10 Ways to Create the Most Collaborative Environment, through Teams by Microsoft

Now, more than ever, people are shifting the way they work and how they communicate across the globe. Video conferencing was popular before, but now it is indispensable. It’s being used daily by people who have had to figure out how to work and do business from home.

While many of these products are great for basic communication, not all are created equally in the eyes of organizations and large groups of participants. This is where Microsoft Teams shines. Let’s explore what makes it so great.

What makes Teams better than other conferencing products?

1. Probably the biggest reason to use Teams is that it is already included in Microsoft Office 365 and can be seamlessly integrated into your network if you are using Active Directory either on-premises or with Azure AD in the cloud. You can use one login to access your local machine, company network, and all your Office applications. 
2.  Teams can integrate seamlessly with other Office products such as Word, PowerPoint, and Excel and share documents with multiple users for whole team collaboration. 
3.  Distractions are less because you can only see 4 users’ cameras at a time in the viewer, but there is an update available in the near future that will increase that number to 9 active tiles.

What collaboration and scheduling opportunities does Teams provide?

4.  You can access your team members’ Outlook calendars to schedule meetings. You can also utilize the Chat and internal social media feed features that are always connected to your team. Files can be uploaded and documents can be shared directly through Teams and the other Office products. 
5.  You don’t have to schedule and open a meeting. You have connectivity to anyone on your network and your designated Team members collaborative spaces. You can even see if they are available, away, or currently already participating in a meeting before contacting them. 

What features am I not already taking advantage of in Teams?

6. As of today, there are about 24 bots available that provide a variety of automated functionality. There’s the T-Bot that offers FAQ capabilities to answer your most asked Teams questions. Also, Statsbot can provide automated reports scheduling to deliver information from Google Analytics and Salesforce. There are also many more bots to automate all kinds of information delivery and provide notifications across the organization. 
7.  Teams can integrate with productivity software such as Jira, which provides the ability for others to easily submit work tickets. You can see your tickets and action them directly in Teams and have it show up in the Jira management console.

What if I want to communicate with my Team on the road?

8.  Mobile audio and video calls are also available with Teams. You can access, share, and collaborate on documents while conferencing with your team members on the go with your Android and Apple mobile devices.

How do I keep all my stuff secure?

9.  Teams integrates with your network and other Office tools to provide SSO (Single Sign-On) and dual authentication capabilities to make sure that your documents and team members’ information stay safe. 
10.  Documentation is also a huge feature provided in Teams. Every chat, audio call, and video conference can be saved or recorded for documentation purposes. Super strong search capabilities are also available so that you can easily find that important nugget of information that someone casually dropped in a video call 2 months ago.

These are only some of the features provided by Microsoft Teams and we’d love to hear how your team is using it uniquely. We’re also happy to help answer any questions you might have on the platform or we can help with Microsoft Teams training. Chat with us today!