M365 Changelog: Suggested communities on home page, new community creation, and improved pinned conversation treatment

MC233430 – Updated February 23, 2021: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

We are bringing suggested communities to the right rail on the Yammer home page and improving the pinned conversation experience.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 66151 and 71474.

When this will happen

• 66151: Will start rolling out in mid-March and will complete by early May
• 71474: Started rolling out in late-January and expect to be complete by late April

How this will affect your organization

Once the changed is rolled out:

• Suggested communities on the home page:
  • You will now have an easier time discovering and joining communities on Yammer! Upon every visit to the home page, you’ll see 3 personalized community suggestions for you to join. Want to learn more about the community? Visit it by clicking on the community shown. Want to join the community suggested? Join it by clicking the ‘Join Community’ button below the community you’d like to join. Don’t like the suggestion? Dismiss it by clicking the ‘X’ button in the upper right corner of the community displayed.
• An improved pinned conversation experience:
  • For community feeds – pinned conversations will be seen in a view optimized for vertical height (less text, attachments, and comments shown) if the newest activity on the conversation has been seen.
  • For event feeds – pinned conversations will always start off in a view optimized for vertical height (less text, attachments, and comments shown).
  • Want to see more of the pinned conversation? Expand the conversation by clicking the chevron in the upper left hand corner of the conversation card. To view less of the conversation, simply click the chevron again.

What you need to do to prepare

We recommend you share out the coming change to community admins, as they may want to add community cover photos or avatars to help their communities stand out in the suggestions, or pin conversations without fear of taking up too much room on the feed.