Microsoft Teams
More is possible with Microsoft Teams. Simplify collaboration with Microsoft Teams to level up your work, connect with others for greater impact, and scale your business to achieve more.
Enable flexible, hybrid work with online meetings
Video conferencing; Make teamwork feel more personal by communicating face-to-face in online meetings.
Virtual events; Hold secure web conferences and webinars for up to 1,000 attendees and broadcasts for up to 10,000.1
Audio conferencing; Join meetings with a mobile device, a dial-in number, or an online meeting app such as Teams.
Virtual meeting devices; Get more features from devices, such as a speakerphone or room system designed specifically for video meetings.
Stay in the flow of work with virtual meeting features
Start meetings quickly; Get started on time with one-touch join across many mobile devices, and start sharing content with web conference attendees everywhere easily.
Make it personal; Turn on video to engage on a deeper level, even if you blur your background for more privacy. When it’s time to present, use PowerPoint Live in Teams for an immersive remote presentation.
Edit workbooks together; Excel Live transforms real-time collaboration during Teams meetings.
Record your virtual meetings; Capture audio, video, and content by recording team meetings to share with those who couldn’t attend and for future reference.
Set the cadence; Schedule another meeting or establish a series of team meetings more easily with an online meeting app.
Why are virtual meetings useful?
Virtual meetings are more important than ever before as many companies switch to hybrid work models. In a hybrid work model, employees work some days in person at their office and some days at home or from another remote location, such as a coworking space.
Benefits of online meetings include:
- The ability to join team meetings from nearly anywhere.
- Whether you’re at home, in the office, or out and about, virtual meetings help ensure that you never miss an important meeting, even if you can’t be physically present.
Stronger coworker relationships. - When you’re a hybrid or fully remote employee, the face time and relationship building that evolves naturally in the office can be harder to come by. But video meetings allow you to see and interact with coworkers face to face, which leads to more natural conversation, collaboration, and trust.
Different ways to engage. - Thorough virtual meeting software combines typical online meeting features, like audio and video, with additional features, like a running chat log, a hand-raising feature, and different virtual reactions to cheer on presenting coworkers.
Key features of virtual meeting platforms
A strong virtual meeting platform is designed to factor in all the ways that employees communicate and collaborate with one another.
Here are some key features to look for when choosing an online meeting platform:
Mobile and desktop apps; Most online meeting platforms will have an app for your computer, but the addition of an app for mobile devices broadens your ability to stay connected, even when you’re not at your desk.
Screen sharing; Sharing your screen with meeting participants is often the easiest and fastest way to show everyone exactly what you’re discussing and to maximize productivity.
Chat; A running chat panel is a powerful tool for a virtual meeting. Add thoughts and comments without interrupting the speaker as well as share relevant links, files, photos, and GIFs. Ideally, the platform will keep a record of the chat for future reference and continued communication with meeting participants.
A hand-raising feature; Anyone who’s attended a virtual meeting knows that it can be more difficult to gauge when someone is done speaking than in an in-person meeting. With a hand-raising feature, you’ll be able to indicate to others that you have something you’d like to say without cutting off the speaker or trying to find the right break in the conversation flow.
The ability to record.
Recording team meetings is important because it gives those who may be out sick or on vacation a straightforward way to catch up on what they missed. Recorded meetings are also useful for when you need to refresh your memory about the specifics covered.
Creative ways to interact; Sometimes presenting to a large group virtually can be daunting without the body language you’d pick up on in an in-person meeting. For example, you might not notice that someone is nodding their head in agreement, even if they’re on video, and wonder how people are receiving what you’re saying. That’s when it’s great to have built-in engagement features, so your coworkers can send a quick thumbs-up or hand-clapping emoji that will appear unobtrusively on your screen as you continue to present.
Virtual backgrounds; Although they’re often used for fun, having some options for virtual or blurred backgrounds gives employees working remotely more privacy.
