Microsoft Loop

Loop is one of those products that both hits and misses. I do use it frequently, but the collaborative goals I had with it are overshadowed by the misses, making its usefulness less than desired. For hits, there are some really interesting tools when creating content on a page, and the integration of Copilot in the page authoring itself can be helpful. However, for all the hits, there are misses. Folders you create have no real organization in them, and you cannot templatize a folder to create a project brief, shared task list, etc. So, you have to manually produce that organization. Also, in the Office tools, Loop components are embeds. They can have their own security, etc., something that cannot be seamlessly managed. It's as though the product was an internal skunkworks or separate effort, was acquired, but the integration across the suite never happened.

I'm a big fan of Microsoft Office 365 and I see value in some of the things they do alot of the times they get ahead of themselves and don't perfect the system but as my mentor one said shoot and then aim. This is no different with this loop program. I am not a computer tech so it's a little harder for me to understand and maneuver within the program but I've been working on trying to implement projects and assign them to experts that can help implement the project and get into the field instantly. I would give it a five if they take the technology side of it and implemented it for those of us that are not tech experts, and make it a lot easier To implement projects and assign them to vendors/ contractors outside of our organization that are experts, so you can bring them into move on the project. I would recommend it, especially now that they have the MS Loop app.

Loop has improved since first release in test flight. The overall app across the O365 apps is decent. UX is a little clunky, not always intuitive to how to best setup workspaces. It would be great to see the team create a setup walkthrough that helps configure based on what you want to do with Loop since it has a ton of great use cases attached to user stories. Overall, solid at connecting a number of Microsoft apps and business processes into a single shareable solution.