An Introduction To Microsoft Teams
Published 18 Sep 2019

Welcome to the seventh in our Office 365 blog series.  In previous blogs we have spoken about why your business needs Office 365, the different mix and match subscription options, and the benefits of Hosted Exchange, Microsoft Forms, Microsoft Flow, and in our previous blog - Microsoft Power BI.

In this blog we discuss Microsoft Teams.

What is Microsoft Teams?

Microsoft Teams is the collaboration tool that sits at the centre of your Office 365 world.  Once installed, teams can be used to bring together people in a project.  The team can share files, discussions, calendars, Wiki articles in a way that permits the team and its members to focus on delivering your plan or project.

Teams can use chat instead of email, securely edit the same files at the same time, see likes, replies and @mentions all in one place.

Teams has the beauty of being simple to set up and use, but it hides some serious, automatic, tech underneath the surface when you start using it.

The Tech of Teams

When you create a new Team the following are automatically created for you:-

1.    A new Office 365 group
2.    A SharePoint Online site and document library to store your team files
3.    An Exchange Online shared mailbox and calendar
4.    A OneNote notebook
5.    Links to other Office 365 applications such as Planner and Power BI

Don’t let this put you off, the technical stuff happens in the background.

What Does Teams Look Like?

Teams is available via your web browser, via Windows Explorer, in a desktop application and even on your mobile device.  The desktop application and mobile views are shown below:-

What Does Microsoft Teams Look Like

Navigating Around the Desktop Application

At first Teams can look a little daunting but after a little familiarisation, you will be up and running in no time.

Navigating The Microsoft Teams Desktop

Planning your Teams

Think of each team as a contained project – that could be a customer or supplier project, or a project to help you achieve a goal.

For example, within a customer project (Team) you could have folders (Channels) for correspondence, shared files, how-to guides, quotations and a timeline of actions.  This is in addition to the day-to-day chat about the customer, and any actions assigned to members of the team.

One word of warning here though. Be mindful when deciding who can create Teams. It is all too easy to become overwhelmed by the sheer number of Teams when everybody gets excited about this new product.  You may want to have department-based teams – Sales for example, and within sales have Channels for pricing, lead generation, customer incentives, sales literature.  A little bit of forward planning here will save you a lot of rectification later on.

What Else Can Teams Be Used For?

For smaller companies Teams could be used in conjunction with, or in replacement of, a traditional file store. Files can be shared within each Team and the relevant people given access to them.  Only team members can see each Team so you can restrict the Sales Team and Channels to members of your sales team, HR Teams and Channels to your HR employees etc.

How Do I Get Teams?

Teams is available as a part of your Office 365 subscription and most Business Office 365 subscriptions include this.

Where Is My Data Stored?

When you create a Team the behind-the-scenes technology creates a SharePoint Online site. Your data and files are saved within this.  Each Office 365 subscription comes with an element of cloud storage and your Teams data is a part of this.

Is My Data Backed Up?

As with all Office 365 subscriptions your data has high availability,  but it is not backed up beyond the standard 30-day Microsoft retention period.

High Availability means that if something happens to the physical hardware your data is stored on within the cloud, you are switched to another server where your data is replicated. You would struggle to notice the difference.  High Availability also means that as long as you have an internet connection you should be able to get to your data.

High Availability does not mean your data is backed up.  If you delete a file (or an email within Exchange Online) after 30 days it is permanently deleted from Microsoft servers - with no way of retrieving it.  Similarly, should your machine become infected by a virus or ransomware your “high availability” files could be affected also.

Needless to say, a whole industry has emerged offering Office 365 backup solutions and we can help advise you on the best options for your business.

Given the relatively low cost of Office 365 backup solutions, we strongly recommend customers take advantage of an Office 365 backup solution.

How Can Pro-Networks Help You With Microsoft Teams?

You may be an existing customer who wants to take advantage of the efficiency and collaboration benefits Teams provides.

You may not yet be a customer but you want to engage with a company who can look after your IT and show you how to get more from your Office 365 subscription.

You may not be using Office 365 and want help migrating to it.

You may be a larger organisation who wants help with licencing Office 365.

Pro-Networks can help with all areas of Microsoft Teams and Office 365 – speak to us today to find out how we can help you.

 

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