Overview
Microsoft
Teams is a communication/chatting tool for...you got it, teams. Visualize
Microsoft Teams as a place where you would want to say something directly to
one person or to multiple people, most likely expecting some sort of reply from
them. Microsoft Teams was designed to help organize team communications using a
layout that’s much easier to follow, read, and reply to versus email.
There are
three important sections to Microsoft Teams.
- Teams: Here, you can see what teams you are a part of. Inside of these
teams, there are separate channels (sub-topics) that are associated with the
team. These channels help separate and organize conversations. Anything you put
in any channel can be seen by all of the team members. They are public spaces
and conversations are like a Facebook post.
- Chats: Here you can chat with one person, or several people in a
private environment. Any chats that happen here cannot be seen by anyone who is
not a part of the initial chat. Think of it like a Facebook Messenger chat.
- Meetings: Microsoft Teams is a great audio and video collaboration
tool as well. You can create meetings with specific people or entire teams. You
can then join the meeting using any app (Mac, Win, iPhone/iPad) or the web app
(teams.microsoft.com).
Better than email
What makes
Microsoft Teams really powerful is the notifications system. In the email
world, every group email that is sent out and the replies from every person
clutter up your inbox, hard to track, and make your "unread"
notifications skyrocket up. Every time you start a new conversation inside of a
Teams channel, the app will NOT buzz or notify the team. It WILL help everyone
keep track of what they have read and what is unread by them. However, if you
want to get someone's attention, you can type "@<NAME>" and
then it will notify them like 'Hey, someone is trying to get your
attention." You can also do "@<team>" which will
notify/buzz everyone, and "@<channel>" which will notify people
who are a part of that specific channel. Little icons and read flags in the Teams
conversations will help you find where you've been mentioned or which
conversations were pinged to the whole team.
Downloading Microsoft Teams
- Once you've installed the app, open it and sign in with your account.
- Any team you've been added to will already appear in your
"Teams" area (bottom row of buttons).