Everyone gets very excited about new Office 365 features, but how do we handle the dark side of change - deprecated features and functionality? The answer is that we probably don't do such a good job of managing features out of tenants. Maybe it's not the most exciting topic or work to do, but the simple fact is that deprecations happen and will continue to happen.
Adoption and Change Management are often discussed when companies move to cloud services, including Office 365. How quickly can we adopt the new services and how can we manage change? As it happens, Microsoft is extremely interested in driving customer adoption, so much so that this can cause problems with change management simply because so much change happens so quickly insist Office 365. As we discuss here, a structured approach to change management helps.
Microsoft says they will communicate large changes in Office 365 better, but what about all the small changes that show up without warning? Teams is a serial offender, perhaps because it’s the new kid on the block and is rushing to replace Skype for Business Online. In any case, it would be nice if we heard about small changes before we found them.
Based on user feedback and a horrible year of change management missteps, Microsoft is changing the way it handles major updates for Office 365. The plan seems like it might work and let’s hope that it does. No one wants to experience the same kind of update surprises we have seen in 2017.
Read an overview of tools and resources recommended to keep up with the changes in Office 365.