Empower Firstline Workers and supercharge search—here’s what’s new to office.com/setup 365

Since the early days of personal computing, information workers have benefited the most from technology. That makes sense since these workers tend to spend the bulk of their day at a computer screen. But there are 2 billion workers in the world who don’t work behind the computer. You’ll find them, instead, behind the counter, on the factory floor, in the operating room, and out on the tarmac. First with customers, first with products, and first to represent your brand, these Firstline Workers are the lifeblood of organizations across the planet. And for too long, they’ve been underserved by technology.

With Office.com/setup 365, the world’s productivity cloud, we’re changing that. Thanks to new technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and automation, we can build experiences across devices to connect organizations from the shop floor to the top floor. So, while we continue to unlock new productivity experiences for information workers, we can help their Firstline colleagues get more done too.

Firstline Workers already use tools like office.com/setup Teams and Power Apps to digitize shift schedules, take meetings from anywhere, and simplify workflow. And this month, I’m thrilled to announce some exciting new tools to help Firstline Workers collaborate and complete tasks, along with management tools to make managing them simple and fast.

Starting with this month’s “What’s new to office.com/setup 365” blog post, we’re partnering with Modern Workplace on a new podcast that complements both the blog and the Modern Workplace video series. For the first episode, host Alex Bradley and I talked about news coming out of the National Retail Federation (NRF) tradeshow, this month’s office.com/setup 365 updates, and my 2020 productivity New Year’s resolutions. Please have a listen, subscribe if you want to hear more, and feel free to leave a comment with topics you’d like us to cover.

Empower your Firstline Workforce

Several new office.com/setup Teams updates help you drive higher levels of employee engagement and enhance customer experiences.

Improve collaboration with Walkie Talkie in Teams—Now Firstline Workers can more easily communicate and manage tasks at the touch of a button. The new push-to-talk experience in office.com/setup Teams delivers clear, instant, and secure voice communication over the cloud, turning employee- and/or company-owned smartphones and tablets into walkie talkies. This new feature not only reduces the number of devices your employees need to carry but can also lower IT costs. And when integrated with new devices—such as the recently unveiled Samsung Galaxy XCover Pro—your Firstline Workers can communicate with each other instantly. Walkie Talkie will be available in private preview in Teams in the first half of this year.

Streamline user experiences for Firstline Workers—Firstline Workers can now sign in to all their office.com/setup 365 and custom apps using one-time SMS codes—streamlining their sign-in experience. And shared device sign-out enables users to sign out of their apps on shared devices with just one tap, helping to protect customer data while improving the user experience. Finally, an updated Tasks feature in office.com/setup Teams delivers new capabilities and reporting to everyone from the C-suite to Firstline Workers.

Make management easier for your IT pros—Now you can minimize the management of employee tasks for IT pros. The new delegated user management feature allows IT managers to approve password resets and enable Firstline Workers to use their phone numbers for SMS sign-in via a single, customizable portal. In addition, Azure Active Directory (AD) user provisioning now integrates with SAP SuccessFactors, making it easy to onboard and manage identities at scale, across any application. And finally, off-shift access controls for the Teams app enables your IT administrators to limit employee access to the Teams app on their personal devices outside of working hours. These updates are rolling out over the next couple of months.