With the launch of the Measuring Collaboration Success initiative earlier this year, we asked the community to share their thoughts on what defines “collaboration success” by participating in a survey. While many organisations claim that their internal collaboration efforts have been successful and have provided value, the results of this survey show that few are able to truly articulate that value.
The purpose of this initiative, as the name implies, is to capture feedback from the community and develop best practices around a shared definition of what makes collaboration successful, to understand the metrics being used to monitor and measure that success, and to identify the best practices for implementation to achieve these goals.
In this second phase of the initiative – which runs through November 18th, we are once again asking the SharePoint community to participate in a survey to help us better understand the specific metrics around success collaboration.
While the survey is completely anonymous, respondents have the option to receive the raw survey data at the conclusion of each phase. Additionally, a whitepaper with the full results of the first survey — as well as commentary from members of the community panel – is now available for download.
Monitoring and Measuring
Collaboration is a broad topic, encompassing everything from email to instant messaging to real-time video communication. While we use a variety of technologies to meet the unique needs of our different businesses, the goals of these systems, platforms, and solutions are fairly consistent across organisations: to share information, improve communication, and support corporate culture. We may approach collaboration in different ways, but most organisations seem to fail consistently at one thing: defining “success.”
During this second phase of the #MeasureCollabSuccess initiative, the questions in our survey progress from definitions to the specific metrics that we use to monitor and measure success. These range from out-of-the-box activity-based, or quantitative metrics — such as number of files uploaded, or number of page views — to the more results-oriented, or qualitative metrics that help organisations better understand the value being achieved. For example, whether the tools and systems help reduce the time it takes to deliver a product or project, or to better leverage collective knowledge to innovate. Different organisations may have varying measurements of success, and the point here is to share and learn from the best practices of others within the community.
Learning from the Community
The second survey will run through mid-November (until the 18th), after which the results will be made available. The third and final phase of the initiative will run through the end of 2016, with comprehensive results and analysis to be shared in January.
If you would like to participate in our latest survey and share your experiences in monitoring and measuring the impact of your own collaboration tools and systems, you can find the survey here.
Thank you for your support of this community initiative. We look forward to your feedback!
