Microsoft launches Adoption Score to help customers optimize Microsoft 365 subscriptions

Microsoft has released Adoption Score, a tool designed to assist both Microsoft 365 admins and IT leaders enhance their productivity with Microsoft 365. The tool replaces the Productivity Score dashboards and unpacks a ton of features and controls that will in turn enhance effectiveness and efficiency.

According to Microsoft:

The anonymized metrics in Adoption Score help IT admins understand and optimize Microsoft 365 usage patterns in support of their digital transformation journey. The new name reflects the new product truth and provides clearer differentiation from other solutions that offer insights for business leaders and managers.

Microsoft further indicated that they will be rolling out additional new functionality to the tool with the aim of ensuring that organizations make the most out of their Microsoft 365, simultaneously ensuring that they do not break their commitment to user-level privacy. We saw Microsoft make some privacy changes to its Productivity Score software amid the COVID-19 pandemic because of the rising concerns that termed the tool “a full-fledged workplace surveillance tool”.

Time Trends will also be part of the Adoption Score Tool, which will help admins decipher admins understand historical insights data across the organization. “Time Trends is added to each people experience category across Content Collaboration, Meetings, Teamwork, Mobility and Communication, and extends organizational trend data from 28 days up to 180 days”. “IT admins can now understand how a particular behavior or insight, such as the response rate for new emails with @mentions, has evolved over the last 30, 90 or 180 days”. By monitoring @mentions, admins will be able to analyze and understand trends, ultimately helping them see whether they are close to achieving set goals or not.

The Adoption Score tool is available as part of users’ existing commercial Microsoft 365 subscriptions. As for Global admins, they can access the new tool via the Microsoft 365 admin center. They will also need to approve both Adoption Score and the people experiences category to access Time trend data.