Microsoft Teams

I started using Teams in 2019 as a place to keep shared / collaborative documents. In March of 2020, we began to fully use MS Teams for all meetings, phone calls and instant messaging, as we were required to work from home. I've found this tool has been amazing at organizing our team and bringing us together. We work better using Teams that we ever did when we worked in the office together. I'm very pleased with this software and look forward to a time where they include Air pods as a supported audio device.

Microsoft Teams brings the power of exchange, calendar, chat and video all in one tool. Once implemented, most folks like in Teams rather than many different tools. Microsoft makes major improvements in the tool and have releases frequently. Like any tool that is in the process of improvement, Teams also has week spots. It can get quite clingy and slow at times. Still I believe it has great potential for collaboration.

Microsoft has improved Teams over the years to be a solution that is now widely used and depended upon. Using Teams is easy and straight-forward for most users. Integrating easily to other Microsoft products is beneficial even though can be cumbersome to some users. In times of remote working, Teams provides an easy way to communicate within your organization, see people's faces and/or easily share content from your screen. Voice quality has overall been very good in my experience. I would recommend this product especially if packaged with MS Office or other package offerings.

At wheelhouseit.com, we use Microsoft Teams, for organizations that have adopted the Microsoft ecosystem and Microsoft Teams for collaboration they have Shifts inside of Microsoft Teams for free. It's an easy to use tool that is already included in most Microsoft subscriptions. Organizations can allow their employees to use this solution on their computer, phone, tablet etc. Team members can communicate internally, swap shifts, get manager approval all from one user friendly app that is already paid for! 

At US Insurance Agents, we use Microsoft Teams. One of the biggest advantages to Microsoft Teams is its versatility. I work for a large school district that was already facing challenges in preparing our schools to face COVID-19. But in the end we were extremely successful, and that’s thanks in large part to Teams and its functionality.

As a district already invested in Office 365, we immediately turned to Teams as our “homeroom hub” when classes were moved to a virtual setting. Teams proved to be more than capable of hosting video chats that could accommodate entire classes. Teachers are able to create “Teams” in which they could add their students, and remain in constant contact with them through the program’s many collaborative tools.

This leads me to its next advantage. Teams is capable of much more than video conferencing.  Users have the ability to share and collaborate on documents, while making live edits along the way. They can also chat, enact automatic chats and calls, and keep assignments organized. As an even bigger advantage (in my opinion), Teams seamlessly integrates with Office 365. So whether you’re working in Outlook, Word, PowerPoint, or Stream, it’s all accessible under the Teams platform. 

Finally, Teams is extremely user-friendly and intuitive. As someone who never used it prior to the pandemic, it took me no time to find my way around the program and to catch on to its many functions. 

On the flip side, many will likely see Teams’ integration with Office 365 as a disadvantage. If you’re not already actively using this platform, you likely won’t experience the full effect of its capabilities. 

At Jaserodley, we use Microsoft Teams.

 Microsoft Teams previously known as Skype for Business has really stepped up to the plate.

 It’s a bit complicated at first as to finding out what all the features are and how to activate them as such. But once you know your way around, the features and shortcuts vastly improve your conference experience and once you’ve used them you’ll wonder how you ever lived without them.

 The free version offers almost as much as the paid plan, so unless you’re an enterprise business you can keep your money in your pocket.

 The Mobile app isn’t great, but we use the Desktop/Web app version 90% of the time anyway so it’s not an issue for us.

 My favourite feature is the collapsing long threads when needed - save looking at an infinite thread, it automatically hides older messages. 

At  Simple Life Insure, we have tried a number of web-conferencing tools over the years, but my personal favorite is Microsoft Teams.  

Teams comes standard in a Office 365 package, which makes it user-friendly and approachable compared to other conferencing software. Plus, pretty much everyone has access to some kind of Microsoft software. Setting up a meeting under its name has a familiarity tied to it that's incredibly beneficial, especially when chatting remotely with clients these days.   

My favorite features are the screen sharing and whiteboard functions. In my line of work, life insurance, these two are essential when reviewing policy drafts and documents both with my team and with clients.. All of us can look at and annotate the same document in real-time, which is great.  

As for cons, I've had the occasional snafu with Teams' recording function, which relies on cloud access. Teams automatically files any video recordings in Microsoft Stream as well, which is an add-on piece of software. Your standard Office 365 package only comes with Office 365 Video.  

Its only major headache for me really comes down to its recording function, which requires navigating some hurdles plus an extra platform integration to use smoothly. 

At Packline Solutions, we have been using Microsoft Teams for web conferencing. We have been using Teams across our organisation with great effect. Whilst Microsoft Teams can get a little complex when first setting the program up once all users have been fully onboarded it is a very intuitive platform.

Pros:

1- Organisational live chat which links through to Sharepoint is a fantastic feature allowing conversations to be connected to documents easily.

2- The combination of instant chat, phone and video conference calls is a huge plus

3- Easy to use, simple interface

4- Can view documents and chat according to channels

Cons:

1- Team is ideally suited to in house communication with some technical issues created when inviting users who don't have an Office 365 account.

2- Non-Windows users have issues using the platform for the first time.

3- Can get difficult to set up across an entire organisation without an Office 365 IT specialist