• Viva Goals excels at integrating with Microsoft’s suite of tools. This seamless integration allows for a smooth transition and utilization within existing workflows, leveraging familiar interfaces and enhancing collaboration across various Microsoft applications.
• The platform’s use of color coding to display progress on Key Results offers a quick and intuitive way to track and comprehend achievement levels. This visual representation simplifies monitoring and understanding the status of goals, enabling users to identify areas needing attention or those excelling at a glance.
• Viva Goals facilitates consistent engagement and progress tracking through its automated weekly check-in reminders. These reminders prompt users to reflect on their objectives, update progress, and align their efforts, fostering accountability and regular team communication.
• The inclusion of progress graphs for each key result provides a visual advancement timeline. These graphs offer a historical view of progress, enabling users to track trends, identify patterns, and make informed decisions based on historical performance. Thus, they contribute to more effective goal management.
• One of Viva Goals’ key strengths lies in its straightforward and user-friendly interface. The platform’s intuitive design simplifies navigation and use, reducing the learning curve for users. Its user-centric approach ensures ease of adoption and encourages active engagement among team members, contributing to a more efficient goal-setting and tracking process.

• One drawback of Viva Goals is its lack of in-app training resources. The absence of comprehensive training materials or guides within the platform might pose challenges for users looking to explore or optimize the software’s functionalities without external assistance or guidance.
• The Viva Goals user interface is not fully optimized for mobile devices, which can limit accessibility and convenience for users who prefer or need to manage their goals while on the move. This limitation might hinder the user experience for those who rely on mobile platforms.
• The platform’s inability to copy or set recurring goals is a limitation. This absence of functionality hampers efficiency, as users cannot replicate or automate the creation of similar objectives or routine tasks, potentially leading to repetitive manual input and inefficiencies.
• Viva Goals does not offer quick employee survey functionalities within the platform. This feature absence restricts organizations from seamlessly gathering immediate, real-time feedback or insights from employees directly related to their goals or performance.
• The platform lacks AI-driven features for goal-setting and action item creation. The absence of artificial intelligence assistance might limit the software’s ability to provide personalized recommendations or automated suggestions, potentially impacting users’ efficiency and precision of goal-setting and action-planning processes.

Microsoft Viva Goals offers two different plans based on the features they have.

Standard Plan ($6 per user per month): This plan offers an affordable entry point into Viva Goals and provides essential OKR workflows, templates, and integrations. Users opting for the Standard Plan can access the core functionalities of goal setting, progress tracking, and alignment tools.

Microsoft Viva Suite ($12 per user per month): The Microsoft Viva Suite package represents a comprehensive bundle that encompasses many Microsoft applications. Alongside Viva Goals, this package integrates Viva Engage, Viva Pulse, Viva Insights, and Viva Learning. This well-packed suite offers a holistic approach to employee engagement, productivity, insights, and learning within the Microsoft ecosystem.

Let’s take a look at the features in the Microsoft Viva Suite:

Viva Goals is a basic OKR management tool you can rely upon, but to really get the most out of it, you have to shell out extra money for the suite plan.

Other OKR software in the market, like JOP (Joy of Performing), provides similar features at a much more affordable price. For instance, the survey feature is built into JOP’s standard plan.

Viva Goals streamlines the goal-setting process with its diverse range of OKR workflows and templates. These pre-designed frameworks offer a structured approach, facilitating efficient goal creation and alignment with organizational objectives.

The platform provides a visual representation of goals through its Chart View feature. This graphical display allows users to comprehend and assess goal alignment at a glance, enhancing clarity and understanding of the broader organizational objectives.

Viva Goals emphasizes consistent progress tracking with its Check-ins feature. This functionality enables regular updates and discussions around objectives, fostering continuous alignment, accountability, and transparency within teams.

The Activity Log comprehensively records actions and changes made within the platform. It offers a detailed update timeline, providing users with a historical overview of goal progress and modifications. This ensures accountability and traceability.

Viva Goals promotes collaborative discussions and feedback exchange through its Comments feature. Users can engage in dialogue, share insights, and provide feedback directly within the platform, fostering a culture of communication and constructive input.

Initiatives within Viva Goals facilitate the breakdown of larger objectives into actionable steps. These initiatives or action items empower teams to define and execute tasks necessary for goal achievement, ensuring clarity and accountability.

The platform supports quick surveys via an integrated app, enabling organizations to gather swift employee feedback. This feature enhances communication channels, allowing teams to collect valuable insights promptly facilitating data-driven decision-making and agility in response to employee feedback.

Viva Goals simplifies the OKR review process by allowing users to score their objectives and key results. This scoring mechanism provides a quantitative assessment of progress, enabling clearer evaluation and comparison of goal achievement across teams and timeframes.

The platform offers Quick Views of OKRs that condense progress into easily digestible summaries. These concise overviews empower users to swiftly assess the status of objectives or key results, facilitating faster decision-making and action.

Viva Goals provides customizable dashboards, enabling users to tailor their visual representations based on specific metrics or preferences. These dashboards offer flexibility in displaying key performance indicators, allowing users to focus on relevant data for informed decision-making.

Integrated within the Viva Suite, Viva Insights complements Viva Goals by providing deeper analytical insights into employee engagement, productivity, and well-being. This feature adds another layer of data-driven insights, contributing to a comprehensive understanding of organizational performance.

Viva Goals excels in its seamless integration with various Microsoft applications. This cohesive integration allows for a unified user experience, enabling smoother transitions and collaboration across Microsoft’s ecosystem. Users can access Viva Goals effortlessly within familiar Microsoft interfaces, enhancing usability and adoption among existing Microsoft users.

Microsoft Viva Goals is a reliable player in the realm of OKR management software, but it’s evident that there’s room for growth and enhancement.

Despite its reliability, the platform could benefit from adding more thoughtful features to elevate its status as a go-to tool for companies seeking a highly productive OKR software solution.

Furthermore, the need to pay extra for additional features within the same platform, such as employee engagement and insights, might limit the solution.

This might deter potential users from seeking a more comprehensive package without additional costs, as other competitors in the market offer similar functionalities at more competitive prices.

We hope this detailed overview of Microsoft Viva Goals helps you find the right OKR software for your company.