MS Teams
By Niels Tietgen (s193191).
Abstract
Microsoft Teams - in short MS Teams or just Teams - is the name of a cloud-based collaboration and communication platform developed by the Microsoft company that allows for document collaboration, presentation, and white-boarding capabilities in addition to their more well-known communication features. [2]
Within Microsoft 365, MS Teams is the central place for digital collaboration. Microsoft Teams enables group chats, joint work on documents, news feeds, video and telephone conferences, online meetings and much more. In addition, a shareable cloud storage space is provided. The platform can be used from various devices such as PCs, laptops, smartphones or tablets. Supported operating systems are Android, iOS, Windows, macOS and Linux. [1]
MS Teams is combining earlier known digital tools like Skype (for Business), Clouds or Drives, and several more. Furthermore, Teams is widely used by multiple companies and institutions to provide connectivity and communicate across locations and during home office. Therefore, “the software skyrocketed in popularity during [the COVID pandemic] lockdown, reaching 44 million active users by March and 75 million by April“ [3].
At the centre of the various functions of Microsoft Teams are the so-called teams. These are groups that are created by a group administrator (team owner) and include people inside or outside a company or organisation. For example, members of a department, a project or a learning community can be gathered in a team. [1]
As already mentioned MS Teams is providing the basic features like - individual calls and video group meetings; scheduled and short notice - document share point organized in different projects and portfolios - providing space for polls and surveys and furthermore focusing directly the topic of project management with tools like Gantt charts, timelines and task managers.
Additional features of MS Teams are - transparent sharing of overall information - tracking of deadlines - individual organized accessibility to project folders - clear timeline and time tracking - monitoring progress and task management - organizing documents, notes and calendars - navigating between several projects and portfolios with individual accessibility - providing flexibility and transparency - it offers multiple add-ons like Microsoft Planner, Azure DevOps, Jira, and Microsoft Project [1]
[1] Microsoft [2] Proserveit [3] Business of Apps
