7 Ways Microsoft Viva Can be Internal Comms Best Ally

In today’s hybrid and remote working environment, employee engagement continues to challenge organisations. According to Gallagher’s latest State of the Sector 2025 report, internal communicators are juggling competing priorities—with strategic alignment and culture-building ranking highest, while change fatigue has emerged as the second-biggest barrier to success. The good news? The right mix of Microsoft 365 tools can help you navigate this landscape and build genuine connection.

Gallagher’s research shows that organisations are struggling with “noisy” communication spaces where employees are overwhelmed by multiple messages and channels. Yet when communicators have access to the right tools—particularly around personalisation, audience targeting, and leadership engagement—the impact changes dramatically.

If you’re using Microsoft 365, you already have the foundation. Viva Connections and Viva Engage come included at no extra cost with E3 and E5 licenses. And if you’ve invested in the Communications & Communities bundle, you unlock the premium capabilities that help cut through the noise and reach the right people with the right message at the right time.

Here are seven ways Microsoft Viva can support your internal comms strategy.

1. Meets Employees Where They Actually Work

Hybrid working means your people are spread across locations and time zones. Viva Connections sits right inside Microsoft Teams—where your team is already collaborating, communicating, and getting work done. Content from SharePoint surfaces in personalised dashboards, news feeds appear where they’re working, and announcements land where people are paying attention. Your team stays informed without hunting through separate apps or portals.

2. Cuts Through the Noise with Personalisation

One of the biggest complaints we hear from employees? Too many messages, too many channels, not enough clarity. Viva Connections delivers personalised content based on role, region, department, and individual interests. Each employee sees a dashboard tailored to what actually matters to them—not a generic company-wide broadcast that disappears in a crowded feed. This level of targeting means your messages land better, engagement goes up, and employees feel less overwhelmed. For internal communicators, you can confidently report that your message reached the intended audience.

3. Makes Leadership Visible and Approachable

Leadership Corner in Viva Engage transforms how employees connect with leaders. Rather than waiting for annual all-hands meetings, employees can follow their leaders, see their updates in real-time, and participate in Ask Me Anything sessions. For communicators, this means facilitating authentic conversations between leadership and teams without the logistical burden of physical events. Leaders can stay visible and accessible, which builds trust and reinforces strategic direction. With delegate posting (part of the Communications & Communities bundle), your team can help manage the cadence of leadership communications without relying on busy executives to post themselves.

4. Turns Conversations into Shared Knowledge

Viva Engage enables employees to ask questions in communities and get answers that become discoverable for others facing the same challenge. Over time, this creates a searchable knowledge base that reduces repetitive questions and empowers people to find answers themselves. This matters for communicators because you’re building organisational memory rather than just broadcasting messages into the void. Communities become genuinely useful resources that employees return to.

5. Ensures Consistent Messaging Across the Business

One of the toughest jobs in internal comms is keeping messaging aligned when different departments, regions, and teams are communicating separately. Viva Amplify (included in the Communications & Communities bundle) lets you create a campaign once, tailor it for different audiences, and publish it across Teams, Outlook, SharePoint, and Viva Engage with one click. Your strategic message stays consistent, while the delivery feels personalised to each audience. You maintain control and consistency without becoming a bottleneck for departmental comms.

6. Brings Remote and Frontline Workers into the Culture

Remote and deskless workers often feel disconnected from organisational culture and strategy. Viva Connections acts as a cultural hub where company values, strategy, and key updates surface in a personalised way. Viva Engage creates genuine communities where remote workers can connect with colleagues, find expertise, and feel part of something larger. The practical result? Remote employees stay as in-the-loop and culturally connected as office-based staff.

7. Gives You Data That Actually Means Something

Generic analytics—views, likes, clicks—don’t tell you whether your message landed. With Viva Amplify and Viva Engage analytics, you get deeper insights: sentiment analysis showing how employees actually feel about your message, engagement breakdowns by audience and channel, and trending topics so you can spot emerging issues or conversations early. You can report confidently to stakeholders with real data rather than assumptions. You can also iterate quickly—if a message isn’t resonating, you’ll know why and can adjust the next campaign accordingly.

The Bottom Line

Gallagher’s research shows that communicators feel most confident when they have the right tools and clear strategy. Microsoft Viva—especially with the Communications & Communities bundle—gives you those tools. You can personalise at scale, keep leadership visible, maintain message consistency, and support remote workers, all while gathering insights that show whether your comms are actually working.

You already have most of what you need in Microsoft 365. The question is whether you’re using it to its full potential.

Want to explore how Viva can work for your organisation? Get in touch with us.