Why has this support site moved away from Yammer?

[Ruven Gotz]

You may think: Proof! Microsoft has lost confidence in Yammer. This is not at all correct. When you look at the use-case of Yammer vs. Lithium (the platform used for this community) there are a couple of key reasons for moving this community support site away from Yammer.

Yammer is a platform for Enterprise Social Neworking within an organization (and extending to that org's partners). It was not meant to handle this type of public social platform supporting multiple millions of users. Also, the requirement that you log in before you can see or search posts was a limitation of Yammer for this use-case.

Yammer continues to be Microsoft's Enterprise Social Network. I applaud Microsoft for shifting platforms to serve users better, knowing they'd be taking the inevitable "Yammer is dead" backlash.

[#2]

I get why the change was made to make this available to more users without the administrative challenges of an invite-only scenario. However, this UI makes no sense to me, and the change communication for this new platform is weak (unless it hasn't happened yet, and that's what is meant by "preview").

I have to think that "Yammer Bugs" is one of the most engaged groups in the Office 365 Network, but I see nothing like that here. If those posts are going to be housed in one big "Yammer" group, expect that any other posts will be pushed down whenever there's a major bug.

There's also too much clicking and scrolling compared to Yammer... and everything is blue.

[#3]

Naomi....Thank you for taking the time to write this. It helps me understand this shift a little better.

I thought you may want to edit one section though....

"But even seeing folks like CVP SharePoint and OneDrive, Jeff Teper, answering questions live and authentically from real users at Office 365 community events on Saturdays, is incredibly demonstration of the power of customer led innovation and willingness to dialog." It appears you meant "...is an incredible...." in lieu of "...is incredibly demonstration..."

[#4]

I, like you, wish this weren't happening.  Alas.......just a big "sigh" from me.

[#5]

Thanks Dennis - swatted that one! Typo queen status regained unfortunately... :)

Also thanks @Boris Kapitanovic yes, some people didn't like the shouting but I also thought it was necessary :)

Posted a longer follow up and perspectives also (let me know if you spot anything there!) - most valuable part is the comments from folks though - really great to hear your thoughts.

Office 365 Network: What We Have Here is A Failure to Communicate

[#6]

It is really HARD to find MY CONVERSATIONS in this platform. Miss Inbox and/or Profile having a list of my convos. How do I know if people replied to my comment? This feels a lot like an old-style BBS with prettier branding. :\

[#7]

@Naomi Moneypenny - great follow up post, i like how you decomposed the issues, thanks for sharing your views!

[#8]

Hey Diane, you can do this in a number of places. 

1. Click on your avatar in the top right (should open a slideout). Click on the notification bell to see all of your latest notifications.
2. Click on your name to get to your Profile page. Scroll down to 'Activity & Notifications" to find them. 

Hope that helps! 

[#9]

---

@Diane Kennedy wrote:
It is really HARD to find MY CONVERSATIONS in this platform. Miss Inbox and/or Profile having a list of my convos. How do I know if people replied to my comment? This feels a lot like an old-style BBS with prettier branding. :\

---

This is really great feedback and put very simply.  I know @Michael Holste gave you the technical answer of how to do this, but I think as a general theme this is such a critical aspect of interaction in our community.  Was just meeting with my team and discussing this exact statement, making sure it is easy to continue a conversation, go further with a conversation, not just a one hit wonder "found my answer, moving on".  Thanks for this.

[#10]

And a good mantra that is.......learn it, love it, live it

[#11]

Christopher,

I do not disagree with you with the following question.  I am sincerely curious ....

How does this network give you more accessibility than Yammer?

Dennis

[#12]

"The other thing I would recommend working on is your use of badges. Badges for the hell of it (like putting a profile photo us) are not legitimate incentives and can be seen as condescending. Each badge/reward needs to link to a specific intrinsic user motivator... at the moment there are too obviously skewed to your interests rather than the end users (this is gamification 101 guys)."

Agreed with this statement Scott. The "badges" and things like that are somewhat annoying to me.

[#13]

This site isn't as great as MS wants to think it is. What I get from this is that instead of investing in Yammer, MS is instead choosing to move away from Yammer. Perchance a message we should take w/ some weight. CC: @Antoine Snow

[#14]

You would also think that they would take some basic functionality into account. Like hyperlinks within the new posts.

[#15]

The strategy of having one collaborative platform for enterprise collaboration and another for public collaboration seems to me to be flawed? People just want one tool to collaborate, which is what made email so successful. 

It would have been better to take the best of breed collaboration tool, ie Yammer, and add support for public collaboration in those networks that need it. Then you'd have a killer tool.

I'm trying to keep an open mind with this new platform, but it's already irrating me with basic problems:

• I have to re-login it, each time I come back to the site
• It doesn't hide messages I've already read, which means coversations are sorted back to front and I have to page to get to the most recent and most relevant messages, and risk missing them.
• It seems to be optimized for mobile devices, which means it is de-optmized for desktops. Better to optimize for desktops and use an app on mobile devices.
• Notifications don't seem to work, nothing is brought to my attention?
• ...

[#16]

Funny how things work.  I guess I am now glad this group of IT Pros moved from Yammer to Network.Office.com. Otherwise I would have lost contact with a lot of great people.

Why? Well you were used to seeing me post at Dennis.Wilson@MapleMount.org.  As it turns out, I found out today my "skillset no longer meets the need of the organization."  So, I am self-employed full time once again.

So I no longer have access to my old profile....except I did get in long enough to add "Old Profile" to my profile.

It will take me a while to build this profile but I will get it built as quickly as I can.

Dennis Wilson, Head Computer Guy

The Computer Guys LLC.com

PS I have no access to my old Yammer Profile so cannot answer queries.

[#17]

Welcome back, @Dennis Wilson.  :)  Wouldn't want to leave you behind. 

[#18]

Thanks Tom.

Funny thing is, I had just last week logged into Yammer and Network.Office.com, one on each screen to find the names of those I had been following in Yammer.  I didn't want to lose them once the Yammer IT Pro Network went dark.  All that work for naught!

It sure would be great if there were a way to gain access to my old account so I can find all the really great contributors I used to follow.  But, I guess I'll just have to rebuild it over time as I see names I recognize and then "follow" them. 

[#19]

Hey Dennis, I just sent you an email to help with the follow question.

[#20]

Thank you so very much Lana.  

That list was marvelous and all that have made the transition to Network.Office.com have been "followed" now.  

I was quite surprised how many I was following in Yammer that have not transitioned to here.

Of the 80,000 members to the Yammer IT Pro Network, how many have made the move?

[#21]

Make a polite guess ;)