If Microsoft really did want to increase the ability for their workers to innovate, why not do the obvious and formally create an "innovation day" each week where workers are free to:
1) Watch recorded presentations or demos to expand knowledge and be inspired
2) Read whitepapers
3) Review and play with other software for inspiration
4) Have group discussions involving a lot of "what if..." and "I just learnt..."
5) Work on whatever project they want to that the worker has decided would be interesting for end users to trial or colleagues to learn from
There's nothing preventing any of the above from being conducted remotely.
Workers are arguably more likely to do mundane work in an office setting without inspiration, creativity or any desire to innovate. As has been found through various implementations of "20% projects"[1] it's not the physical location of workers exist that matters, it's whether the company is forward looking enough to invest a significant portion of wages into increasing skills and knowledge of workers, and allowing workers to freely conduct R&D. Google was once considered innovative in its early days. However, Google's "20% projects"[1] approach was famously killed off in 2013, or arguably long before this by effect of workers doing 100+20% work rather than 80+20% work, and I would argue that Google in the last decade has been very poor at innovating for its size.
1) Watch recorded presentations or demos to expand knowledge and be inspired
2) Read whitepapers
3) Review and play with other software for inspiration
4) Have group discussions involving a lot of "what if..." and "I just learnt..."
5) Work on whatever project they want to that the worker has decided would be interesting for end users to trial or colleagues to learn from
There's nothing preventing any of the above from being conducted remotely.
Workers are arguably more likely to do mundane work in an office setting without inspiration, creativity or any desire to innovate. As has been found through various implementations of "20% projects"[1] it's not the physical location of workers exist that matters, it's whether the company is forward looking enough to invest a significant portion of wages into increasing skills and knowledge of workers, and allowing workers to freely conduct R&D. Google was once considered innovative in its early days. However, Google's "20% projects"[1] approach was famously killed off in 2013, or arguably long before this by effect of workers doing 100+20% work rather than 80+20% work, and I would argue that Google in the last decade has been very poor at innovating for its size.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20%25_Project