Website: www.yammer.com
Operating Systems: iOS, Android and Windows
Category: Constructive, collaborative, communication and learning support
Type of Learning: Informal and implicit
Learner Needs: Cognitive, social, affective
Cost: Free version with limited features or starting at $3.00 per month per user.
What it is: Yammer is an organization-based social network platform that allows employees to connect through posts, videos, documents and links. Groups can be based on job related categories such as location, department, or task focus and interest-driven groups maybe created as well. Yammer is often compared to other social platforms like Facebook; however, Yammer is internally based. Yammer is offered as part of the Office 365 Suite. Yammer can also be used to offer live training and meetings.
Review: Installation of the Yammer app was smooth and I was able to access Yammer sites for Penn State using my PSU email and my work email. For this review, I’ll focus on uses in my workplace. The app displayed the content that I have viewed on the desktop version well. I could easily access my feed, groups, inbox and notifications. In addition, I can easily make a new post including a link or image. My colleague’s photos show with their comments and that is a nice way to stay connected to people that I do not see on a regular basis—I work remote a lot and it is valuable to me to stay connect so that I feel like I am contributing to the engagement and culture. Some of the posts that I viewed relate to knowledge items and topics.
Why use it? Although my organization does not currently use the live training features, I think that it would be a really great option for communications and webinars. And, even more so because these could be accessed from the palm of one’s hand. It would be interesting to start creating new hire cohort groups in Yammer so that new hires could stay connected closely with the network of people that they started working with. Maybe a trainer could monitor the group and help with any questions or resources they might need. As the new hires use the app to communicate with their cohort, they could post photos of resources, videos of them doing tasks, etc. to help each other learn with and from one another. While the focus of the app is communication, the tool can help support post-class retention by reminding learners of information through facilitator postings and polling. This will help recall and knowledge sharing throughout the organization. The app supports adult learners who are self-directed and have experience to share with others.
Risks: Privacy due to the organization’s intellectual property possibly being posted as content. Bullying would be possible due to the social networking features of the app.