Microsoft Teams - How to Create and Manage Your Teams

Step by step on how to create your Microsoft Teams and tips to start using it today

Since all of us got trapped in our houses to comply with the new social distancing rules and work from home recommendations, Microsoft Teams usage exploded all over the world. One of the reasons is because its use is intuitive and pretty straightforward.

Edith Byrne, one of our Technical Experts in Teams and Microsoft instructors, has been teaching Microsoft Teams since its launch and in this article, we gathered a couple of tips and simple steps from her last Microsoft Teams beginner’s session.

What is Microsoft Teams?

Microsoft Teams is basically a hub for teamwork integrating tools and capabilities to help workers in their daily routine. It’s the primary client for Intelligent Communications in Office 365, replacing Skype for Business Online over time. According to Edith, file collaboration is one of the major things which can help people to collaborate and work together using Teams.

How to Create Your First Teams

Before starting to use is recommended to think about the structure that you wish to have in your Teams. The most logical one for small and medium-sized companies is to think as your departments and areas. So, you can follow the same pattern, for example, human resources, finance, accounts, marketing, sales, etc. You can create one Team for each.

The company can break the sessions as they wish and create their own structure:

Teams (e.g. leadership team)
Channels (channels which belong to that team)

Channels should be used as topics, so you create and organise them by categories. Once the team is created, a general channel is automatically generated, and it will list all the activities in that Team.

In the example below the HR Leadership team has 4 channels, which were decided and created by the owner.

As mentioned above General channel is automatically created, once you create a new team. This option shows you all the changes and activities in that team.

How to Create a Team

Let’s check now the step-by-step on how to create a Team when you are new into the Microsoft Teams.

At the bottom left of your Team app, you click on Join or Create a Team.

Two options will pop up, click on Create a Team.

Then you need to choose if you want to create a team from scratch or create from an existing one. For first time users, we recommend keeping it simple and select create from scratch.

In the next step, you will decide if your Team is public or private. For this example, we will stick with the private option, which is probably the one that you will use the most.

Adding People In

Next, you will add people in.

Edith Byrne, our Microsoft Teams expert, reveals an important tip here. “From this point, people who you have added will be able to access everything. To avoid that, you have the option to SKIP it and add people later, after deciding their rights.”

Your Team is now created. As you can see below, from this point you can add more people, create more channels, and open the FAQ’s.

How to Manage Your Team

Using the left lateral menu, you can access the general tab and click on Manage team.

Once you have clicked on Manage Team, you will see the options as the image below:

Here you can access requests to join your team and approve them. It’s also where you create your channels and manage your Team settings.

How to Manage Your Settings

Edith recommends leaving the two last options ON in the Member Permissions, the rest of them you better leave ticked off. She also suggests setting up the settings before adding any member, so you play it safe and avoid problems.

The option Guest permissions must be done by your IT admin professional. Team owners can’t add permissions from here.

At the option “Team code” you can create a code to share with people you would like to invite to your Team, so they can join directly, and you won’t get join requests.

The option “Fun Stuff” is where you can control and decide if you allow people to access GIF’s, stickers and memes, for example. Here you should think about the communication style that the company wants to adopt.

After that, you can come back to the Members tab and add your members, clicking on Add member, as below:

Once you have clicked on Add Member, a new pop up window will open and then you type the person’s email address and hit ADD.

Once the user was added, you click at the option Member to define if this person is a member or owner.

Owners can delete Teams, add people to the channel, delete users, etc. So, think carefully about the role which one will perform in your Team channel. It’s possible to have more than 1 owner, our instructor Edith recommends a maximum of two people with ownership rights.

The Analytics tab shows you the performance and how people are using Microsoft Teams.

In the next tab, you can select the Apps that people will be able to access. When you click, it will show a default list. You can click on More Apps to find out more options.

Microsoft Teams contain a lot of more options than the ones listed above. We covered the basic steps to create your first Team and starting to use the app now to communicate in a better way with your colleagues and co-workers. Click below to access a previous article that we published covering more about Teams.

Microsoft Teams – Meetings, chats, shifts, and guest access explained

Microsoft Teams Courses at New Horizons Ireland

At New Horizons Ireland, one of the leaders on delivering Microsoft courses we offer a wide range of courses. From all levels of IT professionals to end-users. Check it out with one of our Account Managers and choose the best option for your needs.

Microsoft Teams Courses