What is a Team and a Channel?

A team is a group of people gathered to get something big done in your organization.
Sometimes it’s your whole organization.

Teams are made up of channels, which are the conversations you have with your teammates.
Each channel is dedicated to a specific topic, department, or project.

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How to create a Team

To create a Team select the Teams icon in the left-side menu.

If you’re an administrator, to create or find a team within Microsoft Teams, click the link at the bottom of the window which says Join or create a team.
Options to Create a team will appear.

Choose Build a team from scratch.
You can then choose if you want to make it private, and have people ask permission to join, public, so anyone can join, or organization-wide, so everyone can join.

Next, you can name the team, and select create.
You’re then free to add people, groups, and entire contact groups by typing out their names, selecting Add and then Close.

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How to create a channel

Once you create a team, you’ll get a General channel. (This is a great place for announcements and posting information for everyone to see).
You can create more channels for other purposes if need be.

You can do this by clicking on the … More options next to the team > Add channel and enter in a name and description.
You’ll also want to select Automatically show this channel in everyone’s channel list if you desire to have everyone see the channel. Click Add.

It’s also worth noting that while only Admins can create new teams, users can also create their private channels from within an existing team.
This setting is turned on by default unless otherwise configured by an Admin from within the Microsoft Teams admin center.

Configuration and use of Teams and Channels

Private channels in Microsoft Teams

Only the users on the team who are owners or members of the private channel can access the channel.
Anyone, including guests, can be added as a member of a private channel as long as they are already members of the team.

You might want to use a private channel if you want to limit collaboration to those who have a need to know,
or if you want to facilitate communication between a group of people assigned to a specific project, without having to create an additional team to manage.

For example, a private channel is useful in these scenarios:

• A group of people in a team want a focused space to collaborate without having to create a separate team.

• A subset of people in a team want a private channel to discuss sensitive information, such as;
  budgets,
  resourcing,
  strategic positioning and so on.

A lock icon indicates a private channel.
Only members of private channels can see and participate in private channels that they are added to.

Manage private channel membership and settings

Each private channel has its own settings,
including the ability to add and remove members, add tabs, and @mentioning for the entire channel.

These settings are independent of the parent-team settings. When a private channel is created, it inherits settings from the parent team,
after which its settings can be changed independently of the parent team settings.

The private channel owner can click Manage channel, and then use the Members and Settings tabs to add or remove members and edit settings.

How to set a Team photo

Click on the three dots next to the Team name. Choose Manage Team
Click on Settings in the top bar menu → Team picture.

How to add an app to a channel

Go to the channel, group chat, or a one-on-one conversation of your choosing, click Add a tab.

From there, select the app you want. In some cases, you might go on to add a specific file to the tab.

How to pin

Go to a channel name and select More options > Pin.
This ensures that the channel stays at the top of your list. If you change your mind, just select it again and unpin it.

You can also position the Teams and/or channels you use the most by Drag and drop for easier access to the teams you most frequently use.

Hide a team or channel

If you don't want a team or channel to show in your teams list, hide it.
Go to a team or channel name and select More options > Hide.

You can also show channels from the hidden channels menu beneath the channels list of a team.
Select More options → Show.

Posts in Channel

A message sent in a channel is called a post and is open for all members of the channel to view.
Use the reply button to respond to a post. That way all replies relevant to the post will be under that specific post, in correct order.

How to save a message for later

To save a message or post, hover your pointer above the message until the three dots appear. Select Save message.

• To see a list of your saved messages, select your profile picture at the top of the app, then choose Saved.

• Or type /saved in the command box at the top of the screen.

How to attach hyperlinks in posts

Click on ‘Format’ and then choose the ‘Insert link’ as shown below.

How to mark a post as important

Click on ‘Format’ and then click on the exclamation mark as shown below.

How to send files

Click Attach under the chat-box.

Select from these options:

• Recent

• Browse Teams and Channels

• Upload from my computer

If you're uploading a file from your computer, select a file, click Open, and then Send.

Deleting posts

To delete an individual message, hover over the message and click on the three dots to the right. 
You can then choose Delete message from the dropdown menu.

The message will be deleted immediately, and you will be notified at the top of your Chat window.
You will also have an option to undo.

Once a message has been deleted, users will see a Message has been deleted note in place of the original message.

How to edit a message

Place your pointer onto the message you want to delete. Click on the three dots indicating further menu options.
In the pop-up menu that appears; Select Edit message.

NOTE: Once a message is edited, all users within that chat will see that the message has been edited.

Email in a channel

Send an email to a channel

Go to the channel name and click More options (the three dots) → Get email address.
Copy the email address into the address bar in the email you wish to send and then press send.

NOTE: This feature may need to be turned on by your IT admin.

View the original email

Sometimes, emails that get sent to a channel are too large to view in the conversation.
To see an email in its original format, click View original email under the email in the conversation.

Reply to an email in a channel

When you reply to an email message that has been sent to a channel, it's treated like a reply to any other post in a channel.
Replying to the post in Teams does not send an email reply to the original sender.
Any comments or conversations you have about the email in a channel aren't visible outside of Teams.

Try to limit the use of e-mail for internal communication.
Post and sharing files directly in a channel might be a better way to co-work and interact with each other.

Files and folders

Open the channel and choose Files from the top bar menu.

• To create new folder, click on +New.

• To upload a file, click on upload.

• Change the placement of a file by marking it > three dots > move.

• Rename a file or folder by clicking on the three dots > rename.

• Pin the file or folder by clicking on the three dots next to the name and then choose Pin in the pop-up menu.

• You can work on the file while in the Teams app or online version.
  Click on the file to open. When connected to internet the changes performed will be auto-saved.

• Download a file by marking the file > the three dots > download.

NOTE:
When online, files are auto-saved.
Multiple people can work on the same document at the same time.

In the menu on the left side you can easily access all files.