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The working world has changed a fair bit in the last decade.
From the rise of remote and hybrid work, to conversations about 4-day weeks and flexible hours, the times certainly seem to be a-changing.
To complement these cultural shifts, the tools we use for work have also been made over, with platforms like Microsoft Teams not only offering a lifeline during the pandemic, but a chance to thrive in the new age of work.
The desire to optimise efficiency and improve processes to stay ahead of the competition is now a priority for most companies, but finding and elevating great ideas isn’t always easy.
Not easy, but not impossible.
Nobody knows a company better than its people, so why not use employee ideas to make improvements?
Thought leaders like Richard Branson seem to agree:
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More importantly, employees agree too.
A 2021 U.S. survey found that 62% of employees have ideas to make their company better.
In one of our recent Idea Exchange webinars, we shared an example of this idea in action in the U.K., covering how in 2014, one request for staff feedback led to then-Tesco CEO Dave Lewis combing through over 10 hours worth of emails filled with bright ideas from his teams.
Sounds great, if only that latter part could be optimised.
Did you know?
So, how can you capture and manage the best of your employees’ ideas, and what role can Microsoft Teams play in all of this? All will become clear as we explore the powerful possibilities of idea management on Microsoft Teams
Let’s start with the obvious question: why manage ideas through Microsoft Teams?
As of 2025, Microsoft Teams has over 320 million active monthly users, making it the most populated online collaboration tool in the world.
From meetings to morning stand-ups to chats between colleagues, Teams is the go-to platform for many professionals, seeing greater adoption and faster growth than any of its competitors in recent years.
With so many employees using Teams on a daily basis, it’s likely already being used for idea sharing. So, all companies need to do is add extra functionality to make organising and evaluating submissions easier.
After all - where better to collect and manage ideas than the platform employees are most familiar with and comfortable using?
In short, Teams is perfectly-positioned to make idea sharing a natural part of day-to-day work.
Great things happen when companies tap into the creativity and innovative thinking of their workforce…
Just look at Frito-Lay. After some unsuccessful product launches resulting in a dip in sales, CEO Roger Enrico called for his 300,000 employees to "act like an owner". A janitor named Richard Montañez, empowered by the words of Enrico, decided to call up the CEO with an idea for a new product.
The idea was eventually launched as Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and became a multi-billion-dollar product. The janitor's idea instigated a new range of Cheetos flavours, with over 20 flavours now on offer, each worth over $200 million!
Want more examples?
We've got you covered! Take a look at these 14 inspiring examples of intrapreneurship in action!
Turning ideas into actual plans can be challenging.
Every company wants the next Flamin’ Hot Cheetos story, but in reality, even if a similarly brilliant idea exists among your team, you’ll face some challenges bringing it to life.
But challenge is a big part of business, and nothing that smart planning and management can’t overcome.
Did you know?
. . . leaders run the risk of time-saving, cost-saving and revenue generating ideas slipping away.
Many businesses don’t have solid systems in place to collect, manage or develop ideas. This might not seem like a problem at first, but failing to build a culture of idea sharing can be costly.
Take the video conferencing software developer WebEx, for example.
One of their employees, Corporate VP of Engineering - Eric Yuan, had an idea for a video communication tool built to support and simplify remote collaboration and remote meetings.
After his idea fell on deaf ears, Yuan left his 6-figure executive job to develop his own platform independently, taking 40 WebEx engineers with him.
Yuan went on to found Zoom, an idea worth over $22 billion as of 2025.
. . . leaders empower their teams to collaborate and grow.
When employees across all aspects of a business are given equal opportunities to share great ideas, new pathways to success are revealed, but what does effective idea management look like?
Begin your free trial of Ideas by Sideways 6 and start building on employee ideas today.
Now that digital collaboration tools are a staple of modern business, the way many successful teams approach idea management has evolved.
Collecting, organising and elevating great ideas has never been more accessible.
Integrated idea management takes tools like Microsoft Teams that employees already use to collaborate, then enhances them to turn sharing and refining ideas into a more natural process.
The goal? To drive engagement in change initiatives by making it easier for employees to share feedback, opinions and great ideas.
No new apps, no new passwords, no extra training.
Definition
Integrated idea management
Integrated idea management is an approach of listening to ideas by using pre-existing tools and software, rather than a dedicated ideas application. All the ideas collected are then fed into a single platform where they can be filtered, reviewed and managed accordingly.
In practice, companies turn everyday tools like Microsoft Teams into employee ideas apps, allowing for the effective and efficient management of ideas at scale.
Employees can collaborate and share ideas remotely inside Teams, from anywhere and at any time, with just a few tweaks to the original platform.
Learn exactly how Ideas by Sideways 6 makes this possible, and start your free trial here.
The success of an integrated idea management process depends on how comfortable employees are with sharing ideas.
Part of this necessity is baked into the concept itself, enabling employees to share ideas freely inside the apps they already use daily, but business culture also has an important role to play.
So, what does a culture of idea sharing look like?
Of course, encouraging employees to share ideas freely is the cornerstone of effective idea management, but great ideas aren’t much use if they’re not well-organised.
When employees have no dedicated place to share ideas, leaders run the risk of their enterprise social networks becoming overrun with disparate posts and unstructured conversations that can quickly become distracting.
To add structure and efficiency to your idea management process, what you really want is an employee ideas app, but many people are simply tired of learning to use new tools and adding them to their workflows.
Did you know?
The average employee has to switch between 35 work-based applications over 1,100 times a day!
Thankfully, you can build your own employee ideas app directly inside Microsoft Teams, and no, you don’t need any programming knowledge to make it happen!
You don't need more tools.
You need your tools to do more.
----- Cigdem Seftalioglu Ercetin, Product Lead at Sideways 6 -----
Ideas is a native Microsoft Teams app by Sideways 6, built to provide your team a dedicated space to share great ideas.
Sideways 6 helps leaders to:
Whether you're a large company looking to run enterprise-wide idea campaigns or a small team wishing to promote collaboration, Ideas by Sideways 6 has you covered.
See how the platform works for yourself by booking a free 30 minute demo call here.
There are many benefits to building an ideas program inside Microsoft Teams - click here for more on that - but how can you know what type of program to build?
Teams users will know the platform has its own native app store that hosts a few effective idea management tools, so there are choices to be made.
The two most popular ideas apps for Teams are Ideas by Sideways 6 and Microsoft's Employee Ideas App.
Both are effective, but in fairly different ways; let’s look at the differences.
Ideas by Sideways 6, built in partnership with Microsoft, excels at managing enterprise-wide idea campaigns, with a focus on user-friendly functionality and time-saving AI-powered features to help boost engagement in change initiatives.
From a single, intuitive interface, users can launch custom campaigns, vote and comment on submissions, organise content and combine similar ideas to streamline the idea management process, with automatic notifications, updates and insights sent straight to collaborators through the Microsoft Teams platform.
Key Insight
Learn how Sideways 6 and Microsoft came together to develop the revolutionary Ideas by Sideways 6 Teams app: How we built an ideas app for Teams in partnership with Microsoft.
Microsoft Employee Ideas
Microsoft's Employee Ideas App is geared more towards smaller teams, and can be installed as a tab inside a Teams channel (a feature that Ideas by Sideways 6 also shares).
Leaders can create a custom campaign, then share their prompt with other users who can add notes, images and files as responses. Employee Ideas can be a handy app for smaller teams, but its lack of wider organisational and enrichment features makes it a little less effective at managing ideas at scale.
Here’s a comparison chart to help you assess which app best meets your needs.
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Finding the right idea management software is only part of the equation, the next step is to build a campaign employees will actually engage with.
This part can be challenging for many businesses, leading to around 70% of change initiatives failing.
If you don’t fully understand why you’re running a campaign, your employees won’t either. Start by defining your goals, the challenges you want to overcome and the questions you’re looking to answer.
Next, outline practical factors like timeframes, budgets and personnel requirements, then decide how you’ll measure success when the campaign is finished.
Add as much background information to campaigns as possible, covering things like major goals and future plans, to help employees understand why their ideas are important to you.
If you’re using Ideas by Sideways 6, you can use configurable campaign features to add questions, descriptions, banner images and communication templates to your campaign to help employees best-understand what you’re looking for.
Our team can show you how to do this (and much more) on a free 30 minute demo call.
When you launch your campaign, you need to make sure everyone inside your company knows about it. Ideas by Sideways 6 has an in-built Comms function to help with this, allowing leaders to launch campaigns with customised messaging to engage unique teams.
It’s also wise to spread messaging across your wider media channels and enterprise social networks to build up excitement and get everyone talking about your new initiative.
When managing ideas, we recommend defining various idea stages. Think of this much like a funnel, with ideas only passing through to the next stage if they meet your set criteria.
The stages we recommend are:
To learn how to put these stages into action, check out our Best Practice Guide to Running Employee Ideas Campaigns on Teams.
Engagement levels can dip after launch, but if employees see their peers’ great ideas being recognised, it can motivate them to get back involved.
Shortlisting and spotlighting your brightest ideas is simple in the Ideas by Sideways 6 app, just use the Ideas Table and Ideas Page features to find those that meet your review criteria and use the export function to copy and share them with your teams.
If employees hear nothing about your campaign after submitting an idea, their motivation and engagement levels will likely drop.
Make sure to regularly update your teams online and in person, as well as check submission feedback in your idea management software to connect with employees whose ideas are gaining traction.
Take the goals you set at the beginning of the process and measure your campaign against them. Collect feedback from employees and consider how successful you think the campaign has been, then use these insights to inform future initiatives.
Ideas by Sideways 6 can help with this process, allowing you to set goals and measure engagement when you build your campaign, then use powerful analytical tools to conduct post-project reviews.
Check out this article for a more detailed Best Practice Guide to Running Employee Ideas Campaigns on Teams - or gain some insight into how other companies run successful ideas campaigns through our Idea Management Masterclasses.
Did you know?
With support from smart idea management software, leaders can engage employees in impactful change initiatives and make sure their voices are heard. Empowered by user-friendly, customisable apps like Ideas by Sideways 6, employees can share bright ideas from anywhere at any time.
Get started by signing up for your free trial of Ideas by Sideways 6 today.
If you found this article useful, you’d love our Webinar 'The Future of Ideas on Microsoft Teams' with Nick Heddelman from Microsoft, or perhaps you’re interested in seeing what other companies in your space are doing?
If so, check out our case studies, featuring stories from the likes of Nestlé, AstraZeneca, and Kingfisher!
