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 organizations 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, 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 organizations: to share information, improve communication, and support corporate culture. We may approach collaboration in different ways, but most organizations seem to fail consistently at one thing: defining "success."

If we cannot accurately define what success looks like with our collaboration solutions, how can we measure it and claim 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 organizations 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 organizations 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 the end of August, after which the results will be made available. The third and final phase of the initiative will be launched at the end of the month, with comprehensive results and analysis to be shared in multiple sessions at the Microsoft Ignite conference to be held in Atlanta in late September.

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 at http://bit.ly/2aQIw54

Thank you for your support of this community initiative. We look forward to your feedback!