Microsoft 365 Teams Overview


This article encompasses several service areas that are governed by specific guidelines or policies that you should be familiarized with before setting up your Microsoft Teams environment, which include:

Overview

Microsoft Teams is a chat-based workspace in Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365) that creates an open, digital environment to make work visible, integrated, and accessible. Teams combines chat, meetings, notes, attachments, email integration, and other types of collaboration tools all in one place. Teams has an application for multiple platforms, including Teams online, Teams desktop applications (Windows and Mac), and a mobile device. You can download your mobile app from one of these app stores. All versions require an active internet connection and offline mode is not supported. There are four types of teams to choose from: classes, professional learning communities (PLC), staff members, or anyone (e.g., students). Teams can be either private (join by invitation only) or public (joinable and discoverable by anyone at the University of Chicago.) As Teams is a fully transparent collaboration space, members will have complete visibility to all resources (chats, files, other apps) within your team. However, Teams may be used to private chat with any other Teams user within the main University of Chicago environment—at this time, this does not include the UC Medical Center, Booth, or the Lab School.

An interactive demo of Teams by Microsoft is available.

Limitations

There are some known global issues published by Microsoft. Please make yourself aware of them to avoid pitfalls in your implementation. Below is a list of limitations that are related specifically to the UChicago implementation.

Getting Started

Access and Install the Microsoft Teams Client

The Microsoft Teams client is available in two forms, a web app or a full desktop client. The web app is accessible at portal.office.com. Once you sign in with your UChicago email address and password, select Next. On the next page, select Work or school account created by your IT Department, then enter your CNetID and password. Complete two-factor authentication if prompted. Once logged in to the Microsoft 365 portal, click the Teams icon that appears to launch the Teams web app.

Tip: You can also access the Teams web app directly at teams.microsoft.com. If you desire to use to full desktop Teams client, from the Teams web app you should see a button in the upper right corner inviting you to download and install the client. If the button does not appear, it may be that the client is already installed on your computer.

UChicago Team Names

When choosing a name for your team, be aware that names cannot be reused at this time. The more specific your team name, the easier it will be to search for it in the future. We suggest using your department as the initial part of the naming structure. For example, use the name Library-HR, instead of HR alone. Note, you cannot have custom URLs, and the name chosen for your team will be the name used for the various artifacts associated with the Team (Planner, Group Mailbox, Group Calendar, SharePoint site, etc.) Also, be advised that the shared email address that is associated with the team will be formatted as name@teams.uchicago.edu. At this time, only a team display name can be changed, not the original name created for the team or the Outlook group mailbox.

Create a Team

Step-by-step instructions on how to create a team, join a team, and add guests are available on the Microsoft website. UChicago LinkedIn Learning also offers an array of videos to assist in further learning. More information on guest access is available on the Microsoft website.

Note: After you create your team, but before you add members, you are encouraged to modify your team permissions, bots, and additional functionality by checking the Settings of the Team.

Chat

Teams is built on a continuous chat functionality, meaning you can join and exit the chat as you want and the conversation remains stored there. Team conversations are visible to the entire team. Team members can set up channels, which allow members to communicate about specific topics or projects without the use of email or group text. Members can reply to posts with images, GIFs, and custom-made memes. Channels are limited to the members of the team only. Finally, you can also initiate private messages with one or more members of the team using the Chat app in the left navigation.

File Sharing

Files uploaded to Teams can be viewed and edited in the Teams app or can be accessed via the OneDrive sync client, or directly in SharePoint. The document will refresh as members edit to keep the most recent version available, and you can pin a file as a tab to the toolbar for easy access. Team members have the ability to comment on a file and their comment(s) will stay attached to that file. A view of all your accessible files, including your personal and team files, is located in the Files tab on the left navigation pane. By default, only files located in the tab of a specific channel are visible to all team members.

OneNote (Assignments and Notebooks)

The type of team you create (classes, professional learning communities (PLC), staff members, or anyone) determines the type of OneNote notebook available to the team. Notebooks provide many ways to take notes: typing, writing, drawing, sketching, speaking, copying, and so on. Along with basic typing, you can also hand-write notes on a touch-capable device. OneNote offers the ability to convert handwritten notes to text.  Have a look at the OneNote quick start for more information.

Cloud Storage

Meetings

Owner Account Closure

If an owner will be leaving a team, it is recommended to identify a new team owner before departure. The team may have more than one owner. However, a team will remain even if there is no owner.

The University conducts yearly audits to determine the inactivity of the team and to identify teams without owners. Team owners will be contacted. If no response is received, then team members will be notified. If after two weeks of no response from either the team owners or its members, then the account will be closed. Teams are also subject to closure if they violate the Acceptable Use Policy (AUP).

Help

For additional assistance, please submit a request to the IT Services.