As the world grappled with unprecedented crisis, Microsoft technology become more important than ever to connect and collaborate. Simultaneously, workers spoke up about their struggles with stress, mental health, and digital fatigue. Microsoft knew the current way of working wouldn’t be sustainable. But if the world won’t return to normal, where will it go?

Driven by its global mission “to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more,” Microsoft was concerned with the global crisis and recovery. As the world leader in enterprise software and technology, they recognized their unique position to use proprietary data and scale to help global business and the workforce navigate the future of work.

The objectives were multi-dimensional: 1) determine the implications of the downturn and crisis; 2) make improvements to the MSFT365 product suite (Teams, Outlook, etc) and 3) find ways to help as many people and companies as possible.

Above all, our analysis made tangible the collective feeling of a workforce one year into the pandemic, underscoring what companies must address to retain, engage, and attract new employees across the next phase of work:

High productivity hides an exhausted workforce: time spent in Teams meetings increased 2.5X globally and 50% of Teams chats saw response in under five minute, quantifying heightened digital intensity people expressed feeling.

Leaders feel energized, but workers feel exhausted: 61% of leaders said they are “thriving”- 23 percentage points higher than those without decision-making authority.

Talent is everywhere in a hybrid work world: notably, Women, Gen Z, and those with less education are most likely to apply for remote jobs amidst a 5X increase in remote job postings on LinkedIn.

The data also revealed that 41% of global employees were planning to leave their current employer within the next year, doubling the pre-pandemic average.

Our core dataset was a global survey (31,000+ workers across 31 countries), supplemented with 122 billion email interactions, 2.3 billion meeting interactions in Microsoft Teams and Outlook and LinkedIn data. Aggregate emails, meetings, searches, and posts created a window into human interactions at work and insight into how collaboration and productivity changed over time. We combined this with findings from Microsoft’s Human Factors Lab which explores how virtual work impacts our brains, expert analysis, and advice from researchers across Microsoft who study social capital, wellbeing, and human interaction.

Multiple datasets were analyzed in tandem to explore macro trends, extract and pressure test learnings and expedite insight development.

For example, survey work that explored what drives connection was reinforced with a big data model built on metadata from Teams’ meetings and Emails/Chats. This approach was applied across all dimensions of the project resulting in powerful insights for the core audience.

Armed with clear insight into workforce impact, we pushed one step further, guiding strategic shifts across Microsoft:

To better manage digital exhaustion, Microsoft made a fundamental change to how meetings are booked, adding a 5-minute meeting delay in Outlook. This small adjustment wielded massive behavioral impact, changing how millions move from one meeting to the next.

To better understand the employee experience, we launched Microsoft Viva, helping business leaders better understand their workforce through employee engagement.

To empower people for extreme flexibility, we paired the Work Trends Index with an announcement to open the Microsoft campus for hybrid work, prompting Microsoft to develop a Playbook for Hybrid Work that paved the way for business leaders.

Further, working across earned, owned and social media, we shared our learnings with business leaders everywhere, generating 320 global media placements, 110 million earned impressions and 182K social engagements.