Teams, Dynamics, and the Flow of Work

When we talk about “the flow of work” it means moving through a set of operational activities, moving between tools and processes, efficiently and effectively. Flow of work can be optimized through technology and process controls, and through active management. Within the modern workplace, the use of workflow tools is a common example of streamlining complex workplace activities, often between multiple tools and platforms.

Within knowledge management and collaboration platforms, there is some degree of automation that can be leveraged, but much of the work product of employees is created and managed through meetings and conversations. As such, the future of the flow of work will increasingly rely on collaborative applications that can be seamlessly added to a chat, a discussion thread, or even a real-time meeting. For example, during a Microsoft Teams meeting, the organizer might add a live poll to the team chat and ask for immediate feedback, or pull up and share customer profile information directly from the Dynamics 365 platform so that participants can review the state of a pending customer opportunity. The idea is to pull the necessary business tools and information and data into the conversation, thus supporting collaboration without interrupting the flow of work.

In the next #CollabTalk TweetJam taking place on Tuesday, August 31st at 9am Pacific (UTC -7), the community will once again join forces and have a focused discussion on the topic of “Activating the Flow of Work.” In this 1-hour Twitter-based panel discussion, we’ll bring together Microsoft MVPs and RDs, community experts, Microsoft partners, consultants, and practitioners to share their perspectives and real-world examples for the changes happening to the ways in which we work, and to explore Microsoft’s increasing focus on the employee experience (EXP).

Anyone can join this community discussion using Twitter and the #CollabTalk hashtag or your favorite Twitter platform. You don’t even need to be an “expert” to participate in the online conversation. Anyone can ask questions, comment on the questions posed, or just “lurk” in the background. These online discussions are open to anyone — you do not have to be on the panel to participate.

As always, this month’s tweetjam is being sponsored by tyGraph and AvePoint. Thanks for your support!

If you have never participated in one of these tweetjams, it’s pretty simple: anyone can jump in and share their thoughts, or just lurk in the wings and absorb the wisdom of the crowd. Either way, it’ll be a TON of content to consume in a single hour. You can follow the live session using the Twitter UI of your choice (Twitter.com, Hootsuite, Tweetdeck, whatever). How it works is that I’ll post a series of questions every few minutes, and people will respond to Q1, Q2, Q3 and so forth with A1, A2, A3, always including the #CollabTalk hashtag with their answers. Feel free to reply as often (or as little) as you’d like, ask your own follow up questions, share relevant links, re-tweet others, and engage with the audience.

The questions we will discuss during the session include:

1. What does it mean to “collaborate in the flow of work?”
2. In what ways are you/your organization trying to improve the employee experience and streamline the flow of work?
3. What are the business essentials to operate successfully in this era of hybrid, asynchronous collaboration?
4. How do collaborative apps fit into your current and future plans to improve the customer and employee experience?
5. What are the greatest gaps that are keeping your organization from reaching your employee experience goals?
6. Which Microsoft solutions have had the greatest impact on the flow of work for you/your organization, and how?
7. What is the future of collaborative apps for the modern workplace? What are your predictions for the flow of work?

As always, there will be side-questions, side-conversations, and wise-cracking throughout. This is open to the public, so please join in the discussion! The dialog is always thought-provoking and fun.

Participating on this panel (so far):

• Eric Overfield (@ericoverfield), Microsoft RD & SharePoint MVP, founder of PixelMill
• Mike Fitzmaurice (@mikefitz), vp of north america and chief evangelist for WEBCON
• Gokan Ozcifci (@xGokan), Microsoft Regional Director, SharePoint MVP, and IT infrastructure consultant at Neoxy
• David Drever (@DavidMDrever), Office Apps & Services MVP, senior manager and enterprise architect at Protiviti
• Adam Ball (@AdamCBall), co-founder of COUCUG, Teams and Skype for Business MVP
• Mark Kashman (@mkashman), senior product manager on the Microsoft 365 team focused on SharePoint and OneDrive
• Sharon Weaver (@sharoneweaver), Microsoft Regional Director, consultant, trainer and ceo of Smarter Consulting
• Nicki Borell (@NickiBorell), Microsoft MVP & RD, evangelist & consultant for SharePoint, Office 365 and Azure
• David Patrick (@DavidEPatrick),  Office Apps & Services MVP, user group organizer, subject matter expert with DSA, Inc.
• John White (@diverdown1964), dual SharePoint and Data Platform MVP, cto at UnlimitedViz and tyGraph
• Stacy Deere-Strole (@sldeere), SharePoint MVP and owner of Focal Point Solutions
• Mike Maadarani (@mikemaadarani), Office Apps & Services MVP, cloud solution architect at MCM Consulting
• Hal Hostetler (@TVWizard), Microsoft MVP and senior field engineer and social media coordinator for Roland, Schorr & Tower
• Ed Senez (@edsenez), president at UnlimitedViz and tyGraph
• Galen Keene (@sdkeene), consultant and collaboration architect, managing partner at Butterfly Technologies
• Eric Riz (@rizinsights), SharePoint MVP and ceo of Empty Cubicle
• Nick Brattoli (@Byrdttoli), Microsoft MVP, founder and lead consultant at Byrdttoli Enterprise Consulting
• Patrick Curran (@pcfromdc), federal cto at Planet Technologies
• Kurt Kragh Sørensen (@KurtKragh),  intranet consultant and owner of IntraTeam.com
• Jay Leask (@jayleask), Office Apps & Services MVP and US federal director, strategic accounts & solutions for AvePoint Public Sector
• Eli Robillard (@erobillard), SharePoint MVP, musician, fly-fisher, collaboration technology guy
• Shari Oswald (@shortcutshari), co-founder and productivity evangelist at PowerUP! Learning
• Matt Varney (@thevarnish), intranet manager at KCTCS
• Sascha Fredrich (@saschaF80), IT consultant of Microsoft solutions at bei Bechtle AG
• Vesa Nopanen (@vesanopanen), Microsoft MVP and principal consultant at Sulava Oy
• Tobiasz Koprowski (@KoprowskiT), Data Platform MVP, founder and consultant at Shadowland Consulting
• Kevin McDonnell (@kevmcdonk), Office Apps & Services MVP and solutions architect at CPS
• Suzanne George (@spgenie), Microsoft Regional Director, MCTS, and chief architect for collaboration services at Cognizant
• Wes Preston (@idubbs), SharePoint MVP, evangelist,  and owner at TrecStone
• and your host, Christian Buckley (@buckleyplanet), Microsoft MVP & RD, #CollabTalk founder, Microsoft gtm director at AvePoint

If you would like to be included on one of these panels, please drop me a line via email, LinkedIn, or Twitter. And thank you again to tyGraph for your support of these CollabTalk tweetjams! And finally, if you are interested in being a sponsor of a future tweetjam, please contact me.

We’ll be back on September 22nd with another tweetjam, so be sure to follow me (@buckleyplanet) for news and updates.