Yammer

What is Yammer?

Yammer is the College of Charleston’s enterprise social network, a private and secure online environment that makes real-time communication, collaboration, and sharing among faculty and staff easier and more efficient than ever before.  Yammer will consolidate the disparate methods used to communicate across the college into a centralized “one stop” service for college communication, information sharing, and collaboration.  Yammer is extremely intuitive and easy to use, allowing faculty and staff to:

  • Ask questions and get quick answers 
  • Meet coworkers who share your interests and have relevant expertise 
  • Share news and announcements with the people who need to know 
  • Discuss major decisions and prepare for change 
  • Solicit and contribute opinions and ideas with colleagues across the college 
  • Coordinate work for projects and teams 
  • Gain visibility and insight on key developments 
  • Introduce new hires and get them up to speed 
  • Discover valuable information that can help you get work done faster 
  • Stay connected on-the-go with Yammer mobile apps, or via email.

Additionally, you can use Yammer to subscribe to content based on your interests and responsibilities and send messages directly to groups or individuals. You can also create public or private groups for departments, project teams or special interests.

How do I sign up?

Signing up is easy and takes less than 60 seconds. Here’s how:

  1. Go to yammer.com/office365
  2. Enter your College of Charleston email (@cofc.edu)
  3. You will be redirected a College of Charleston branded login page.
  4. Enter your MyCharleston password, and click submit
  5. Follow the steps to set up your Yammer account
View Detailed Instructions

Will there be training?

Yes! To help everyone get familiar with Yammer, we held the following interactive training sessions.  You will learn what Yammer is, how to get started and best practices.

Yammer Google Hangouts

Virtual interactive training session via Google Hangout.  Each session will provide initial training for setting up and using Yammer.

  • September 29th @ 3pm
  • October 7th @ 11am

Yammer Training Resources

Microsoft Virtual Academy - Microsoft Yammer Essentials

Yammer Groups

The following groups have been created within Yammer to create categories for discussion:

  • All Company- All Faculty & Staff are a members of "All Company".  Only messages that need to be communicated to all CofC Yammer users should be posted to "All Company"
  • Faculty Only – Private group for College Faculty.  Only members can view or particpate in this group.  Membership must be verified and approved by group administrator.
  • Classifieds – College classifieds, items for sale
  • Events – Things to do at the College
  • Open Discussion – Share your opinions here!
  • Yammer Help – Get answers to your questions about Yammer here!

More information about setting up & managing Yammer Groups coming soon!

Yammer implementation

Yammer has been reviewed and piloted by members of the Staff Advisory Committee (SAC) and the Faculty Education Technology Committee (FETC) throughout the Spring and Summer of 2015. Both the SAC and FETC have performed a formal review, and each endorses the implementation of Yammer across the college.

Yammer will serve as a central point of communication and collaboration for the college replacing several of the current disparate outdated communication methods. With the implementation of Yammer, these methods will be decommissioned, ensuring that communication across the college is unified. The following will be decommissioned when Yammer “Goes Live” on October 12, 2015.

  • Faculty Listserv
  • Faculty & Staff Listserv
  • Staff Listserv
  • College of Charleston Web Forums

One of the advantages of Yammer is that it combines the functionality of web forums with listservs so that members can receive and post messages via a web interface, mobile client, or simply by email.
Other communication methods not listed above will remain unaffected. Several listservs will remain in use because they include or are focused on participants outside the College. These include but are not limited to JobPostings, Sports, and Parents.

Email distribution lists like Administrative Information and All Enrolled Students will continue to be available. These are created and maintained with the College’s email system and are not impacted by Yammer.

CougarAlert, the College’s emergency notification system, will be enhanced by adding Yammer as an additional location where alerts will be posted automatically.
The implementation of Yammer will benefit all faculty and staff at the college, and Information Technology has planned a series of communications, training sessions, and resource availability that will continue up to and beyond the Go Live date of October 12th.