Microsoft Teams
This year’s global pandemic has meant that more than ever we’ve had to embrace digital solutions to keep businesses functioning with some sense of normality for both employees and customers.
We relied heavily on Microsoft 365 whilst working from home, particularly Microsoft Teams, the comms hub within Microsoft 365 that has allowed us to keep collaborating, talking, messaging and seeing each other!
Microsoft Teams has been described as “The digital translation of an open office space”, a collaboration platform for Microsoft 365 users designed specifically to help simplify an organisation’s workflow.
As well as making use of several chat-based communication channels (from voice and video chat through to text based comms), Microsoft Teams integrates with other Microsoft services available as part of the Microsoft 365 suite, allowing calendars to be shared and files to be integrated with group editing. All coming together to form one big collaborative environment.
Multiple ‘channels’ (think organisation MSN Chatrooms) can be created within each Team, each of which contains threaded conversations, notifying members of updates. If users need face-to-face conversation, they can jump straight into voice or video chats with other channel participants with a single click.
Although it may seem simple in its make-up, Teams is designed to be used for more than just a communications tool such as Slack. With Microsoft’s software portfolio forming its foundation it also works to combine strong content collaboration features. An example is documents from Microsoft’s Sharepoint platform being easily accessed and edited without leaving the app.
How can Teams work for my business?
For us, Teams has been a Godsend over the past 7 months and has helped us to keep communicating and collaborating remotely, as if we were in the office. It’s great for project work, meetings, managing communication across departments and teams. With its threaded conversation layout it’s easy to keep track of where everyone is up to, and being used in this fashion means that mailboxes aren’t cluttered up with long email strings which take a while to search through to find the info you’re looking for.
Ultimately, how you use applications such as Microsoft Teams depends on your requirements, but certainly every business can benefit.
How do I get Teams?
Teams is available to Microsoft 365 users on these license plans: Business Essentials, Business Premium, Enterprise E1, E3 or E5.
Want more information on what Microsoft Teams powered by Microsoft 365 can help communication in your business? Contact us for more information or call us on 0333 009 0836.
