What is Microsoft Teams? Why Does it Matter to Enterprise Video?
Office 365 is one of the most popular tools used by enterprises around the world, combining the familiarity of applications of Microsoft Word and Excel with the extended capabilities of Microsoft Stream and Microsoft Teams.
Microsoft Teams is already making its mark on the enterprise world, with over 20 million daily users as of July 2019. There are many reasons for the continued growth of Microsoft Teams, but streaming video is certainly among them. In this blog post, we are going to give a brief overview of Microsoft Teams for Office 365, explain how it differs from Microsoft Stream, and explore how your organization can leverage live video with Microsoft Teams.
What is Microsoft Teams?
Microsoft describes Teams as “the hub for teamwork in Office 365.” Microsoft Teams is a comprehensive tool for teams, enabling collaboration and communication over a variety of channels. Some of the features include chat, video, and file sharing. And in each case, these conversations can include the entire team, or be reserved to more private messages between team members.
Teams also includes the ability to add other Microsoft applications or third-party services, like Envoy, Salesforce, or Constant Contact, so that organizations can customize their Teams experience.
What is the difference between Microsoft Stream and Microsoft Teams?
Microsoft Stream and Microsoft Teams, at their core, are both communication tools. However, Microsoft Stream is more of a video hub, where Microsoft Teams is more focused on connection and collaboration.
Microsoft Stream is entirely focused on allowing organizations to share video internally. It is an intelligent platform for uploading, hosting, and sharing internal video, enabling employees to explore video on demand with the additional capabilities of Live Events.
As a more comprehensive communications tool, Microsoft Teams goes beyond hosting video, with its chat and file collaboration features. It also goes beyond organizations.
Whereas Microsoft Stream was designed for sharing video internally, Microsoft Teams gives users the option to share live video outside of their organizations (assuming they have been given sufficient permission from their IT team.) This is helpful for enterprises giving presentations or hosting important meetings with external individuals, including to clients, partners, or shareholders. It also gives your enterprise the ability to make public announcements on a live video stream, for your organization’s biggest news.
How can I leverage live video with Microsoft Teams?
One of the most exciting aspects of Microsoft Teams is its live video feature. Microsoft Teams allows users to share live video both within, and outside of their organization. The ability to broadcast and record presentations for internal and external audiences helps to lower some of the barriers associated with web conferencing.
Depending on your setup, participants won’t necessarily need to sign in to view the live stream. Microsoft Teams also provides the option for additional features to your presentation, such as a Q&A session at the end, or captions throughout the presentation.
With the familiarity of the Microsoft ecosystem, setting up live video streams within Microsoft Teams is designed to be easy. And with a video encoder that has been certified with Microsoft products, like Haivision’s Makito or KB series, your enterprise will soon be able to share high quality live video both inside and outside your organization, for optimal collaboration.
Would you like to learn more about getting started with live video streaming for your organization? Read our blog post, “3 Questions Your IT Department Must Answer Before a Live Stream.”
