Following the recent outbreak of Covid-19, schools and corporate businesses alike are being forced to close their doors - many of which will be preparing to work remotely. During these uncertain times, Altinet have been working to assist in every way we can.  

The advances in Office 365 security, and even the migration to the cloud, has been directly affected by recent circumstances, with IT leaders being at the forefront of not only security needs, but also accessibility and productivity.   

Some of the challenges we've noticed customers facing at this time have involved an immediate roll out of Microsoft Teams, in addition to a suitable security solution for this to ensure the deployment be as effective as possible. With no prior experience in such a dramatic roll out and no security measures in place, we advised them on key elements to focus on during implementation, aiming to make it the most effective and easy approach.  

 

Deployment

Prior to the full deployment, the organisation needs the required licensing to use Microsoft Teams.

When deploying Microsoft Teams, it will be initially managed from Office 365 Admin Center where the administrator will ensure all required users for integration into Microsoft Teams are populated and create any initial Teams. For example, an org-wide Team can be created that all users can access, or multiple public or private Teams can be created during the initial deployment and throughout.

When the initial configuration is complete, an administrator needs to deploy the client application to their users. There are multiple methods to roll out the application, including deployment to all users as an MSI package, or users downloading it themselves using their Office 365 account.

The most common use for Microsoft Teams is to add Channels under the different Teams:

Similar to the Teams, Channels can be both public or private to certain members. Members can then use the chat function in the Channel and also share files (all files will then be stored in a SharePoint site for that Team). Another big benefit of Teams / Channels is the ability to use multiple different apps. You can view PowerPoint & Word documents, as well as sharing OneNote files.

 

Azure Active Directory

During the process, Altinet found the deployment of Teams was made simpler using the Azure active directory alongside the app:  

The Microsoft application supports teams, for example by faculty using dynamic membership. This allows team members to be determined by rules based on user’s characteristics in the Azure Active Directory. Depending on these aspects users are automatically placed in the relevant teams over time as categorisation changes, with virtually no IT administration needed.  

These features are only available on a premium P1 license, however and with a tenant admin account team membership can be allocated based on any users Azure AD properties.  

 

Key Elements of Teams  

Once these teams are created, each has channels which are subsections within the team. Initially, a 'general' channel will be created, and additional ones can be created from here. For example, for schools, teams may be created based on subject area for staff, such as 'English', within which there may be a channel for 'Speech and Language'. These can of course be set up entirely upon the type of organisation in question. 

Microsoft Teams - Create and Manage Tabs | The Marks Group | Small ...

There are three key tabs within a channel typically, these include conversation, files and notes. These can be changed to your preferences and more channels can be added, for example, meetings, which syncs with your outlook calendar.  

 

Conversations

02 Microsoft Teams Conversations - YouTube

The first, and maybe most common aspect of teams Is the conversations channel. This allows for group or Individual conversations, as well as file sharing and voice and video calling. Users can also @mention initials within the chats to draw attention to relevant conversational topics, and the individuals in question will be notified.  

 

Files 

Share a file in Teams - Office Support

The files channel allows users to access and share files in one space, instead of having to leave the application. Teams also has a feature which enables team members to create chat for specific files, for example to discuss any amendments, movements or deletions.  

 

Notes

Each team has their own OneNote which is a shared space for note taking, which can be easily accessed in the team’s app and similar to files, requires no need to leave the app. However, should this be something you wish to do, it's also possible to open the OneNote application separately and the relevant information will sync.  

 

For information on how you can better secure your Office 365 environment, including business data stored in applications like Teams, take a look at our guidance article 'Complete Office 365 Protection in 5 Layers'.