One of the first posts on data centre group NEXTDC’s Yammer network came from CEO Craig Scroggie, advocating that ‘all-company’ emails were a thing of the past, let’s communicate on Yammer.

“Having Craig’s executive support is the single most important key to the success of the enterprise social network”, says NEXTDC’s Digital Workplace Manager, Rebecca Jackson.

NEXTDC is living proof of the value executive engagement introduces to the success of this collaboration platform. NEXTDC recently ranked No.1 in SWOOP Analytics’ 2020 global benchmarking of 116 organisations, led by its low reliance on just a handful of key influencers and the fact most employees are active in many Yammer communities.

Rebecca tells the story of how within days of Yammer becoming accessible at NEXTDC in 2015, Craig was among the first to post on Yammer, with the suggestion of a new and more effective way to communicate internally.

“Yammer took off from there under Craig’s stewardship,” Rebecca recalls.

“Our People and Culture team very quickly transitioned all communication from ‘all-staff’ emails to the ‘All Company’ group on Yammer. Craig stopped sending emails and used Yammer for his enterprise-wide announcements and encouraged the concept that this was now our corporate communication tool.”

Rebecca can’t emphasis enough the importance of Craig’s support of Yammer.

“If you want to put the story of Yammer success in one line it’s that it was driven by our CEO,” she said.

“Every single guide to Yammer will tell you, you need executive support for it to flourish. For us, Yammer’s broad adoption was driven by Craig’s enthusiastic support. Almost immediately we went from a large number of communications being distributed to all staff via email to the notion that ‘we no longer need all-staff emails’.

“We have successfully refocused email from being a communication tool, to being a task-driven tool.”

Every new employee to NEXTDC is welcomed to the company with a post on Yammer, along with their photo and a self-authored bio. There are now 260 employees at NEXTDC, a top 100 company on the Australian Stock Exchange.

Twix or Twirl?

Rebecca said another key to NEXTDC’s Yammer success is to make it fun, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic when employees are missing the day-to-day interactions with their colleagues.

“We are serious about data centres, but we don’t take ourselves too seriously,” she said.

“We’re big on straight talk but we like to have a bit of fun with ourselves and our teammates.”

An example of the fun on Yammer is a rolling, three year Yammer poll, which continues to be among the most engaging posts, according to data from SWOOP.

It was initiated by an employee named Mat, who asked his colleagues to vote on which is the better chocolate bar – Twix or Twirl?

Three years on, the poll is still going strong. Rebecca recently interviewed Mat about the poll and he explained when he meets a new employee, he asks if they have voted in his poll. If they’re unsure of how to use Yammer, he shows them.

“It’s one of those examples where Yammer doesn’t have to be all serious,” Rebecca said.

Praising colleagues and sharing organisational success are other important aspects to NEXTDC’s Yammer success.

“Sharing praise to let a colleague know they have done a great job is the simplest way to spread good will and grow a positive culture,” Rebecca said.

“Big or small, it creates a connection, encourages positive behaviours and is as easy as a few words and clicks.”

Rebecca said NEXTDC’s Sales team are some of the most engaged employees on Yammer because they celebrate every win by sharing Praise in their Sales community.

“While they’re praising each other, they’re also sharing what they’re doing with the business, how we are winning and what they are seeing/experiencing in the front line,” she said.

“This helps with knowledge sharing across multiple business units, and keeps us informed and focused on what we are here to do – which is delivering the best data centre solutions in the country.”

Measuring success

Prior to using SWOOP Analytics, Rebecca, who is a Microsoft MVP, knew NEXTDC had a healthy Yammer network based on regular pulse surveys. However, with SWOOP, she now has access to real-time data which gives much more granular feedback to what was really happening on the platform.

“With SWOOP we can more accurately measure how people are engaging in Yammer and Teams and provide them with real, and useful, feedback that is targeted but also that looks at how Yammer is affected by the introduction of (Microsoft) Teams,” she said.

Learn more about NEXTDC’s Yammer journey in Rebecca’s blog post.

Download SWOOP’s full 2020 Global Yammer Benchmarking report.