What's new in Microsoft Teams?
Microsoft Teams has become my default communication tool with my work colleagues over the last year.
This has enabled us to stay connected, manage work, and talk to all clients all without using other tools, bringing everything together in a one-stop-shop which I have learnt to really appreciate.
Here are some of the best features, that you may not be aware of which I love!
Background noise reduction
One of the downsides of WFH is background noise.
Dog’s barking, lawnmowers cutting, neighbours cleaning patios… the list goes on.
With noise reduction built into Microsoft Teams, this problem goes away to a large extent allowing me to have calls without worrying about distracting noises around me feeding through to my meetings.
Read all about it here:
Reduce Background Noise in Teams Meetings.
Custom lists
This is a fantastic way we can create some structure around a particular process or requirement without the need to involve expensive developers or weird customisations of tools.
So far, we’ve used it to track time on projects, to budget for projects, to brainstorm amongst others.
The possibilities are huge, and I’m sure we’ve just started to use this incredible feature.
Read all about it here:
Get Started with lists in Teams.
Here are some template Lists:
List templates in Microsoft 365.
Planner integration
Are you using Planner? If so I hope it’s all integrated with Microsoft Teams and really if you’re not using Planner and are using Microsoft 365 why aren’t you?
It is the perfect way to manage tasks, be transparent about who is doing what and surface information where it is needed most, in Microsoft Teams where everyone can access it.
Read all about it here:
Use planner in Microsoft teams.
Custom People Tags
I’d also like to highlight custom people tags.
What is this?
This is the ability for anyone to create a list of a group of people and then use that list using the @ symbol to reference the list and notify everyone on the list about a particular message.
So @Directors is quite convenient for me, as is @Developers or @ChangeTeam
I bet you can come up with some scenarios where this can make your life easier.
How do you do this?
Read all about it here:
Custom backgrounds
Gone are the days when someone sees my messy ‘study’, or patio table.
Today they see a polished office, with my logo, all neat and tidy. (or my cats enjoying the view.).
This helps with appearances and lets me work from anywhere.
Read all about it here:
Change your background for a teams meeting.
Here are some backgrounds you might want to try:
There you have it… some quick ways to make your work life easier.
If you prefer other features I’d love to know what those are.
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