Teams Overview

Teams is a collection of online tools intended to allow groups to collaborate flexibly and securely.

·         Here’s Microsoft’s Explanation 

·         What's below are Jim Mitchell’s notes to explain key concepts

Communication: Chat vs. Channels

• Chat (The "Hallway"): Private, linear messaging for individuals or small groups. (Files save to OneDrive).

• Channel Posts (The "Conference Room"): Public, threaded discussions visible to the whole Team. (Files save to SharePoint).

File Collaboration

• Live Co-authoring: Edit Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files simultaneously with others.

• Universal Viewing: View PDFs and 300+ file types directly in the app without downloading.

Meetings

• Integrated Calling: Video and Audio built-in (Scheduled or "Meet Now").

• AI Tools: Live captions and searchable meeting transcripts/summaries.

Project Management

• Planner: Integrated task tracking, assignments, and due dates.

Extensibility

• App Integration: Add external tools (Adobe, Trello, etc.) directly into tabs.

Intelligent Meeting Assistance

• Real-time Summaries: During a live meeting, you can ask Copilot to summarize the discussion so far or list unresolved questions without interrupting the flow.

• Post-Meeting Recaps: Automatically generates a list of key decisions, action items, and a structured summary once the meeting ends (requires transcription).

• Participant Insights: Ask specific questions like, "What was the feedback on the proposed budget?" or "What were the main concerns raised by the volunteers?"

Chat & Channel Synthesis

• Catch Up: Summarizes long chat threads or channel discussions from the last 30 days, highlighting the main points and decisions made while you were away.

• Information Retrieval: Locate specific files, links, or dates mentioned across multiple conversations by asking in plain language.

Content Drafting & Refinement

• Message Polishing: Helps rewrite chat messages to adjust tone (e.g., making a request more professional for a board member or more encouraging for students).

• Brainstorming: Use the Copilot pane to generate ideas for meeting agendas, project outlines, or event taglines based on existing team data.

Standard vs. AI-Enhanced Teams

Instead of traditional manual workflows, Copilot shifts the focus to oversight and high-level strategy:

• Meeting Notes

  • Standard: Requires manual entry by a designated person, often leading to incomplete records or distracted participants.

  • AI-Enhanced: Provides automated, editable AI-generated notes in real-time.

• Catching Up

  • Standard: Users must scroll through hundreds of missed messages to find context.

  • AI-Enhanced: Offers a one-click summary of the "main points missed" while you were away.

• Action Items

  • Standard: Relies on individual memory or manual follow-up lists that can be easily lost.

  • AI-Enhanced: Automatically extracts a "Task" list with suggested owners based on the conversation.

• Context & Search

  • Standard: The user must remember exactly where (and by whom) a specific data point or file was shared.

  • AI-Enhanced: Provides a searchable history across all chats, files, and meetings through a single natural language interface.

The Team is the "container" for your project or group

• Organizational Membership: You can be a member of multiple Teams simultaneously

• Privacy Levels:

  • Public: Open to anyone within your organization to join.

  • Private: Requires an invitation from a Team Owner.

• External Access: You can invite "Guests" (people outside your organization) to join a Team to collaborate on specific projects.

• Creation: Most organizations allow users to create Teams, making it easy to spin up a group for a temporary task force.

Channels: Organizing the Work

Channels are subdivisions that prevent the "General" chat from becoming cluttered.

• The General Channel: Every team starts with this. Use it for high-level announcements and "water cooler" talk.

• Standard Channels: Visible and accessible to every member of the Team.

• Private Channels: Focused workspaces for a subset of the Team (e.g., a "Budget" channel only for the Board Chair and Treasurer).

• Autonomy: Any member can typically create a channel to keep a specific project moving forward.

Files & Real-Time Productivity

The "Files" tab within each channel is powered by SharePoint/OneDrive, offering robust data management.

• Centralized Storage: Every channel has its own file folder. No more searching through "Sent" emails for the latest version.

• Co-Authoring: Office 365 files (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) can be edited by multiple people at the same time directly inside Teams.

• Accessibility: Non-Office files (PDFs, Images, CAD drawings) can be viewed in the app or downloaded for local editing.

How to Use Teams Effectively

• Navigation: Select the Teams icon on the far-left sidebar.

• Selection: Choose your Team from the list, then select a specific Channel.

  • Take advantage of the ability to create favorites (there are several types)

• Viewing Content: The right-hand pane displays the Posts (conversations) and Files for that specific topic.

• Note: If you are new, you may only see one Team. As you expand your work, your sidebar will grow into a comprehensive directory of your different commitments.

How to Access Teams

You can engage with your team across multiple platforms to stay productive and connected:

• Web Browser: Navigate to teams.microsoft.com for instant access without installation.

• Desktop Application: Download the official app from the Microsoft website.

  • Recommendation: This is the highly recommended method for the best experience.

  • Pro Tip: Keep the app running in the background to receive real-time notifications and respond to chats promptly.

• Mobile & Tablet: Download the app from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store to stay connected while on the go or visiting project sites.

Who Can Access Teams

Access is divided into two primary categories to ensure secure collaboration:

• Internal Members

  • Requirements: Any individual within the organization with a valid Microsoft 365 license.

  • Capabilities: Full access to all organizational features, files, and integrated apps.

• External Guests

  • Requirements: Anyone with a valid email address invited to a specific team by an internal member.

  • Capabilities: Access to chat, meetings, and shared files. Note that some administrative settings and advanced organizational features may be restricted.

  • Note: Guests have somewhat limited capabilities, but most that matter are available

The Unified Navigation Experience

As of the latest 2026 updates, Microsoft has moved away from having separate "Chat" and "Teams" icons on the sidebar. They are now integrated into a single, streamlined workflow to reduce "context switching."

🔔 Activity

• Purpose: Your central notification hub.

• Function: A chronological feed of mentions, replies, and reactions. Since Chat and Teams are now combined, this hub is even more critical for seeing where your attention is needed across both private messages and public channel discussions.

• Pro-Tip

  • Use the @mention view (usually found at the top of your unified list) to see a "greatest hits" of messages directed specifically at you. This bypasses the clutter of general channel noise and focuses on your direct tasks.

💬 Chat & Channels (The Unified View)

• Combined Interface: This single icon now houses both your 1-on-1 private chats and your group Team channels.

  • Teams has many options. You can separate Chat and Channels if you wish. You can also create your own favorites.

• Organization: * Favorites: A section at the top where you can pin both private chats and specific channels (e.g., your "Non-Profit Board" channel next to a chat with a fellow teacher).

  • Custom Sections: You can now create your own categories (e.g., "Active Grants" or "Spring Semester") and drag-and-drop both chats and channels into them.

• New Message Flow: Click the New Message icon at the top. You can now start typing a person's name for a chat, or a channel's name to post a public message, all from the same starting point.

• Filters: Use the "Unread," "Chat," or "Channels" filters at the top to quickly toggle between views if the combined list feels too long.

📁 Files

• Unified View: Shows every document from across all your Teams and private chats.

• OneDrive Integration: Access your personal OneDrive folders directly. In the 2026 version, Copilot can summarize these files for you without you having to open them.

Technical Architecture

Understanding the "back-end" helps you manage data.

• SharePoint Backbone: Every "Team" you see in the combined view is actually a Microsoft SharePoint site. Files shared in a channel live in SharePoint; files shared in a 1-on-1 chat live in the sender's OneDrive.

• Permissions: Access is controlled by Microsoft 365 Groups. When you add an advisor to a Team, they automatically get access to the SharePoint files, the group calendar, and any associated Planner boards.

• Technical Note: While the interface is now unified, the storage remains separate (OneDrive for private, SharePoint for Teams).

AI Search & Agent Comparison (2026)

With the rise of "agentic" AI, these tools now do more than just search; they can perform tasks.

• Microsoft Copilot (M365)

  • Best For: Internal ecosystem tasks.

  • Key Strength: Because it sits inside the Microsoft Graph, it can "read" your unified chat/channel history to summarize board meetings or find a specific spreadsheet from last year's fundraiser.

• Google Gemini (Workplace)

  • Best For: Creative planning and large data analysis.

  • Key Strength: Features a massive context window, perfect for teachers who need to upload an entire semester's worth of PDFs and ask for a unified lesson plan or grading rubric.

• Perplexity AI

  • Good For: External research and grant verification.

  • Key Strength: It remains the gold standard for "Answer Engine" search, providing real-time web citations for verifying facts or finding new non-profit grant opportunities.