The holidays can stir up different emotions in all of us. When I look back on this past year, I can say it has been filled with a lot of dark days. I know I am not alone in this feeling— for most of us, 2020 was filled with more difficult moments than we have ever endured in a single year.

The hardships we have overcome make this year’s successes feel even more rewarding, and celebrating our collective triumphs helps bring us closer to those we truly appreciate, in a time when physical togetherness is not an option. To that end,  we would like to close the year by highlighting some notable 2020 "wins” Vitalyst was able to achieve alongside our valued customers and partners:

Northwell Health

Microsoft and their Teamwork Partner of the Year Vitalyst have worked together to drive hundreds of enterprises to adopt and leverage the powerful capabilities of Teams. One such organization was Northwell Health, a New York City-area healthcare network with 23 hospitals, almost 800 outpatient centers and 72,000 employees, that needed a way to communicate that was secure and HIPAA-compliant.

With a little help from the top Teamwork solution provider within Microsoft’s rich partner network, Northwell boosted the adoption of Teams with training, specialized end user support and other resources.  Customized, virtual training was created and delivered over three months to prepare the workers at Northwell to work from home and keep them equipped to use in Teams for the months that followed. 

The tailored training program proved successful. Today, Northwell employees rely heavily on Teams: Clinicians use it on mobile devices to quickly and easily find patient information and test results so they can answer questions immediately. The streamlining of information in Teams “eliminates redundancy and empowers the clinicians to create and follow a joint care plan,” says Michael Oppenheim, Vice President and Chief Medical Information Officer for Northwell Health, “placing the focus back on the patient experience”.

The City and County of San Francisco

The Department of Technology at the City and County of San Francisco has this mission, to provide “innovative, reliable, and secure business solutions that support and empower CCSF agencies and departments in their delivery of high-quality government services for the public.” Microsoft Teams was ideal application to support these goals, as Teams was already included in the Microsoft 365 Suite and had support from the c-suite. Additionally, Teams was also selected for the capabilities of its Live Events feature, which enables the hosting of up to 10,000 viewers to participate in town hall style meetings. Teams Live Events made certain that CCSF complied with its “sunshine ordinance” which aims to keep government meetings and records easily accessible to the public.

Leveraging the top Teamwork solution provider within Microsoft’s rich partner network, the City and County of San Francisco transformed their work force and governing structure. CCSF utilized Vitalyst’s proprietary Adaptive Learning Platform to propel their technology transformation, which includes a suite of adoption and change enablement services and content.

Within 90 days, Vitalyst’s Adaptive Learning Program had successfully trained over 12,000 workers to maximize the power of Microsoft Teams into their daily work routine. Bradford said finally, “As we work to further enable collaboration within our workforce, training and end-user enablement programs will be a significant part of the strategy.”

Vitalyst’s wins Microsoft’s U.S. Partner Award for Modern Work—Teamwork

In Microsoft’s Fiscal Year 2020, we engaged with over one-hundred Microsoft customers in the United States, employing adoption readiness planning and utilizing the Adaptive Learning training programs to effectively establish Microsoft Teams as the centralized communication and collaboration hub for all workers.  Following these project related efforts, Vitalyst partnered with its customers to implement continuous learning solutions, sustaining a culture of learning and employee collaboration as Microsoft continues to add new tools and enhancements to its Office 365 products.

“2020 has brought unprecedented challenges to businesses around the world. Enterprises everywhere were forced to instantly navigate the future of remote work, and to unpack every ounce of potential value in their existing technology investments to keep their employees productive.  Enabling users to leverage all features within Microsoft Teams is a necessity to avoid employee fatigue and mitigate productivity losses.  The Adaptive Learning platform was key to helping our clients overcome these obstacles. We look forward to continuing this momentum in Fiscal Year 2020 with our continued focus on Office 365 and Dynamics365.”

—- Barry O’Donnell, Chief Executive Officer at Vitalyst

Keith Carvalho, Vice President of Strategic Alliances at Vitalyst has led the company’s efforts to provide rapid solutions for training new, remote workforces through its distribution channels, Carvalho stated, “Microsoft Teams has been at the forefront of the transformation strategy for a great number of businesses during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Vitalyst is incredibly grateful to have had the opportunity to work together with Microsoft to help organizations respond to these rapid changes, and for the opportunity to guide countless individuals through Adaptive Learning in adjusting to their own new normal through the power of modern Teamwork”.

As we look toward 2021, we here at Vitalyst are proud of the victories of our clients and our organization, and deeply grateful for the opportunity to help so many businesses navigate through such a difficult year.