Microsoft Viva Insights

Contents

Microsoft Viva Insights
Personal insights
Introduction
Privacy guide
In Teams
Introduction
Home
Overview
Reflect
Send praise
Virtual commute
Headspace
Stay connected
Protect time
Inspiration library
Setup
Discover the app
Configure the app
Admin tasks
FAQ
Briefing
Overview
Privacy guide
Configure Briefing
Briefing rollout
Conduct a user pilot
Admin trial
Downloadable resources
Use Briefing

Prepare for meetings
Follow up on tasks
Book focus time
Headspace meditation
Plan your week
Catch up with your team
Settings
Languages
FAQ
Outlook add-in
Introduction
Use Insights
Inline suggestions
Delay delivery plan
Home
Dashboard
Digest emails
Focus plan
Work patterns
Focus
Wellbeing
Network
Collaboration
Personal insights FAQ
Admin guide
Introduction
Deployment guide
Setup
Plans and environments
Privacy guide for admins
Activity report
Adoption

Introduction
Individual adoption

Get started
Diagnose your issue
Set your goal
Develop new habits
Sustain change
Resources
Team adoption
Get started
Plan
Implement
Measure
Reinforce
Resources
Habit resources
Learning modules
Habit-building method
Habit playbooks

Personal insights

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

Microsoft Viva Insights helps you identify opportunities to build better work habits with personalized insights
created just for you. You can prioritize wellbeing with actionable recommendations, such as reserving time for
focused work, taking regular breaks, and practicing mindfulness.

Viva Insights includes the following different ways you can use personal insights to do your best work:

Viva Insights in Teams - Shows your personal insights within your Microsoft Teams flow of work,
including how to stay connected, protect time, use Headspace for guided meditation, and start a virtual
commute.
Viva Insights in Outlook add-in - Shows you insights within Microsoft Outlook about how to prepare for
upcoming meetings, gain focus time, maintain your work relationships, plan time away from work, and
improve your overall work-life balance.
Dashboard - This unified web experience shows you statistics about how you've spent your time over the
past month, productivity insights about your work habits, and how to you explore your network, top
collaborators, and collaboration activities.
Briefing emails in Outlook - Within two hours of your workday (as set up in Outlook), you'll get an email
about any relevant items to help you stay in control of your calendar and be intentional about your day,
including outstanding commitments or requests, preparing for upcoming meetings, and suggested times to
schedule for focusing or catching up on messages.
Digests in Outlook - Digest emails are generated by Viva Insights and inserted into your Outlook inbox
that can help you better understand your work patterns and suggests ways to improve them.
Inline suggestions in Outlook - AI-driven notifications that appear in Outlook while you are either
reading or composing an email or a meeting invitation. These suggestions, tips, and best practices are
designed to help inform and guide you in making effective email and meeting decisions.

Introduction to Viva Insights

See Introduction to Microsoft Viva Insights for an introductory learning module.

Privacy guide for personal insights

6/9/2022 • 6 minutes to read • Edit Online

Personal insights in Microsoft Viva Insights help you find opportunities to build better habits and get back in
control of your time. This article describes how Viva Insights uses personal data for personal insights, where it
stores that data, and the ways in which it was designed to keep that data safe. It also describes how Viva Insights
complies with GDPR regulations.

Summary of key points

Personal insights in Viva Insights is not designed to enable evaluation, tracking, automated
decision making, profiling, or monitoring. Viva Insights provides you with personal insights through
the Viva Insights in Microsoft Teams app, the Insights Outlook add-in, a cloud-based dashboard, Viva digest
emails, Briefing emails, and inline suggestions in Outlook. Personal insights in Viva Insights has no
mechanism or option that allows anyone but you to access the personalized information that is displayed
through these surfaces, unless you purposefully and independently share it. Personal insights data provided
by Viva Insights cannot be used for automated decision making or for profiling.
Personal insights in Viva Insights does not give employees access to new personally
identifiable information on other coworkers. Viva Insights converts data into personal insights by
doing calculations on information that you generate just by going about your workday. Most of the data that
you see in personal insights from Viva Insights is simply an aggregation of information to which you already
have access, but that you wouldn’t be able to quickly perform calculations on without some support.
Personal insights in Viva Insights data is processed and stored in the employee’s Exchange
Online mailbox. Viva Insights processes data from these sources for personal insights: Exchange Online
email and calendar data, chat and call signals from Skype for Business and from Teams, and—if both you and
your organization's IT administrator opt you in—Windows 10 application activity history. Viva Insights stores
and processes this data inside each employee’s Exchange Online mailbox.
Personal insights in Viva Insights suppor ts General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)
compliance. Microsoft has designed Personal insights in Viva Insights to support your organization’s needs
to follow GDPR requirements.

Key principles

As a Viva Insights user, only you can see your own data.
Your data is stored and computed in your Exchange Online mailbox.
You can opt in and opt out at any time.
Personal insights in Viva Insights shows you no personally identifiable info of co-workers beyond what you
can already see in Outlook and Teams.

Where to see personal insights

Personal insights in Viva Insights are available as follows:

Viva Insights in Teams
Viva Insights in Outlook
Viva Insights dashboard
Briefing emails in Outlook
Digest emails in Outlook

Inline suggestions in Outlook

Data types

Viva Insights provides personal insights with the following types of data.

Mailbox data - Email, calendar, chat, and call activity that you generate by using Microsoft 365, such as time
that you spend in meetings or emails that you send to a specific person or group.
Windows 10 activity history data - Data on your usage of apps and services on your device: whether you
worked on a document and whether you browsed the web.
Incremental data - Data that would otherwise be unavailable to you but is presented in an aggregated form
designed to protect individual privacy.

Mailbox data
Mailbox data represents information that you already have access to simply by going about your job, such as
sending emails, arranging meetings, or chatting with coworkers. Viva Insights processes and shows the
information in ways that make it actionable.

For example, Viva Insights provides views that allow you to quickly understand how much time you spend in
meetings and in email every day, who you collaborate with the most, who you are losing touch with, and to
whom you have made commitments and requests.

You can take action on this information. You might decide that you spend too much time in meetings, for
example, and adopt a personal goal of running more efficient meetings.

Personal insights are derived from data that is already available to you in the following places:

Your Exchange Online mailbox
Your activity in OneDrive and SharePoint documents
Your chat and call history from Teams and from Skype for Business

Viva Insights simply applies some basic calculations and rules to make this data more actionable. Mailbox data is
stored directly in your Exchange Online mailbox.

For example, if you want to determine which colleagues sent you the most email over the past week, you could
technically do so without Viva Insights by manually counting emails from coworkers in your inbox. Similarly,
you could determine your coworkers’ average response time to the emails that you sent them by using the
timestamp information readily available in your mailbox. Viva Insights saves you the trouble of having to
perform these tedious calculations.

Windows 10 activity history data
Windows 10 activity history data refers to the things you do on your device, such as the apps and services you
used, whether you worked on a document, and whether you browsed the web. The activity history is stored
locally on the device, and if you're signed in to the device with a Microsoft account and you give permission,
Windows sends the activity history to Microsoft.

Viva Insights uses Windows 10 activity history data to compute the personal insights (for example, time spent in
apps, multi-tasking in meetings) about your work habits. These personal insights are private and stored in your
Exchange Online mailbox.

Also note that, if you choose to send Windows 10 activity history to Viva Insights, activity data is saved even if
you use a non-work or non-school account (for example, a personal live.com or facebook.com account) to
connect to the app or service. However, activity data is not saved when you browse with InPrivate tabs or
windows in the Microsoft Edge web browser.

Incremental data

In a few cases, Personal insights in Viva Insights provides you with de-identified information on other people
that would not have otherwise been available to them, such as for Email read rates.

Email read rates

Viva Insights tracks the percentage of recipients who opened an email message (in the Outlook add-in) for email
that you’ve sent to five or more people.

To preserve privacy, Viva Insights does not track read rates for messages sent to fewer than five people. Viva
Insights also doesn't show read rates of "0 percent" or "100 percent," as that would allow people to make
definitive conclusions about individual coworker actions. Instead, the read rate in these cases is displayed as a
range that encompasses a threshold value that depends on the number of recipients of the email.

This metric is calculated based on the "read" flag in Exchange Online. For some people, messages are flagged as
"read" when you open a message in the Outlook preview pane. For others, you might need to double-click to
open the message to mark it as "read."

You can control this setting in your Outlook settings. To show these signals in the sender’s mailbox, the “read”
flag is copied within the Microsoft 365 environment, and then delivered to the sender’s mailbox.

GDPR Compliance

As is the case with the full Microsoft 365 suite, Viva Insights helps support compliance with GDPR requirements.
For example, Viva Insights supports the following:

Secure and protect personal data. Because all Personal insights data in Viva Insights is stored in your
Exchange Online mailbox, Viva Insights meets this security obligation by virtue of Exchange Online also
meeting the obligation.
Requests to expor t, delete, or restrict processing personal data. Microsoft supports user requests,
such as requests for export of or deletion of data.

For more information, see GDPR compliance.

Viva Insights in Teams

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

The Microsoft Viva Insights app in Microsoft Teams shows you personalized recommendations that help you do
your best work. Get insights for building better work habits, such as following through on commitments made
to collaborators and protecting focus time in the day for uninterrupted, individual work.

It derives these insights by summarizing your Microsoft 365 data – data that you already have access to – about
emails, meetings, calls, and chats.

By using the Viva Insights app, you can:

Stay connected – Stay on top of your collaboration with colleagues through features such as AI-based task
suggestions and meeting assistance.
Protect time – Find more time to eliminate distractions, stop multi-tasking, and focus on your core priorities.
Send praise – Send acclaim to your employees and coworkers, either in a private chat or in a Teams channel
conversation.
Reflect – Take a moment to check in with yourself, to reflect on how you're feeling.
Headspace – Experience a guided meditation from Headspace.
Take a break – During your workday, take an occasional one-minute "breathing break."
Start a virtual commute – Mindfully close out your workday.
Use Microsoft To-Do – Take action on a task in your to-do list.

Privacy

The insights for individuals that this app presents are completely personal and private. Personal insights in the
app are for your eyes only; neither your manager nor the system administration can see your insights. For more
information, see the Privacy guide.

How it works

The personal insights and actions in the Viva Insights app are based on your Exchange Online mailbox data, such
as email and calendar data. The insights are derived from data that isalready availableto you in your Exchange
Online mailbox. For example, if you want to determine what commitments you made to others, you could
manually review each email in your mailbox. The Insights app simply saves you from this tedious process.

NOTE
To get access to the Viva Insights app, you must have an Exchange Online license and access to Teams.

Related topics

Viva Insights Home
Privacy guide
Discover and pin the Viva Insights app
FAQ
Admin tasks

Viva Insights Home in Teams

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

In Microsoft Teams, select Insights (left app bar) to open the Home page for the Microsoft Viva Insights app:

The Home page makes it easy to start the other Viva Insights features. You can reach some features on the top
menu and others within the Home page.
You can also open a web-based Viva Insights at insights.viva.office.com. You can also open Viva Insights through
the Microsoft 365 App Launcher menu at office.com.

On the top menu

When you select a feature on the top menu, you'll leave the Home page.
Stay connected
Protect time
Inspiration library

On the Home page

You use the following features on the Home page with the on-screen instructions.
Up-next card - View the card and its message.
Reflect - In How are you feeling?, select a representative image.
Send Praise - In Send praise to your colleagues, select Send praise.
Guided meditations from Headspace - In the Headspace card, select the 'Play' button. (Alternatively, you can
select from among More mindfulness exercises.)
Take a break - In Take a break, select Star t.

NOTE
Headspace is only available if you have your language is set to English in Teams. Additional languages will be supported
soon. However, the Take a break option is available even if you don't have your default language set to English.

For the next three cards, you can take a quick action while remaining on the Home page. Alternatively, you can
open the full feature (and leave the Home page) by selecting another option on the card – such as More
insights.

Stay connected – Follow up on an action shown in Stay connected, such as to book a 1:1 with a specific
person.
Protect time – Take action on what's shown in Protect time, such as to book focus time for tomorrow.
Inspiration library – See inspirational articles within specific themes, such as wellbeing, culture, impact, and
resilience.
Microsoft To Do – Take action on what's shown in your To Do list, such as to book a meeting.

Up-next card

On the Home page, the top card shown in the upper left alerts you in various ways based on the time of day and
the events in your calendar. For example, if your lunch time (as configured in the Outlook add-in) is approaching,
it'll let you know how soon:

The card's color changes to alert you of other events, such as scheduled focus time, meetings, the switch from
morning to afternoon, and for the end of your scheduled workday or Virtual commute:

Mindfulness content from Headspace

This feature offers a curated set of guided meditations and focus music from Headspace. For more information,
see Headspace.

Take a break

This feature offers a one-minute "breathing break" animated experience that you can use as often as you want
during your workday. To start it, select Star t.

Microsoft To Do

This card shows tasks that are in your To Do list that are due today or for which a reminder for today has been
set. Select All To Do tasks for today to open the Tasks app in Teams. For more information, see Microsoft To
Do.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Reflect in Viva Insights

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online
You can use this feature in the Microsoft Viva Insights app in Teams to become more aware of how you're
feeling. This awareness can benefit both your productivity and your wellbeing. In fact, research has shown that
even the act of taking a moment to reflect has positive benefits for wellbeing.

IMPORTANT
Performing self-reflection by selecting the available emojis is an entirely private action. No one else can see what you
chose.

Reflect

You can choose your own frequency for self-reflection. Once daily might work well for you — or more often
than that, or less often.
1. On the Viva Insights Home page, locate the How are you feeling? card.

2. Select the emoji that best represents how you're currently feeling. The card gives you feedback to
acknowledge your choice.

3. (Optional) Select Reflection histor y to see how your feelings have changed over time, as indicated by
the emojis you've chosen. For example:

4. (Optional) Set a reminder to practice reflection. Go to Set a reminder to self-reflect.

Set a reminder to self-reflect

Remind yourself to self-reflect in the future.

NOTE
You can schedule reflection reminders for any day of the week, including days not configured as workdays in your
Outlook settings.
The time you select will apply to every day on which you'll see reminders. You cannot set different times for different
days of the week.
The reminder might not arrive at exactly the scheduled time, but most reminders appear within five minutes before
their scheduled time. For example, if your reminder is scheduled for 5:00, the reminder could appear between 4:55 and
5:00.
Scheduled reflection reminders can expire. If you select a reflection reminder for a previous day or time, you will see a
message that the reminder has expired.
You can reflect at any time on the Home page or the virtual commute page. Reflection that you do on those pages is
independent of any reminders that you have set for reflection.

You can set reminders to reflect either on the Settings page or the Home page, as described here:

1. On the Build a habit of emotional awareness! card, select a day and time:

2. Select Set reminders.
On the day and time that you configured, the Viva Insights app will remind you to self-reflect.

Selecting the reminder notification opens the Reflect feature, after which you can continue with the steps in
Reflect.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Praise in Viva Insights

6/9/2022 • 4 minutes to read • Edit Online

You can use this feature in the Microsoft Viva Insights app in Microsoft Teams to recognize the contributions of
your employees and coworkers. Praise messages are shown as notifications in Teams. You can have a praise
message delivered in a private chat, or for wider recognition, in a Teams channel conversation.
You can also set reminders to send acclaim on a regular basis to your coworkers and view your Praise history.
See Set a praise reminder and Praise history for details.

NOTE
The praise app is a messaging extension of Microsoft Teams. For more information, see Messaging extensions.

Send praise

To send praise, open the praise feature in one of the following ways:
The Viva Insights Home page
The content pane of Teams

Send praise from the Viva Insights Home page
1. On the Home page, select Send praise button on the Send praise to your colleagues card, which is

located on the Home page at center left:

2. When the Praise page opens, the badge defaults to Awesome. If you’d like to send a different badge with
your praise message, select a new choice:

3. Add the name of the person you want to praise.
4. Choose the visibility of this praise. To make this choice, you must first decide whether you want to keep

the praise private between you and the recipient or to make it visible (as a form of kudos, for example) to
everyone in a Teams channel:

To make the praise message appear privately in a 1:1 chat between you and the recipient, select
1:1 chat. This option is available only if you and the recipient have already participated in a Teams
chat together.
To let all the members of a Teams channel or subchannel see the praise message, select Teams
channel. This option is available only if all of the praise recipients are participants in the Teams
channel or subchannel that you choose.
5. (Optional) In the Note field, add a personalized note.
6. (Optional) Select Preview .
Inspect your praise on the left panel. If you need to edit it, select Edit. Change the badge choice, the
recipients list, or the personalized note.

7. When it's ready to go, select Send.
Send praise from the Teams content pane using the Praise messaging extension

In Viva Insights, you can always send praise directly from the Home page, which does not require installing the
Praise messaging extension.
1. Below the Type a new message field, select Praise:

(If the Praise feature does not appear, follow the steps in Find the Praise feature.)
2. When the Praise modal opens, the badge defaults to Awesome. If you want to send a different badge

with your praise message, select a new choice:

3. If you’re in a group chat or channel, add the name of the person you want to praise. In a 1:1 chat, the
name defaults to the other person in the chat.

4. (Optional) In the Note field, add a personalized note of up to 500 characters.
5. (Optional) Select Preview .
6. When it's ready to go, select Send.
Find the Praise feature
1. Below the Type a new message field, select more options (the ellipsis):

2. In the Find an app field, start typing "praise" and then select the Praise app to open it.

The Praise app opens.
3. Continue with the steps in Send praise from the Teams content pane using Praise messaging extension.

Set praise reminders

Remind yourself to send praise to coworkers. Praise reminders are always recurring; this helps you build the
habit of letting coworkers know that you appreciate their contribution.

NOTE
You can schedule praise reminders for any day of the week, including days not configured as workdays in your
Outlook settings.
The time you select will apply to every day on which you'll see reminders. You can't set different times for different days
of the week.
The reminder might not arrive at exactly the scheduled time, but most reminders appear within five minutes before
their scheduled time. For example, if your reminder is scheduled for 5:00, the reminder could appear between 4:55 and
5:00.

You can set praise reminders either on the Settings page or on the Home page, as described here:
1. Select the Send praise to your colleagues card, which is located on the Home page at center left.
2. In the praise reminder settings, select the time of day and day of the week, and then move the

Reminders slider to On:

On the day of the week and time that you configured, the Viva Insights app will remind you to send
praise. Selecting the reminder notification opens the Praise feature, after which you can continue with the
steps in Send praise from the Viva Insights Home page.

Praise history

NOTE
Praise history is only available for users with Exchange Online mailboxes. Mailboxes hosted on-premises aren't supported.
For more details about plans, refer to our FAQ.

In the Looking back section on the Praise page, you can see the history for as many as 24 messages that you
have either sent or received over the last six months. This history includes any praise sent or received through
this page and through the Teams messaging extension.

This history includes related praise details, such as the type of badge, who the sender and receiver were, the
date and time it was sent, and so on. You can also view the original praise in the Teams chat by selecting Go to
message within the detailed view of the badge.
You can also access your personal praise history by selecting Review your praise histor y in the Praise
section that shows within your Teams channel Posts. This link only shows you your own personal history that
nobody else can see.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Virtual commute

6/9/2022 • 4 minutes to read • Edit Online

You can use virtual commute feature in the Microsoft Viva Insights app in Teams from either the Up-next card or
Within Protect time.

Up-next card

When the Up-next card prompts you to "wrap up your day," you can select it to start your virtual commute now.

This message appears at the following times:
If you've configured virtual commute reminders, the message appears 30 minutes before the time that you
configured. For information about making this and other settings, see Insights app settings.
If you have not configured virtual commute reminders, the message appears 30 minutes before the end of
your workday as scheduled in Outlook.

Within Protect time

In Protect time, when prompted with Ready to wrap up, select Star t.

This causes your virtual commute to start immediately. For details about the virtual commute experience, see
virtual commute steps.
Starting a virtual commute this way does not affect the scheduled days and time of day that you set in Set up
virtual commutes.

Set up virtual commutes

The first time you open Protect time, you are prompted to schedule your virtual-commute reminders:

You can use this prompt to select the days and time of day that you want to see the virtual-commute reminder,
and then select Set reminder.

NOTE
You can schedule virtual-commute reminders for any day of the week, including days not configured as workdays in
your Outlook settings.
The time you select will apply to every day on which you'll see reminders. You cannot set different times for different
days of the week.
The reminder might not arrive at exactly the scheduled time, but most reminders appear within five minutes before
their scheduled time. For example, if your reminder is scheduled for 5:00, the reminder could appear between 4:55 and
5:00.

If you need to adjust these settings at any time, you can do so on the Settings page. For more information, see
Settings > Virtual commute.

Virtual commute steps
After you begin your virtual commute by selecting Star t on the Protect time page, the sequence starts. It
consists of the following steps. All steps are optional; to skip a step, select Next.

1. On the start page, select Let's go:

2. Review and close out current tasks – Virtual commute shows you your open tasks on the Microsoft
To-Do list whose due date is today or that have a reminder set for today. (If you currently have no tasks,
this step is not shown and you go directly to Add new tasks.)

In this step, you can mark each task as complete (select "It's done") or set a reminder for another day:

If you do set a reminder, it will appear in the following places:

In your Microsoft To Do list.
In your Briefing email, if you are subscribed to receive Briefing emails.
On the To Do card on the Home page; it appears here only on the day after you set the reminder.
Select Next.

3. Add new tasks – Use this step to add tasks to your list. There are two reasons to add them to your list:

If you have work-related tasks that are top of mind, adding them to a list holds them for you in a
reliable spot so that you can mentally let them go during your personal time.
Adding them here puts them directly into Microsoft To Do, complete with reminders set, so that you
don't forget about them.

Tasks that you add on this page will appear in two places:
If you subscribe to the Cortana briefing email, you'll see your tasks there.
If you add a task today, it will appear tomorrow on the Microsoft To-Do card on the Home page:

After you've finished adding tasks – or if you have no tasks to add – select Next.
4. Preview of tomorrow – This step shows you the events (such as meetings) that are on your schedule

for tomorrow:

The purpose of this step is to reduce surprises so that you can be prepared for all that's on your schedule.
You can accept, decline, or cancel meetings to make final decisions about your schedule for the next day.
When finished, select Next.

5. Oppor tunity for reflection – At the end of your workday, this step lets you reflect on your feelings, just
as you would by using the Reflect feature on the Home page:

Select the emoji that best represents how you're currently feeling. The card gives you feedback to
acknowledge your choice, which you can view before you select Next. This optional step helps you build
the healthy habit of checking in with yourself.

6. Mindfully disconnect with a Headspace meditation – Select the 'Play' button on the Headspace
card to begin a guided meditation:

When you're finished, select Next.
7. Completion – Complete your virtual commute.

Select Done.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction
Protect time

Mindfulness content from Headspace

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

NOTE
The Headspace experience is available to you if your language in Teams is set to English, French, German, Portuguese, or
Spanish.

Viva Insights has introduced a curated set of guided meditations and Focus music from Headspace. Reach these
resources on the Home page to help you start your day grounded, relax your mind before a big presentation, or
find focus before starting an important project. In just a few minutes a day, meditation and mindfulness with
Headspace can help you decrease stress and increase focus.

Start a guided meditation

Anytime you want, you can start a guided meditation that's been designed for the current time of day:
1. Open the Home page of Microsoft Viva Insights:

2. To start the Headspace exercise, select the 'Play' button on the Headspace card:

3. (Optional) Browse through a curated set of meditations that are designed to fit different scenarios within
the flow of your day. To see your options, open the Practice mindfulness page by selecting More
mindfulness exercises.

4. Under Practice mindfulness, select a meditation option in the Guided meditations area or a musical
option in the Focus music area:

Run Headspace in the background

You can open and run Viva Insights in a new window. This lets you play Headspace meditations and Focus music
while continuing your collaboration in Teams.
1. Locate the pinned Insights app on the left navigation pane of Teams.
2. Right-click the Insights icon.
3. Select Pop out app.

This opens a new window in which the Insights app is running.
4. In this second window, select More mindfulness exercises and then start a Headspace meditation or

Focus music as described in Start a guided meditation.
5. Optionally, minimize the Insights window that you just opened. You can continue working in Teams in the

original Teams window.

Frequently asked questions

Q1. I have questions about meditation and other best practices. Where can I look for answers?

A1. Check out the Headspace app's Questions about meditation page.

Related topics

Viva Insights Home page

Stay connected

6/9/2022 • 4 minutes to read • Edit Online

You can use Stay connected in the Microsoft Viva Insights app in Teams to stay connected with your
collaborators and improve your productivity.

Stay connected includes the following insights:
Identify and pin important collaborators
Set up 1:1 meeting reminders
1:1 meeting suggestions
Reschedule a 1:1 in case of conflict
Stay on top of outstanding task suggestions
Catch up on unread documents shared with you
@Mentions for pinned important contacts
Upcoming meetings that need your RSVP

Identify and pin important collaborators

You might receive insights from various people but some items might deserve more attention than others. For
example, an outstanding task suggestion from your manager or a message from a key customer would likely be
of higher priority.
Based on your collaboration patterns, you can pin some of your contacts as important. All insights from pinned
important contacts are shown with higher priority at the top of the page.
To pin a contact, select the pin icon on the bottom left below the contact’s name:

To unpin a contact, select the unpin icon:

Set up 1:1 meeting reminders

While staying in touch with top collaborators can be difficult, a quick 1:1 meeting with key contacts can help you
nurture your professional network. Microsoft Viva Insights can help you set a target 1:1 meeting frequency for
each contact and provide you with meeting recommendations if you are falling out of touch.
In the following example, if Lynne was an important colleague, you could set up a monthly 1:1 meeting target
with Lynne by selecting the people icon and then selecting the Monthly reminder frequency. Viva Insights will
keep track of your meetings with Lynne and if you have not had a 1:1 with Lynne for a month, it will suggest
setting up a 1:1 meeting and help you schedule it.
If you want to remove the 1:1 meeting target, you can select the people icon and select None. If you are a
manager, Viva Insights will automatically suggest a biweekly 1:1 meeting with your direct report.

1:1 meeting suggestions

If you’ve set up a target 1:1 meeting cadence with your colleague through the Microsoft Viva Insights app and
are falling out of the set cadence, Viva Insights will remind you to set up a 1:1 meeting and help you schedule it.
In the following example, you can select one of the proposed meeting times and then select Send invite to
send a meeting invitation to Lynne. Viva Insights will only show meeting time blocks when both of you are
available to meet. If none of the suggested time blocks work, you can select View calendar for other items to
open the Teams calendar and schedule a meeting on your own.

Reschedule a 1:1 in case of conflict

Microsoft Viva Insights also helps you follow through on your intent to have 1:1 meeting with your colleagues.
If, for some reason, the 1:1 meeting invitation you sent to your colleague has a conflict, Viva Insights will help
you quickly reschedule the meeting.
In the following example, if your meeting with Lynne has a conflict, Viva Insights will remind you of the conflict
ahead of time and you can quickly choose a new time for the 1:1 meeting and select Reschedule to move the
meeting invitation.

Stay on top of outstanding task suggestions

It is easy to lose track of commitments that you've made to your colleagues in email. This insight helps you
make sure that nothing falls through the cracks by reminding you of tasks that you've agreed to do. It is based
on emails that you've sent and requests from your colleagues during the last 14 days of email communication,
and includes:

Commitments – Something that you promised or committed to do for someone else in an email
Requests – Something that another person asked you to do in an email
Follow-ups – Something that you asked for from someone else in an email
In the following example, you can select Re: Sync up on Regression Tests to open the email in which you can
follow up or select Done to confirm that you’ve already followed up.

Catch up on unread documents shared with you

Have you searched for that document that you planned to read but you just cannot find it? With so many
documents shared across meetings and emails, it can be difficult to stay caught up on documents shared by
your colleagues. With this insight you can see a list of the shared OneDrive and SharePoint documents that you
need to catch up on.
In the following example, to open the document, select Open. To open the email through which the document
was shared, select Re: Sync on Regression Test.

@Mentions for pinned important contacts

@Mention is a common way to tag colleagues on important work items. Microsoft Viva Insights can help you
quickly triage recent @Mentions from pinned contacts so that you are caught up on important conversations
and tasks in Teams. In the following example, select Go to comment to open the conversation and follow up.

Upcoming meetings that need your RSVP

Let your colleagues know if you can join their meeting so that they can run effective meetings. Meeting
attendance information helps meeting organizers better plan and prepare for meetings, and reschedule if
needed.
In the following example, select Sync on Proposal to open the meeting invitation for more context on the
meeting and then select Accept to accept (or Decline to decline) the meeting invitation.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Protect time

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

You can use this feature in the Microsoft Viva Insights app in Microsoft Teams to protect your time in the
following ways:

Schedule focus time for future workdays.
Start a virtual commute to end your day.

NOTE
The images on this page represent the latest experience as part of a rolling release with an expected general availability by
the end of April 2022.

Schedule focus time

Research shows that it can take an average of 23 minutes to refocus on a task after a distraction. Constant
distractions during focused work can cause higher stress and lower productivity. Further, it is difficult to focus on
challenging work when you only have small chunks of time available between meetings or are distracted by
incoming emails and chats. Blocking a few hours every day to focus without interruptions will help you make
progress on your important tasks and projects.
Microsoft Viva Insights can help you protect time for focused work and minimize notifications (and thus
distraction) by Teams and Skype for business chats and calls during your focus time.
You can schedule focus time on the Protect time page, as follows:

Book focus time - Use this section to reserve time slots for focused work during the next two or more
days.

After you select Book time, you'll see Focused time booked. If you see Review meeting conflict,
select it to view your calendar and resolve the conflict.
If you have selected Book time and decide that you don’t need it anymore, you can delete the focus
time block from your calendar.
Before booking time, you can select Edit (the pencil icon) to change the name of the focus time block,

which automatically updates the subject for the scheduled focus time.
Focus plan - Within Focus plan, select Get star ted to create a focus plan.

If this is not your first time using a focus plan, you'll automatically be set up with the default
settings. Then based on the prompt, you can then select Edit settings to make any changes.
If this is your first focus plan, you'll be prompted to select the following options.

Do this later skips the prompts and simply enrolls you in a default plan based on your
settings.
How much focus time do you want to schedule each day.
Do you prefer morning or afternoon hours for scheduled focus time.
If you'd like Teams to silence notifications during scheduled focus time.
At any time after the initial setup, you can confirm or change any of the options or leave the plan by selecting
Focus plan preferences in Settings (gear icon) within the Viva Insights in Teams app.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction
Virtual commute

Inspiration library in Viva Insights

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

You can use the Inspiration library in Microsoft Viva Insights to learn more about the things that matter most to
you. This library brings together thought leadership from industry experts that’s designed to inspire you in life
and at work to get the most out of both.
You can use the library to help transform your personal, manager, and leader insights into actions. The articles
are shown on the page within specific themes, such as wellbeing, culture, impact, and resilience. The article
sources include Microsoft, Harvard Business Review, and Thrive.

NOTE
This new preview feature is available in a rolling release starting now through April 2022.

View an article

The library shows you articles that you haven’t read yet first. You can view these articles within your Teams app
on your computer or mobile device. Select the article title to open and read it. For example, the following shows
what you might see from Microsoft. To view all the articles available to read within a specific theme, select View
more in that section.
You can also provide feedback on the articles you have read by selecting the thumbs up and thumbs down
icons at the end of the article. The articles are available in the same languages supported with advanced
insights.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Discover and pin the Viva Insights app

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

The Viva Insights app is pre-installed in Teams by your admin. After your admin installs it, you can discover and
pin Viva Insights to your Teams app for easy access.
After adding the app, you'll have access to all of its features, including Praise, Protect time, Reflect, Stay
connected, and Virtual commute.

Discover and pin the app

Based on the platform you'll use to view your insights in Teams, select and complete the steps in one or both of
the following sections:

For desktop and web clients
For iOS and Android mobile platforms
On desktop and web clients
1. Select the ellipsis (more added apps) on the left bar in Teams.
2. In the search field, enter Microsoft Viva Insights, and then select it.
3. Right-click the app icon shown in the left bar in Teams, and then select Pin ( ) to make and keep it visible in
the left bar in Teams.

TIP
You can reorder apps in the Teams app bar by dragging the app icons. For details, see Pin an app for easy access.

On the iOS and Android mobile platforms
1. Select ellipsis (...) in the left bar in Teams.
2. Select Viva Insights to open it.
3. Select Reorder and then drag the app icon to remove it from the More section.

4. Select Done to save your changes.

Uninstall the app

This section describes how to uninstall the Microsoft Viva Insights app from Teams.

1. In Teams, select the ellipsis (...) in the left bar.
2. If Viva Insights is not visible in your most recent view, find it by using search.
3. Right-click Viva Insights, and then select Uninstall.
4. When prompted, select Uninstall again.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Configure the app

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

Use the Settings page to configure the features for the Microsoft Viva Insights app in Teams. For example, you
can turn reminders on or off, or change the day and hour settings for features on the Settings page, such as for
Praise and Reflection.
To configure the settings:
1. In the upper-right corner of any page, select the ellipsis (...), and then select Settings:

2. You can set the following settings:
Workweek - Edit the days of the week that you work, your start time, end time, and your time zone.
These settings are kept synchronized with the same settings in Outlook. That is, if you change them in
one place, they will be updated everywhere that they appear.
My team - This option is available only to people who are recognized in Azure AD as managers.
Initially this shows your team as it is listed in Azure AD. You can use this option to update the list of
team members. However, after you edit your team members here, it will no longer synchronize with
Azure AD.
Set recurring reminders - You can set recurring reminders for self-reflection, for sending praise, or
for starting your virtual commute. You can schedule these reminders for any day of the week,
including days not configured as workdays in your Outlook settings.

The time you select will apply to every day on which you'll see reminders; you cannot set different times
for different days of the week. The reminder will not arrive at exactly the scheduled time, but within 15
minutes on either side of it. For example, if your reminder is scheduled for 5:00, the reminder could show
up anytime between 4:45 and 5:15.
Each reminder shows up in your Teams activity feed. When you see it, you can select it there and it'll open
the feature (reflection, praise, or virtual commute) directly in the Viva Insights app:

Reflection - Edit the schedule for reminders to self-reflect. Change the days and time to receive
reminders, and then select Set reminders.
Praise - Edit the schedule for praise reminders. Change the days and time to receive reminders, and
then select Set reminders.
Vir tual commute - Choose the days on which you want to see the virtual-commute reminder and
the time of day, and then select Set reminders.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Admin tasks for Viva Insights

6/9/2022 • 3 minutes to read • Edit Online

As a Teams Service Administrator, you can deploy and pin the Microsoft Viva Insights app in Microsoft Teams for
all the users or for specific groups in your organization through custom policies.

Prerequisites

Before people in your organization can use the Viva Insights app, they must have the following:
Access to Microsoft Teams
An Exchange Online account

Install the app

Complete the steps in the following playbooks to get the Viva Insights app up and running for people in your
organization.
1. Confirm they have a Viva Insights service plan.
2. In the Teams admin center, add the Viva Insights app to the list of allowed apps within the organization,

as follows: Release the Viva Insights app within your organization.

NOTE
To allow or block specific users in your organization from using Viva Insights, do the following:
1. Confirm that Viva Insights is turned on for your organization on the Manage apps page.
2. Create a custom app permission policy and assign it to those users. For details, see Manage app permission

policies in Teams.

3. In Teams, pin the Viva Insights app in the left app bar for all users in your organization: Pin the Viva
Insights app.

4. Now that Viva Insights is available, all users can follow these steps to Discover and pin the Viva Insights
app.

IMPORTANT
If your organization assigned licenses before July 2021 (under the Workplace Analytics SKU), follow these steps to enable
or disable access to the Viva Insights premium features released starting in November 2021.

Disable Headspace

When the Headspace feature is enabled, users can find it on the Home page of Viva Insights. As an admin, you
can disable this feature by using PowerShell cmdlets.
The PowerShell commands for working with Viva Insights features are described in Set-VivaInsightsSettings. To
disable Headspace, see Example 1.

Premium access for licenses assigned before July 2021

The following steps are only applicable to organizations who assigned licenses prior to July 2021. You need to
confirm the following assignment options in Azure Active Directory for the Microsoft Viva Insights SKU:

Microsoft Viva Insights - Enables access to premium personal and manager features released starting in
November 2021, including the updated My team page in the Viva Insights app in Teams.
Microsoft Viva Insights (WpA transition) – This option is only applicable for organizations who assigned
licenses before July 2021 and want to keep their access to the advanced analyst features. If this is the only
option enabled, then their access to advanced insights will continue unchanged. However, you must enable
the first app option for access to the premium features released starting in November 2021.

IMPORTANT
If your organization assigned Viva Insights licenses starting in July 2021, the Microsoft Viva Insights assignment option
controls access to all premium personal, manager, and advanced analyst features. Enabling or disabling the Microsoft Viva
Insights (WpA transition) option in Azure Active Directory will not affect their access to these features.

Access to premium features
To confirm, enable, or disable access to premium features for users with licenses assigned before July 2021,
complete the following steps.

1. Go to Azure portal > Azure Active Director y.

2. In the left navigation, select Licenses > All products.

3. Search for and select Microsoft Viva Insights.

4. In the left navigation, for groups, select Licensed groups or for individual users, select Licensed users.

5. At the top, select +Assign.

6. In Users and groups, select the group or individual to add, which will then show up under Name.

7. Select Assignment options, and then select On to enable or Off to disable the following:

Microsoft Viva Insights – Enables access to premium features that were released starting in
November 2021.
Microsoft Viva Insights (WpA transition) – Only applicable to users who were assigned licenses
before July 2021.

8. Select Review + assign, and then near the bottom, select Assign to apply the changes.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Personal insights in Teams FAQ

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

The following are the most frequently asked questions about personal insights within the Microsoft Viva
Insights app in Microsoft Teams.

Q1. Does the Microsoft Viva Insights app comply w ith GDPR?

A1. Yes. The Viva Insights app complies with GDPR requirements. (See GDPR compliance.)

Q2. Can users see information about other users in the Viva Insights app?

A2. The personal insights in the Insights app include only existing information that’s already available in the
user’s mailbox. The insights surface content from documents, emails, and meetings to make it easier for the user
to find what’s most important for their day ahead. Users cannot see any new information about other users that
wasn’t already available in their mailboxes.

Q 3 . Can m y m anager, adm inistrator, or anyone else at m y organization see w hat’s in m y Viva Insights app?

A3. No. Personal insights are private and visible to you. Personal information in the Insights app is from your
mailbox and stored in your mailbox. Insights just make it easier to find items that might need attention.
However, if you give another person, such as an administrative assistant read and manage mailbox permission,
then that person can also see your personal insights within your mailbox.

Q4. How can I send feedback to Microsoft about the Viva Insights app?

A4. There are two ways to provide feedback through the Insights app:
At the bottom of every Insight is the question: "Is this helpful?" Select Yes or No to provide feedback.

Every page in the Insights app has the question, "Is this helpful?" at the bottom-right corner. Select Yes or
No to provide feedback.
After you select Yes or No on one of these options, a dialog box appears in which you can share more.
Select the Allow Microsoft to contact box if you'd like Microsoft to contact you to follow up on your
feedback.

Q5. What data does the Viva Insights app use?

A5. Viva Insights uses:

Information from email items:
Metadata. This includes the email's timestamp, names of sender and recipients, and "read" status.
Task statements. Statements that people have made in the body text of the email. These statements are
used to create task cards for your use only.

Information from calendar items:
Type (meeting or appointment)
Status (busy, free, out-of-office, tentative)
Categor y
Subject
Duration
Attendees

OneDrive SharePoint data: Viva Insights shows a count of OneDrive and SharePoint documents that you have
worked on.

Insights does not use:

Email and calendar data from people outside your organization, with the following exception: Insights uses data
that is present in your own Office 365 mailbox. For example, if you conduct a meeting with a person outside
your organization, the start and end times of that meeting can be found in your mailbox and are visible to you.
This data, therefore, can be used in computations about your collaboration history.

Q6. Why do I not see the insights and suggestions that are described in the documentation?

A6. To have access to the Viva Insights app, you will need an Exchange Online license.

Related topics

Viva Insights introduction

Briefing email overview

6/9/2022 • 2 minutes to read • Edit Online

The Briefing email helps you stay in control of your calendar and be intentional about your day. Within two
hours of your workday (as set up in Outlook), you'll get an email about any relevant items to help you better
prepare for the day ahead, including:

Outstanding commitments, requests, and follow-ups to and from other collaborators in email that might
have fallen through the cracks.
Documents related to today’s meetings that you might want to review beforehand.
Suggested focus time you can schedule to help get independent work done.

IMPORTANT
Briefing is available for Microsoft 365 Enterprise users with Exchange Online mailboxes that are in a supported language.

Why am I getting this?

You are receiving the Briefing email because it is currently turned on for all of your organization. If you are not
receiving the Briefing email, it might be because you previously unsubscribed, or because your admin disabled it
for you or your organization.
Contact your admin if you'd like to receive the Briefing email. This email is not controlled with the Cortana app
and is unrelated to any Cortana on Windows settings. To opt out, go to cortana.office.com.

Adaptive or HTML version

You’ll get a different version of the Briefing email depending on which version of Outlook you’re using:
Adaptive version - If you open the Briefing email in OWA (Outlook Web Access), Outlook mobile (iOS and
Android), and Outlook for Windows or Mac desktop, you’ll see the Adaptive version with links to open tasks,
upcoming meetings, related documents, and complete in-line actions, and book suggested focus time.
HTML version - If you open the Briefing in an email app other than Outlook or in OWA on a mobile device,
you’ll see the HTML version that links to open tasks, upcoming meetings, and related documents, but will not
include in-line actions or suggested focus time.

How it works

The Briefing email looks for actionable tasks in Outlook and includes the top results in the email. If these tasks
are related to any upcoming meetings, they’ll be listed in context with the meeting. Meetings will also have links
to any attached or potentially related documents.
The Adaptive version of the Briefing email also includes any last-minute options to schedule time to focus on
deep work or to work through any of the tasks included in the email. Any existing focus time that’s already
scheduled is also referenced in this section.
For more details, see Prepare for meetings and Follow up on tasks.

First Briefing

As a new user, your first Briefing email explains how to use it to prepare for upcoming meetings and manage
pending tasks. It also explains how your personal information is kept private.

Configuration

The Briefing email needs to be set up for your organization by the admin. See Configure the Briefing email for
details about configuration.

Using the Briefing email

Depending on if you open the Adaptive or HTML version, the Briefing email includes the following sections:
Prepare for today's meetings
Tasks you need to follow up on
Book focus time (Adaptive version only)
Meditate with Headspace
Plan your week (Adaptive version only)
Catch up with your team
Settings

Related topics

Configure Briefing email
Briefing email from Microsoft Viva FAQ

Privacy guide for Briefing emails

6/9/2022 • 3 minutes to read • Edit Online

When data is processed for Briefing emails, Microsoft protects employee privacy and fully complies with local
regulations, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The Briefing protects privacy in the
following ways:

Personal and private - Your Briefing emails are personal and private and are only sent to you directly in
your mailbox, which cannot be accessed by anybody else in your organization, including your IT admin or
your manager.
Ever yone's data is kept private - Briefing emails do not include any new personally identifiable
information about anybody else in your organization. The insights and actions are based on information
generated by you and your organization just by going about your regular workday. Your Briefing emails are
based on information that you already have access to but can’t quickly aggregate without help.
Mailbox security - Briefing email data uses Exchange Online email and calendar data and processes and
stores any insights or actions inside your Exchange Online mailbox, so data security is built-in and enforced
by Exchange.
GDPR compliant – Microsoft complies with GDPR when providing the Briefing email.
User-level configuration – Your admin can turn on or off all Briefing email functionality for one user or for
multiple users. See Configure Briefing email for details. A user can then select Unsubscribe at the end of
any Briefing email to individually opt out.
More information is always available – Your first Briefing email describes what it is, that your data is
kept private, and includes documentation links to get more details. All subsequent Briefing emails will always
include informational links and the option to unsubscribe.

Your experience with Briefing emails

You can use a Briefing email to do tasks, such as the following:

Prepare for meetings which shows you related tasks or documents related to today's meetings.
Manage tasks which reminds you of pending tasks from email.
Make the most of focus time by scheduling time on your calendar that silences notifications for
uninterrupted, independent work.

How it works

The insights and actions in the Briefing email are based on your Exchange Online mailbox data, such as email
and calendar data. The insights are derived from data that isalready availableto you in your Exchange Online
mailbox.

For example, if you want to determine what commitments you made to others, you could manually review each
email in your mailbox. The Briefing email simply saves you from this tedious process.

GDPR compliance

Microsoft helps data controllers meet the following obligations for the Briefing email:

1. Secure and protect users’ personal data. All data is stored in the employees’ Exchange Online
mailbox. The computed metrics, such as tasks, are appended to the mailbox. Thus, the Briefing email
meets this obligation by virtue of Exchange Online also meeting the obligation: