Teams News from Microsoft Ignite 2019
?? Amy Stokes-Waters
Esc | Cyber Escape Rooms | Security Education & Awareness | Experiential Learning | Corporate Events | Non Exec Director | Full Time Feminist | Oh FFS...
The final instalment in my Ignite trilogy is probably more exciting than the last Lord of the Rings, is definitely better written than Twilight, and is less drawn out than any of the Hobbit movies (seriously, how did they make that tiny book into THREE WHOLE FILMS?!)... get ready to learn about my favourite Teams announcements...
Microsoft Productivity Score
Following the success of their Secure Score, Microsoft are releasing metrics to enable organisations to see how productive their employees are. Shown on a nice dashboard, presumably powered by PowerBI (who doesn't love a good PowerBI graph?!), managers will be able to gain insights into things like who is collaborating on Office docs, who is using Office apps across multiple devices, and who is using online meetings.
Users can drill down further into the separate areas to see more indepth insights and see recommended actions to improve collaboration and productivity within the team. Pretty cool!
Learning Pathways
Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways (M365LP for us veterans who learnt about this functionality a whole 3 days ago) is going General Availability this month. But what is it?
Well, it is Microsoft's learning platform, which allows users to stream content about the Office applications to give on-demand training for end users on a whole host of Microsoft apps including Word, Excel, Teams, and Planner! The solution sits on SharePoint, making it easy to provision and manage, winner winner.
Phone System Enhancements
As someone who used to sell Cloud PBX for a living, I was always dubious about the Skype / Teams Calling offerings. Well not any more! Microsoft have announced further enhancements to enterprise voice capabilities including call queues, call delegation, voicemail management, hold music, and more...
Inclusive and Effective Meetings
With inclusivity and accessibility being the headline themes at Future Decoded, I'm not surprised at any of the announcements around enabling all workers within an organisation to be more productive. One of the best things I've seen come out about Teams is the ability to live caption, giving those with different hearing abilities (or those following the conversation in another language) an additional way to follow the conversation.
On top of this, Microsoft Whiteboard is now in GA to give users infinite virtual whiteboard space within a meeting, making sure you can draw, design and doodle to your hearts content!
