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New Features
Why does it take so long for Governement to get new features? For example Sway was announced in Oct 2014, and Planner in Dec 2015 and neither is in my tenant.
I agree on all of these frustrations for G-tenant releases.
While I completely understand the need to get to compliance before release, it is hard to have no sense at all of when we might get a product that is heavily promoted elsewhere.
For us we are in the process migrating/deploying into O365 and have no idea when some features will come to us - makes it hard to write requirements or sent timelines for roll out.
It would be ideal for there to be a release schedule for G tenants that is released at the same time as the other tenant types so we can get some sense of it. Currently we really have that "not YOU" feel when items are not released to us yet and then put in a black hole as to when.
It would also be SUPER helpful in Roadmap revisions to have tags/filters specifically for G releases, so we don't have to dig around to know if this relates to us or not.
To also align the notices in the Admin center similarly would help as well.
Really looking forward to some of these releases...so any help you can give is great.
Can you go into more detail on how First Release impacts this? We are not on First Release right now, but depending on certain features we are looking at (such as Planner) it might be worth us re-evaluating this.
Myself and two others in my organization are on First Release. We don't get the features any sooner than anyone else unfortunately.
It's difficult to try and sell Office365 to my users when they see some feature announced, and I have to tell them, "sorry, we are Government, it might be years before we get that feature."
Most recently we saw where Teams would have solved a Business Problem for us, but we can't use it as it's not available to us. Also, since there is no published date as to when it's rolled out we can't make plans so in the meantime we have to look at other products that potentially cost quite a lot of money.
To say I'm disapointed would be a great understatement.
- Brian Levenson
Microsoft
This is important feedback, Cary. Thank you for explaining your experience. We believe that the focus and prioritizing compliance is appropriate, but this should not come at the expense of your ability to prepare and support your users. I'm going to take your example back to the broader Microsoft team to demonstrate the impact of being unpredictable.
Are there any particular features that stand out in the First Release scenario?
So far, the only time First Release has worked for me has been some of the SharePoint/OneDrive changes. I received the features first, was able to create communication materials, and then distribute them to users so they could have the heads up to the changes.
- Brian Levenson
Great question! I highly recommend considering First Release, which can be applied on a per user basis. It's a great way to let IT Pros, Help Desk, or Power Users get earlier access to new stuff.
As it relates to the US Gov subscriptions, we implement blocks by application at the license level, and turning on First Release will not override this. So in the context of Planner, you won't have access to the non-compliant feature; however, First Release will give you things like the Message Center Digest, which is currently in FR and meets compliance requirements.
You can enable First Release on a per user basis in the Org Profile section of the Admin Center (under Settings).
I agree on all of these frustrations for G-tenant releases.
While I completely understand the need to get to compliance before release, it is hard to have no sense at all of when we might get a product that is heavily promoted elsewhere.
For us we are in the process migrating/deploying into O365 and have no idea when some features will come to us - makes it hard to write requirements or sent timelines for roll out.
It would be ideal for there to be a release schedule for G tenants that is released at the same time as the other tenant types so we can get some sense of it. Currently we really have that "not YOU" feel when items are not released to us yet and then put in a black hole as to when.
It would also be SUPER helpful in Roadmap revisions to have tags/filters specifically for G releases, so we don't have to dig around to know if this relates to us or not.
To also align the notices in the Admin center similarly would help as well.
Really looking forward to some of these releases...so any help you can give is great.
