How SoWork Improved Microsoft's Employee Turnover

The Problem

Distributed and completely disconnected from each other.

This is how Alice Ferng, Director of Innovation & Technology at Microsoft, used to describe her team.

Spread out across 4 countries and 5 timezones, teammates were isolated from each other day-to-day. Employees struggled with feelings of isolation and disconnection. Despite regular video calls and collaborative tools, something was missing.

This disconnection from their teammates and company culture resulted in a damaged team morale and job satisfaction. Alice found that not being able to easily have a casual chat with teammates hindered effective communication and collaboration. Meaningful connection felt impossible, engagement was suffering, and turnover was on the rise.

We realized our team’s engagement was suffering without the time we used to spend together working from a shared place.

Everyone felt isolated when we lost those impromptu hallway conversations, and the ability to be a part of what’s happening with your teammates day-to-day.

To get back to being a real team again, we desperately needed the remote solution to that...

The team tried to use their company’s flagship offering, Microsoft Teams. But Teams wasn’t creating the cohesive environment they were searching for. Alice went on a mission to find a solution.

The Solution

Alice found SoWork and realized what they'd been missing.

Just being together in SoWork immediately solved most of our problems.

SoWork unlocked the feeling of being beside each other. Just being able to see their teammates online, and knowing they could walk up to someone or join in on a meeting was an unexpected and powerful boost for their team's engagement.

Alice was blown away. She got to work customizing the office to represent her team's culture. And to her delight, her teammates joined in. They added their own touch to the office, their workspots, and their avatars, bringing their office to life.

Now, they felt like a real team. They could see each other, work beside each other, walk up to each other for informal conversations, and bond over quick games between meetings. Alice knew this was the solution they'd been looking for.

How Microsoft Uses SoWork

Alice and her team log into their virtual workspace every day and sit beside each other. They love being around each other, even if they're just working quietly.

Throughout the day, they use their SoWork office for team meetings, standups, 1:1s, socials, and breaks.

For us, it's super important that we take all of our meetings in SoWork.

We want everyone to know what's happening. That alone solves most engagement issues. We want people to easily join meetings they didn't know about, and to unlock those critical spontaneous collaboration moments that happen between meetings in SoWork.

If you take your meetings somewhere else, all of that benefit disappears. And team engagement goes with it.

SoWork Benefits

Stronger Team Connections

Whether it was bumping into a colleague in the hallway or striking up a conversation in the break room, employees found opportunities for communication and connection, heavily impacting her team’s morale, togetherness, and culture.

SoWork feels more realistic than anything else we've tried. And there's just something about it that unblocks my team's engagement and collaboration.

Seamless Collaboration

SoWork offices are fully customizable, with social spaces fostering a sense of camaraderie among team members.

This buzzing environment has major benefits to team productivity too. Teammates are able to see who’s in the room, use the 'what's happening' hub to take part in meetings or games, and leverage SoWork's extensive productivity tool suite to get great work done together.

As a result, collaboration and teamwork skyrocketed. SoWork unblocked engagement and then paved the way for higher levels of productivity and innovation within her team.

Conclusion

SoWork made us a team again. It brought the humanity, spontaneity, and collaboration back into our work in a way nothing else could.

SoWork’s contribution to reducing turnover transformed the remote work experience Microsoft.

By prioritizing human interactions and embracing the spontaneity of in-person office dynamics, Alice and her team felt closer than ever, ready to tackle big work goals together.