can continue to expand our impact by providing global enterprises with cutting-edge tech skills for all of their employees. We've worked closely with Microsoft for many years and are thrilled to expand our collaboration into this new area that focuses on enterprise transformation within our highly-intuitive online learning experience."
- Kirk Werner, Vice President of Content, Udacity
“This partnership empowers employees to learn within the flow of work. Udemy Business content is centralized within Viva Learning, enabling companies to weave learning into company culture and drive business performance. This integration will offer on-demand content from Udemy’s top instructors to increase learning engagement and provide managers actionable insights into their teams’ learning journeys.”
- Greg Brown, President of Udemy Business
We love our content provider and Learning Management System partners, and we know our customers do too. In addition, we are partnering with top systems integrators to help you with your learning transformation. While much of Viva Learning will be easily configurable out-of-the-box (see our recent Viva Learning Microsoft Mechanics video for details), our SIs can help you configure complex learning environments, advise on and drive adoption and change management, and facilitate a transition to a learning culture in your organization.
Let’s hear about the Viva Learning opportunity from a few names you’ll recognize:
“The world of work is evolving at speed. The workforce, workplace and workspace are all changing the nature of work, and learning is evolving with it. We see the entire Viva suite as being a next generation solution that will transform the employee experience. With Viva Learning in particular, we’re excited to work with Microsoft on cloud-based KPMG Learning Solutions to help transform learning experiences for clients and their employees by bringing learning into the flow of their work.”
- Jens Rassloff, Global Head of Strategic Relations & Investments, KPMG Learning Services.
“We see Viva as a progressive EX platform that can accelerate the Workplace Experience journey for our clients – putting people at the center of the organization. With Viva Learning in particular, we’re excited to partner with Microsoft on a product that brings learning seamlessly into the flow of work, making it more accessible for employees, and easier than ever for leaders to build a learning culture.”
- Veit Siegenheim, Global Modern Workplace Lead, Avanade & Accenture Microsoft Business Group
“Viva Learning opens new opportunities for learning in the flow of work, which is a foundational strategy of our sales L&D transformation. We look forward to the ongoing partnership with Microsoft as we explore the value to our organization.”
- Bruce Sánchez, Global Lead, Sales Learning and Development Technology, Dell Technologies Global Sales L&D
In addition to partner content, Viva Learning includes content from LinkedIn Learning, Microsoft Learn, Microsoft 365 Trainings, and your own custom-built content stored on SharePoint. With all that learning material at their fingertips with Viva Learning, we’re making it easier than ever for people to find the right learning content, when they need it, so they can keep learning and growing. To see how we’re bringing learning into the user experience across Microsoft 365 (like Microsoft Search, office.com, SharePoint, or other Viva modules), make sure to watch our latest Viva Learning feature video:
We’re also continuing to build Viva Learning public APIs to enable connection from any learning partner into Viva Learning, in addition to the partners we’ve already announced. We will have more details and news to share about the future availability of public APIs in the coming months.
We hope you’re as excited as we are to bring all this great partner learning content into the flow of work with Viva Learning. We expect Viva Learning to be generally available in Fall of this year. As always, make sure to keep an eye on aka.ms/VivaLearning for the latest news and updates.