Goodbye Workplace, hello Viva Engage

On 3 June, we will move from Workplace to Viva Engage.

Email will remain our primary channel for critical news and updates, while Viva Engage is our approved channel for nice-to-know information (events, initiatives, good news, media articles, achievements, recognition of peers etc).

Viva Engage is designed to support your workday through a simple and integrated experience, where you control what you see and when.

Why you’ll prefer Viva Engage

Easy access
Say goodbye to an external platform and repeated logins. Viva Engage is part of the Microsoft suite, which means you’ll be able to access it within your Teams interface.

A simplified community structure
Workplace is currently home to 475 groups covering a variety of topics. Viva Engage will embrace a simplified, audience-based approach, with a smaller number of communities (previously known as groups on Workplace).

The official community structure will be:

• an all-staff community – all staff will be members and are able to post.
• an academic staff community – all academic and research staff will be members. Professional staff may choose to opt-in.
• a professional staff community – all professional staff will be members. Academic staff may choose to opt-in.
• a community for each campus – staff will be automatically added to the community for their campus.

Discussions around the requirements for faculty, school and directorate-based communities continue to take place with the relevant areas.

Some special interest Workplace groups will also be recreated on Viva Engage. You will be added to any of those you were an existing member of on Workplace and can choose to opt-in to others.

Managing your notifications
Notifications are not centrally managed by IT; they are managed by users. The Viva Engage default is to notify you about everything, but you can easily change this. From 3 June, you will be able to set your notifications to either receive a daily digest, a weekly digest or no notifications at all.

Never miss a message from senior leaders
For leaders worried about cut-through, we’ve got you. Senior executive leaders will have access to a special announcements feature, so when you post an announcement, everyone will be notified via push, app and email, regardless of their settings.

For users that have all their notifications turned off, if you do get a notification via push, app and email, you’ll know it’s from one of our leaders.

A digital newsletter
Viva Engage is basically a digital newsletter delivering information to a specific audience in real-time. Got something to tell all staff? Choose the all-staff community. Got a new grant opportunity just for academics? Choose the Academic community. Having an on-campus lunch open to all staff? Choose your campus community.

Of course, there will be times when the broader communities won’t suit your specific needs. Contact the Internal Communications team for advice, we are here to help you.

A new home for our Staff Bulletin
From 18 June, the Staff Bulletin will also live on Viva Engage. You will still receive an email in your inbox, but the articles will link to posts on Viva Engage.

Okay, so what do I need to do?
Right now? Nothing.

The new Viva Engage communities will be set up and you will automatically be added to the All-staff community, professional or academic community (depending on your role) and campus community (depending on where you are located) in time for you to join Viva Engage on 3 June.

From there, you can explore other available communities or just stick to the official ones.

Want more information?
If you missed our Viva Engage information session you can view the recording here to learn more about the platform. You can also check out our FAQs or contact the Internal Communications team for more details.