Microsoft Teams In The Workplace

Free with MS 365, Teams offers great features for businesses. In this episode, Dave Hodgdon and Steve Ripper talk about how Teams can enhance communication, meetings, and more. Then, they outline some etiquette for using MS Teams.

Dave Hodgdon: Good morning and welcome to PCG Tech Tuesday. I’m your host, David Hodgdon. I’m here today with PCG’s senior engineer, Steve Ripper. Steve, good morning. How are we doing today?

Steve: Good morning, Dave. How are you?

What Is Microsoft Teams?

Dave: Top of the morning. We have a great topic today. We want to talk about Microsoft Teams. We’ve seen a game changer here at PCG over the last three, four years in that product, so let’s get started. Steve, what is Microsoft Teams?

Steve: Microsoft Teams, redundantly I’m going to say it’s Microsoft’s version… It originally started as slack with Microsoft Cloud, the idea that we need a better interface for emailing people, saving files, doing video conferencing, instantaneous communications, otherwise known as chatting.

So Teams is Microsoft’s product that bundles all of those features. So you can chat, you can do video, you can do video meetings, you can do video conferencing, you can place files there, you can collaborate with other workers in what are called teams within the Teams product, so really just bundling a whole set of things, and really try to think of it as an interface that is new and different. A lot of people just use Outlook for all these things and it’s not the best at that. Teams is a far better positioned and designed product for a lot of the things you’re doing.

Dave: I almost feel here at PCG, Outlook was the main tool you used all the time. I feel we all have evolved to Teams is pretty much the central point to collaborate because it’s all engaging, which is there.

Steve: Outlook is very much the 2000s, late 90s, 2000s. Teams is the late 2010s and 2020s.

Teams Comes With Your MS 365 Subscription

Dave: So we know the Microsoft 365 subscriptions sometimes could be difficult as to what’s in it, what’s not. And one thing we want to talk about with your subscription, with Teams, it’s included, so why not use it? And I think a lot of people don’t realize that. And can you talk to us a little bit on the 365 platform and Teams, and what people should be doing with it?

Steve: The standard license for almost everybody in Office 365, you can have higher licenses, but what we think of as the standard license is literally called Standard, gives you a mailbox, but all of the other parts of Office 365, it’s easy for most users to think of it as a mailbox, but you’re getting OneDrive, you’re getting Teams, you’re getting SharePoint, you’re getting all those things, you’re getting the Office applications of which Teams is now one of them. So if you had Office in 2005, you had what you thought of as the big four, Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint. Teams and OneDrive are now think of that as the seven.

Teams Vs. Zoom

Dave: And SharePoint’s growing. And I think one thing the audience should always know, the nice thing with the Microsoft subscription is each user gets to use it up to five times. So you could have it on your personal device, your home computer, your work computer, so it’s always with you or on your phone. So we always hear about some of the other things that are out there. You hear of Zoom, GoToMeeting, what’s the difference? Why would someone use Teams over Zoom?

Steve: So a lot of companies will use Zoom. I always try to tell them, first of all, you’re paying twice, you’re paying for your Office 365 subscription, but you’re tending to think of it as, well, I’ve got to have that because of my email, but you are in effect paying for the Teams part of it as well and then you’re paying for whatever you’re doing for Zoom, Zoom’s not free.

Dave: And who knows who else is using something else for a fee?

Steve: Exactly. But Zoom is charging you a fee. So in effect, you are paying twice. Zoom is only going to do your video meetings, it’s a video conferencing tool. And as I discussed with you earlier, Teams is going to give you all of these other things, you’re going to get all the collaboration, you’re going to get the chatting.

And do not underestimate, Dave, that when you’re working within Teams, it knows everybody else in your company. The same way when you are an Outlook and you type S and you get Steve, Dave, and you send me an email, Teams knows who I am too. So there’s no I got to find them, I got to send them, you’re collaborating immediately.

MS Teams Calendar

Dave: We briefly talked about some of the top features, but let’s dive a little bit into each one of those. So we know the chat, calling, the calendar, the channels. Talk to me about the calendar.

Steve: A lot of people don’t realize this, there’s a calendar in Teams, but it’s your Outlook calendar. And Microsoft did that on purpose, because the calendar has been a primary driver, it’s not just getting messages in your inbox, that’s the primary driver, but your calendar functions are a big part of Outlook.

So when you’re looking at the calendar and Teams, it is your Outlook calendar, it’s just giving you that view to it, but the calendar is how you’re going to schedule meetings, particularly with people who are not in your organization. So if you want to do something with a vendor, they have Teams, or someone you’re doing business with, you can just make a calendar item with a Teams entry, send it to them. If they approve it, you now, in their calendar and your calendar, have a meeting for next Tuesday that you can both click and get into.

How to Attend a Teams Meeting If You Don’t Use Teams

Dave: What happens, you have a vendor or client, they don’t have Teams, can they join the meeting?

Steve: They can. Teams is built into a web interface, so just as an aside, Dave, even if you don’t do the app five times around the place, if you were just at a machine, you forgot, kiosk machine at the hotel, very rare, doesn’t happen much anymore, but in theory, you could just sign in to your own account and then there’s a Teams tab in the web portal and go there.

If you’re someone who doesn’t have Teams, you could still click the link and log in with a Microsoft account, or make one at the time and then go into Teams and use it there. If And we run into this sometimes, if you’re someone who just refuses to have a Microsoft, you don’t want one, I hate them, we get it, every Team’s invite also has a 1-800 number that you can call and it treats you as a conference caller, but you can still conference call in. So maybe seven people in the meeting are doing video microphones and everything, and you’re just conference calling in, but that works just as well.

Benefits of Chat in MS Teams

Dave: Microsoft has another great add-on too, we find it very favorable for people on the sales team, you can buy an added subscription to them to have their own personal training calendar that they can join. So if that user doesn’t have it, they can join. Similar to what Zoom has. We talked about chat, talk to us a little bit how you feel chat is a benefit to the client.

Steve: Sure. Well, chat hasn’t changed since 2000 when we all did… It’s integrated, it’s a little bit more seamless, but if you remember back in the day, AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo were the two big players, so it’s chatting. You’re literally going, “Dave-”

Dave: Like texting on my phone.

Steve: Hi, person at the front desk, did I get a package from UPS today? And then she or he can go, “Yeah, it came in or the UPS guy hasn’t been here yet.” But the point I want to make is very clear, stop using email for such incidental communication. The reason why people’s mailboxes, why you see the IT guy starting to yank the hair out of his head is because you have a 50 gb mailbox because you have thousands and thousands of messages that literally say, “So you want to go get pizza today for lunch?” And the other person goes, “Yeah, that sounds good or no Mexican.”

Chatting Eases the Burden on Your Email Storage

Dave: And there’s pictures and it just doesn’t get cleaned up.

Steve: Chatting can absolutely ease the burden and you’re not paying. So here’s the thing people don’t realize, when your mailbox gets to 50 gigs, and you have seven users, archiving isn’t going to be a solution for them, they’re not going to be happy having their mailbox taken apart and having stuff yanked out of it. What you’re really going to do is you’re going to upgrade the license, you’re going to pay more because that person is using their email as step by step. Whereas if you just chat, no cost, Microsoft is streaming the chats up the page forever for free.

Dave: And it’s easy to go back and view those chats.

Chat Can Protect Data When People Leave the Company

Steve: And so I know you’re going to bring this up a little later, Dave, but I’m going to jump the shark on this, if you put the Teams app on your phone, they can just chat you anywhere and you can just chat them back. Really the way to think about this is chatting is corporate texting. So many companies out there, Dave, are texting each other, they’re sending a text to their salesperson, but if that salesperson leaves the company, his half of the texting is leaving with him.

Dave: Correct.

Steve: Any texts that he had, and I’m picking on salespeople, it could be anybody, that they had with you, the CEO, is leaving with them, you cannot get those back, but if you chatted in Teams and that person leaves the company happily or unhappily, either way, all you’re doing is you’re changing the password, you’re cleaning it out, and you’re keeping all of that corporate, that company data is yours, and he leaves and goes to another company.

Dave: Those are huge team, business intellectual property stuff that could be in those chats.

Steve: People, in my experience when I talk about it, Dave, they think of chatting is why would I chat? Why would I chat? It’s so silly. I brought it up, AOL, my teenager used to chat or does this, why would I do that? Hold on, there is a whole communication stream that is business oriented that if you are doing it outside of a corporate owned app, you’re just giving half of the communication away.

Channels or Teams in MS Teams

Dave: Another big topic or usage in there is the channels, talk to us about the channels in Teams.

Steve: Channels, they are literally called teams. And I understood why you called them channels, Dave, because that is a common tripping point. The product is called Teams, but then the actual teams in Teams are teams, and you get that, it’s like, well, Microsoft’s marketing department loves that, but teams are a way for you to collaborate.

So you can say, for example, Dave, we probably do, we have a Teams marketing channel where Dave and I, on this microphone podcast, we’re in that team. We can actually chat back and forth, company owned, about when are we going to do the podcast, what times, what maybe some of the content would be.

But you can do that, you could set them up, somebody’s doing the company picnic, you could have it based on projects. If you’ve got projects out there that you’re working on, your company’s building a bridge, and you’ve got 15 people in your company who are specifically focused on coming up with stuff that’s going with that bridge, make a team. What did that look like before?

Dave, what did that look like before? You made a folder on the J drive on your server called Bridge Project and people stuck Excel spreadsheets, they stuck photos that got taken, and they emailed everything back and forth. Whereas in Teams, you can have the meetings, they’re part of the team, you can have the chats, all of that is saved, you can go look at what you just chatted really back and forth, you can have saved files, there’s wikis. And I cannot even describe to you the number of widgets that are in the menu in there that you can add to those things, YouTube videos, PowerPoint presentations, Adobe type stuff, signatures, and just all kinds of stuff that you can add to it. It’s crazy.

Dave: I try to explain to people, it’s like the house, you have multiple rooms, you have your kitchen, your living room, your bedroom, your dining room, so in Teams like here at PCG, we have an HR Teams channel, the sales, the tech, and I think it’s a great way for teams, not the whole company, but a particular group to focus on that.

Steve: If I can just throw this in, Dave, what I tell them is, “Listen, if you’re planning on making a folder and adding four people to it, and then you have to put a ticket into the IT department to permission that folder off so that only those four people can get to that folder, why are you doing that?

You actually have the power to go make a team that can hold files and add all those other things that can’t be done, you can just do it. You can make yourself the owner by right clicking it and make a team, then add the other three people. They’re the only ones that can get into it, you don’t need to call the IT department, and you get all the other features built into it.”

Dave: Sounds simple to me.

Steve: That’s the whole point.

Is Teams Secure?

Dave: Is Teams secure?

Steve: It’s absolutely secure. So if you think your email’s secure, then there’s no reason to think your Teams isn’t secure, because it’s the same product. It’s using the same SSL technology with AES encryption on Microsoft’s side of things. When you’re in a chat, or you’re in a video conference, or you’re saving files, all of those protections are in place.

MS Teams Etiquette

Dave: Let’s talk a bit about etiquette within Teams. We know people who did the remote workforce, but there’s three or four key things to have a successful Teams meeting, whether you’re going to do it via video or you’re speaking to someone, give us some good ideas of what they should be doing there.

Steve: Wear pants, right?

Dave: Definitely wear pants, yeah.

Steve: Even if it’s jammy pants, Dave. Come on, you’ve done the jammy pants below the waist.

Dave: You saw all the pictures before people showing, they go out there in their bathing suits.

Steve: So people laugh, but it’s true, you think no one will see below the waist, but then your dog knocks something over, there’s someone at the door, and you stand up because you forgot, so it’s a joke and it’s a funny meme.

Also, a really important skill, learn to mute your microphone. The more you use Teams, a lot of meetings will be you need to be a part of it, but you’re just a spectator. If you’re spectating, just hit the mute. Where the microphone icon is, when you click on it, will turn it off. No background noise on your end will infect, if you want to think of it that, the larger presentation that’s going on.

Dave: But also you need a quality mic on your camera. I see a lot of people… I’ve always wanted people… when you’re in the meeting, make sure your camera’s on to show that you’re engaged. People turn off the camera, you’re not sure what they are really doing, are they engaged or just doing something else?

Steve: It’s a sign that you’re not engaged, so just be a part of it, or say you can’t make the meeting. Do one of those two things.

Using Teams as Your Business Phone Solution

Dave: So we always call that etiquette, your rules for engagement, make sure you’re dressed for success, your camera’s good, you’re in the right position, as you said, Steve, you turn off your mic, and just always test things out first, especially for a big call.

One thing that PCG added, Steve, toward our Team’s experiences, we are about ready to pull the trigger on another VoIP system, but then when COVID hit, we realized about the Teams phone solution. Let’s talk briefly about that right there. I think a lot of people don’t know that it can be your full phone system.

Steve: Dave, who does your phones?

Dave: Teams.

Steve: We do Teams here at PCG, we have Teams, so what I would tell you in Teams is that there is a dial pad in Teams, which should lead you right away to go, “Why wouldn’t I just dial a phone? Why wouldn’t it just be my phone?” So it doesn’t really change the behavior that much on your end, but what it is doing is it’s saying it’s taking away the idea that you have two different places, I’m in Teams and I’m getting these calls from my coworkers, but then my phone on my desk rings and I’m getting it from somebody who’s outside. I would tell you all who’s listening to this, at PCG, they are one in the same thing.

If Dave calls me, he’s calling me, it’s in Teams and I just answer it, but if another vendor calls me, one of our clients call me, it’s in Teams and I just answer it. So while there is a learning curve, I’m not going to lie to anyone listening to this, there’s a little bit of a learning curve, Dave, you had to go through it a little bit too, it’s a little different, but I believe you have a phone on your desk, don’t you, Dave?

Dave: I was old school, I thought I needed it, but the point I wanted to bring up is Teams has totally changed the way we’ve used our phone system. My phone was there for a week, because I thought it had to be, I’d need that phone. My computer is my phone, my cell phone is my phone, so no matter where I’m at, my phone is live 24 by seven and it is a very inexpensive way to add phone to your business.

Steve: Dave, it’s the Jetsons.

Dave: The Jetsons.

Steve: No, remember we used to joke that someday we’ll have video calling?

Dave: Right, we’re here.

Steve: We do. Teams is just it. And for a lot of companies it’s at the end of the line on their Office 365, it’s that last tab called the periwinkle, the periwinkle Teams, your video calling future, it’s waiting there for you.

Dave: And everyone’s engaged with the phone on, with your clients, with your prospects, we just CC, it’s just a great tool. Any other wrap up comments on Teams, Steve?

Steve: So I have one last one, Dave.

Dave: Yes.

Training Employees to Use Teams

Steve: So we did another podcast and you all should listen to it, we talked about training, we can train Teams. We’re getting a lot of organizations are coming to us now going, “Listen, we started using it, we’ve got it, we’ve got people, some people are at home, some people are here, and it mixes, so we’re doing more Teams, but we’d love to know more about all of the features.” PCG, we’re happy to come, we can do a Teams training in Teams.

Dave: In Teams.

Steve: But we can come to your place, stand in the conference room, and just show you every feature. And really what what’s valuable about that is not only am I going to show you the features, but some of your users are going to have questions that you didn’t think about if you’re listening to, but they did, and I’m happy to answer them.

Dave: And we know in today’s recession how everyone’s trying to be more productive and get more out of their employees is I feel a lot of people ignore training, and it doesn’t matter whether it’s your in line of business, it’s Teams, it’s Microsoft Office, whatever that product might be, but training is critical to everything you do to optimize that solution. But great topic today, Steve. Thanks again everyone for joining us for PCG Tech Tuesday.

Steve: Wear pants.

Dave: Wear pants. All right, everyone, have a great day. Take care.