Telefónica empowers employees,

achieves digital transformation with

social communities
“The more employees use Yammer to
engage in meaningful conversation, the
stronger our digital culture becomes—and
the more agile and competitive we are.” Telefónica
telefonica.com/en
—Luz Rodrigo, Enterprise Social Strategist, Telefónica 125,000 employees
Spain
Telecommunications
Telefónica provides digital, twenty-first century telecommunications in
its mission to become an “OnLife Telco.” Its end-to-end digital workplace Company profile
communications are equally up to date. Using Yammer, the enterprise Operating globally, Telefónica is based
social network platform in Microsoft Office 365, Telefónica employees in Madrid, Spain, and serves more than
converse across 21 countries in productive, nonhierarchical exchanges— 327 million customers in 21 countries with
open and transparent Q&As to boost innovation, problem solving, mobile, landline, Internet, and television
and customer service. Yammer conversations on corporate strategies telecommunication services.
improve their adoption, keeping Telefónica aligned and progressive.

“A connected company
is more productive and
innovative. While other
enterprise social networks
and collaboration
platforms coexist in the
company, Yammer was the
tool the majority of our
employees preferred.”
—Luz Rodrigo,
Enterprise Social Strategist,
Telefónica
Telefónica, a global telecommunications company, blends
tradition with transformation to achieve business success. Mixing
a 90-year-old history with leading-edge technology has helped
the company drive business in emerging new markets in Latin
America and Europe. Telefónica is taking advantage of the benefits
of an Internet-based economy—big data, and the erosion of
geographical and temporal boundaries—while successfully
negotiating the challenges of data security and privacy issues.
That’s because it stays ahead of the technology curve.
“We were one of the first telcos that focused on the digitization of the company to
provide future communications to our customers,” says Aitor Goyenechea, Director
of Global Internal Communications at Telefónica. “We are moving from selling voice
services to creating new products around the Internet of Things, communication
technologies, and cities of tomorrow. We are focused on improving consumers’ digital
experiences by connecting them to an open and safe Internet.”
Fostering intelligent altruism
Telefónica is making a successful transition to the digital economy by carrying out
its own digital transformation. The company’s new workplace features cloud-based
business productivity tools that employees use to enhance mobility, agility, and global
collaboration. “We are active in 21 different countries, and our workforce speaks four
languages,” says Goyenechea. “We chose Microsoft Office 365 as a key strategic tool
to foster new ways of breaking silos and working more productively in global teams.”
To support its digital transformation, Telefónica relies on a strong corporate social
network using Yammer, among other components of Office 365. The company
believes that by encouraging an online employee community based on respectful,
enlightened conversations and problem solving, a concept it calls “intelligent altruism,”
Telefónica will evolve from a hierarchical organization to a global community of
engaged employees.
“The world has changed exponentially and the way we communicate, work, and
socialize has, too,” says Goyenechea. “Before, large companies like ours tended to
be siloed, geographically dispersed organizations where real-time connections and
conversations didn’t really happen all that much. Today, we are aware that digital life
and technology is an essential part of human experience.”
According to the new company plan at Telefónica, online and offline experiences
are permanently intertwined and cannot be differentiated. Under this new concept,
called “OnLife Telco,” Telefónica aims to create, protect, and boost the connections
in its customers’ lives so they can get the most out of every moment. “This vision also
applies to Telefónica internally,” says Goyenechea.” That’s why we are committed to
technologies that foster communication and dialogue, such as our corporate social
network.”
The business benefits of the transformation are significant. With Yammer already
entrenched in the company—currently more than 95,000 employees have accounts,
and there are more than 600 active groups in the main network with more than 35,000

“Within days, the
millennial group on
Yammer connected with
units across Telefónica
as beta testers for new
digital apps designed
for their peers. Now we
have a new voice to help
refine our offerings and
appeal to this lucrative
millennial market.”
—Aitor Goyenechea,
Director of Global
Internal Communications,
Telefónica
messages every month—Telefónica staffers are “working out loud” to solve problems
faster and generate ideas that support their company’s strategies.
“A connected company is more productive and innovative,” says Luz Rodrigo, Enterprise
Social Strategist at Telefónica. “While other enterprise social networks and collaboration
platforms coexist in the company, Yammer was the tool the majority of our employees
preferred. Adoption has been organic, at 2,000 employees a month for the last
three years.”
Driving innovation
Telefónica has been using Yammer as its platform for employee conversations for
more than three years, and the results prove its theory that social companies are
more innovative. A group of millennials at the company are so excited about the
opportunity to participate in real-time corporate communications that they decided to
give something back to the company. They created an online community to offer their
expertise and provide feedback on new products designed to appeal to the rapidly
growing market of millennial customers.
“Within days, the millennial group on Yammer connected with units across Telefónica
as beta testers for new digital apps designed for their peers,” says Goyenechea.
“Now we have a new voice to help refine our offerings and appeal to this lucrative
millennial market.”
Another group started a Yammer conversation with President José María Ávarez-Pallete
(previously Chief Operating Officer) about boosting the entrepreneurial spirit within
the company with a global approach, not a siloed one. Ávarez-Pallete took note of the
suggestion and decided to foster a global intrapreneurship program, where employees
can pitch their ideas and get the time and support to develop them. This project is
currently moving forward.
Enabling connections, problem resolution
Thousands of employees within the global Human Resources community at Telefónica
are refining contracts and collaborating through conversations on Yammer. When an
HR director had to decide whether to renew or retire a service, instead of asking a
few people in the office for their feedback, he posted the question on Yammer and
got hundreds of insightful comments. The end result is that he renewed the contract
with better terms and conditions for the company. Yammer was also the place where
new and engaging digital skills training occurred in 2013 and 2014 across the global
network in the guise of “digital races.”
“We have hundreds of stores in Germany and the UK where employees only have
one computer, but they are using Yammer to reach out to their peers to problem
solve service issues, or to share success stories that help attract more customers,”
says Rodrigo.
Improving strategy management
Three years ago, when Telefónica asked more than 1,300 executives to participate in
online strategy discussions prior to the Executive Summit, its bi-annual global strategy
meeting, it signaled the beginning of new strategy management at the company. “We
encouraged them to share their ideas and to co-decide the strategy, instead of them
being passive listeners of the strategy presented to them in a two-day event,” says
Rodrigo. “Using Yammer, we delivered an important message to the company as well:
that we have to transform ourselves very quickly and that our top managers are now
using the social tools that our customers and employees are using,” says Rodrigo.
For the 2015 Executive Summit, Telefónica opened strategy discussions to the entire
company. In just two years, this increased the number of people invited to engage in
 strategy discussion on Yammer from 1,300 to 125,000. And for the first time, it was not
only executives who participated in strategy discussions. “We used Yammer to say we
are looking for a new attitude: for everyone to be proactive, engaged, and innovative
around strategy discussions to help set the future for the company,” says Goyenechea.
“And through conversations posted on our social network, we can track the level of
understanding and commitment to those strategies.”

This level of endorsement goes well beyond passive acceptance of policies developed
by top management. “When our employees use Yammer to be part of the discussion,
they internalize and adopt the strategies and work on them with real commitment,”
says Rodrigo. “The more employees use Yammer to engage in meaningful conversation,
the stronger our digital culture becomes—and the more agile and competitive we are.
Yammer already feels like a tradition that’s here to stay!”

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Document published June 2016