It’s no surprise that having fun in the workplace makes you more productive and creative. With Microsoft’s fastest growing communication app, Microsoft Teams, you can have fun by connecting with your coworkers on a personal level.
Microsoft Teams is where communication meets collaboration. In a recent webinar hosted by Involta and Centriq, Microsoft MVP and Centriq Microsoft 365 Trainer, Nate Chamberlain showed attendees the ins and outs of Microsoft Teams.
Below we share some highlights from the webinar. Can’t wait? Watch now.
What is the difference between teams and channels?
- A team inside of Microsoft Teams is essentially a group of people or a place for your group of people.
- A channel is a traditional folder structure where you’re organizing files, conversations, decisions, meetings, recordings, and everything else that your team uses inside of Microsoft 365.
How do I schedule meetings?
Your Microsoft Teams calendar syncs with your Outlook calendar. If you need to schedule a meeting with an individual or a group of people, you can hit New Meeting on the calendar tab. The invite is like the one you would see in Outlook. However, you have the ability to add a channel, which gives you the opportunity to organize the meeting, its content, the chat around it, the files shared during it, the recording, and all of the informational resources gathered from that meeting in one place.
What functions are available in meetings?
Once you’re in a meeting, there are a few different things you can do. First, there is a participant panel at the top where you can see who is in the meeting with you. Second, there is a chat where you can send messages, gifs, etc. during the meeting. Third, there is a reaction panel to send a thumbs up, heart, clap, or laugh and even raise your hand without interrupting the meeting flow.
A relatively new feature to Teams is Breakout Rooms. This allows you to divide the entire group of participants in the meeting into separate rooms. For example, if you start a meeting with twenty people and you want create small groups for brainstorming so that people are more likely to speak up.
Finally, you can change your view of the meeting by going to Gallery. If you have nine people or less with their cameras on, you will see them in a grid across the screen. You will want to use the Large Gallery if you have more than nine people. The last one of the three is Together Mode. You can automatically remove everyone’s backgrounds and place them into an aquarium, an auditorium, or any virtual setting where it looks like you’re all in a room together… or underwater.
How do I chat?
The chat feature is fairly straightforward. Your chat panel shows your one-on-one chats and your group chats.
- Personal chats are normal text. You put your text in there and send your message. You can use advanced formatting too. Underneath the text box there are a few different options you can choose from. You can send rich text, attach files, use emojis, gifs, stickers, and schedule a meeting with the participant of the chat.
- Group chats are very much the same concept as personal chat. However, one thing is different. You can rename your group. Without giving the group a name, you will see, for example, Heather, Ray, Natalie, +3. With larger groups, you can click on the pencil icon in the chat beside the participant names. If they are Marketing team members, then you can name the chat Marketing team.
This is just the beginning of the information shared in our webinar. Watch the full recording and become a Microsoft Teams pro. Microsoft Teams is a great tool for your company to use and what makes it even better is knowing how to use it. Let your creativity shine through Teams and create something extra special with your coworkers in a fun, easy, and productive way.
