New features in Microsoft Teams that take your digital telework forward

During the summer, a lot of news was released on the Teams front, and with all the existing and new features, it's not always easy to keep up. Do you know everything in Teams that would help your organization become more efficient? Here is a selection of what we at WeSafe think is important for you to know.

See more in Team meetings and collaborate better

The need to be able to meet online to look each other in the eye and have conversations has increased tremendously. In Teams, you could previously only see a small number of colleagues' faces, but during the summer Microsoft increased this to 49. Now eight participants are also visible on mobile devices and nine on the iPad. This provides a sufficient level for most meetings that require interactivity, where everyone can be seen and heard in the same meeting. Competing platforms used to gain ground because of this, but now Microsoft has caught up. Teams users no longer need to go to a third party to feel involved in remote meetings.

Together Mode - together is the new big thing!

Microsoft is investing heavily in strengthening the community in digital meetings. Which is a common factor in all these new features in Teams. Something that has now been added is Together Mode. Among other things, this means that you who sit in the meeting virtually end up in a view where it looks like you are sitting in an auditorium. You automatically draw your gaze to the person talking, which significantly increases the feeling of participation.

It is now possible to work remotely and to give reactions to the other participants during the meeting by providing instant feedback. For the lecturer or presenter, these new features are sometimes crucial to performing well. It is extremely difficult to sit and look at the participants' initials, with the cameras turned off, and get no feedback whatsoever.

Med Together Mode you can also choose to actively show the presenter in pictures while sharing the presentation. This also increases proximity between participants and makes the meeting experience more creative and dynamic.

Meet 20,000 people at the same time

For very large gatherings, it is now possible for up to 20,000 spectators to take part in the broadcast. In addition, 1,000 people can interactively participate in the meeting, with the 49 most active participants displayed in the window and the speaker shown by a yellow square around the frame for added clarity.

For the individuals who log in, it is possible to change the background to any image and, for example, make it fit the organization's graphic profile. This creates a more personalized feel to the participation.

Not just meetings in Teams!

The platform is increasingly becoming a hub for collaboration; an ecosystem for your workday. Teams are used not only for meetings but also for external and internal communication. For file management and as a repository for the apps you need to do your job. Now more people are starting to understand how they can actually use this platform to create new documents, manage their calendar, reach colleagues internally and customers externally, and even manage the customer portal. Everything is tied together in one place and Teams is really starting to become a hub and collaboration platform according to Microsoft's vision.

But, as I said, it is not always easy to keep up with all the possibilities offered. For example, why should you keep using Doodle to send out a request to customers when you can use MS Bookings or Forms? Or why use Trello when the similar Planner is built in? If you stay in Teams, you have what you need with one login, data collected in one place and also GDPR-proof.

More news in Teams:

• Microsoft Lists: Which through information tracking in Microsoft 365 can configure lists for better organization of events, tasks, assets and more.
• Reduce data on mobile: The Teams mobile app has a new setting to reduce the amount of data for mobile users.
• Integrated mobile telephony: Through a license and a subscription, you can call directly from Teams with Business Voice.
• Smarter search function: Time to move away from the folder structure and instead use the search function in Teams! You can now search for a file, a person, an app no matter where it is saved.
• Automatic transcription: This function writes what is said in the meeting and saves the transcription. It is then possible to search for words in it afterwards and for what was said in the recording through this automatic transcription.
• WeSafe's customer portal: Not new, but worth highlighting anyway! Includes apps we've made for other customers - this provides a wealth of additional opportunities beyond the standard Microsoft offering! We make our apps available to all our customers.

WeSafe follows you all the way

For you as a user, Teams is the obvious choice - everything you need is available in the platform and on Office.com there are lots of insights and more solutions that can fit your organization.

We at WeSafe believe that access to Teams will be the primary work tool you need when you are new to a workplace, and Microsoft also opens up for multi-party programs. We ourselves work fully in the platform and use many of the existing apps, which means that we can also ensure that our customers are at the forefront, and that they know what is happening when it happens.

While Teams is for everyone, everyone will work in different ways in Teams - the possibilities are endless. We want to help you go the right way: fewer logins, a less complex work environment and lower costs. Get in touch with us and we'll help you along the way.

Do you want an analysis of how your organization uses the power of Teams? Contact us for a free consulting hour where you tell us about your needs and how far you have come in Teams. Then we will tell you what you can do in the future!