There are so many features and cool ways to use Microsoft Teams, that it is tempting to make Teams into a complete digital workplace. But that is a mistake. Teams is not an intranet. Don’t try to make it do too much. As many organizations are finding, overloading Teams reduces its efficiency and increases employee frustration. Here’s why, and here’s what to do instead.
Teams is excellent for collaboration…
Teams offers game-changing tools: chat, video, important integrations with useful Microsoft tools such as Planner and Microsoft Lists. However, where Microsoft Teams really shines is 1:1 and small group collaboration.
The reason is simple: Real-time and asynchronous collaboration are frictionless. When you collaborate in a chat or a channel, your files are right there and easy to share. You know that the version you are working on is the same version your colleague is working on. Teams and channels are easy to set up with templates, and IT admins can easily manage governance with a tool like Powell Teams.
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…but Teams is weak on communication.
Wait, what? Doesn’t collaboration require communication?
Yes, but we like to draw a bright line between collaboration on Teams and the type of communication best served by an intranet. We like to say that “Microsoft Teams is for collaboration and your intranet is for communication.”
In other words, intranets are designed for communicating the type of information that needs to be broadcast widely to the entire organization or targeted groups within the organization, whereas Teams is where employees work on that information before sharing widely.
For example, a working group within Human Resources may collaborate on a new policy document in Microsoft Teams. However, when it is time for every employee to have access to that document, it belongs in an intranet.
An intranet is purpose-built for communication.
A good intranet has a few key advantages over Teams for communicating with your entire organization:
- Information can be organized so that users can find what they need with minimum effort.
- News can be displayed and shared in visually appealing ways.
- User-generated content is easy to collect and share organization-wide.
- Search can be much more powerful with advanced features.
Powell teams can bring the most important elements of your intranet into Teams for easy access for all employees.
The power of an intranet…but in Teams
So, don’t force Microsoft Teams to be an intranet. Build an intranet instead. Or if you don’t have the time or budget to build out a dedicated intranet (and many organizations don’t), you have another option: Powell Together.
Powell Together allows you to provide your people with the best of an intranet for ½ the cost and 1/3 of the setup time. It is a complete portal that IT admins can quickly and easily deploy to provide a centralized location for the news and information your employees need to do their jobs—without having to design and create a separate intranet.
A typical Powell Together implementation comes with:
- A home page for news, quicklinks, and targeted information that is the exact same experience as the front page of an intranet, but lives in Teams.
- Department/Lines of Business template for additional pages
- People Directory to easily find colleagues
- FlexDesk template for reserving desks, offices, or conference rooms (hoteling or hot desking)
- Gamification center
- Powell Teams templates and administration center
Perfect for growing businesses
Powell Together is accessible on mobile, tablets, and desktop.
We recommend Powell Together because it fits the needs of so many organizations that are trying to do too much with Microsoft Teams. It’s a simpler, more effective way to:
- Build company culture with branded experiences.
- Align and empower employees with the information they need.
- Prove low time-to-value without busting budgets.
- Provide a baseline intranet experience on which companies can iterate.
Powell Together, with and inside Teams, creates the optimal communication experience that empowers your workforce to be highly productive–wherever they are.
The service plan you need for the capacity you have
Whether you have a full-fledged IT department or an existing intranet, Powell Together is relatively quick to design and deploy. To help you get started, StitchDX offers three levels of support to meet your needs:
- Foundation: A “starter” kit for getting up and running quickly with ½ day of discovery, basic configuration, and 8 hours of support and training.
- Intranet-in-a-box: Our most popular option includes a full day of discovery, professional configuration, and up to 10 hours of support and training.
- Hub Builder: The most complete package features 2 days of discovery, a more comprehensive and extensive configuration with additional features, content deployment, and up to 15 hours of support and training.
Small and medium-sized businesses across a variety of industries are using Powell Together inside of Microsoft Teams to provide value quickly. Using Powell Together allows them to use Microsoft Teams for what it’s designed for: getting work done.
Find out more (do it for your people).
If you want to explore Powell Together, compare its features against your current intranet, or just want to #UseTeamsBetter, please reach out or go ahead and click that orange chat button bottom right of this page.