{"id":28257,"date":"2023-11-10T09:40:00","date_gmt":"2023-11-10T14:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/centricconsulting.com\/?p=28257"},"modified":"2023-11-10T14:23:59","modified_gmt":"2023-11-10T19:23:59","slug":"microsoft-teams-how-to-decide-the-best-way-to-communicate-using-chat-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/centricconsulting.com\/blog\/microsoft-teams-how-to-decide-the-best-way-to-communicate-using-chat-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Microsoft Teams: How to Decide the Best Way to Communicate Using Chat"},"content":{"rendered":"
Have you ever wondered which Chat option to use to communicate most effectively with a colleague on Microsoft Teams<\/a>? Should you send your message through a Teams Channel or via Private Chat? If you choose a Channel, should you call out the entire Team or only those following that Channel? Perhaps you shouldn\u2019t call out anyone and hope people are paying attention.<\/p>\n In this blog post, we\u2019ll walk through some etiquette for the most effective ways to communicate when using Microsoft Teams\u2019 Chat functionality.<\/strong><\/p>\n For starters, I\u2019ll help you determine who your audience is, identify your communication\u2019s level of urgency, and then choose your communication option \u2014 email, a specific Team audience, a specific Channel audience within a Team, group chat, or private message to an individual.<\/p>\n After that, I\u2019ll explore and help you understand additional tools \u2013 including the Chat @mention<\/strong> feature, announcements, and important notifications \u2013 to help you capture your intended audience\u2019s attention without causing unneeded alarm or notifying more people than necessary.<\/p>\n First, let\u2019s clarify how Teams Channels<\/a> and Chats differ. The most obvious contrast where Microsoft Teams group Chats vs. Channels<\/a> are concerned is the naming convention. Channels have a specific name that typically becomes a sub-topic apart from a Team name. While a Chat shows the names of members added to that Chat, this is the default experience when you first create a group Chat. You can, instead, give the Chat a title, which, actually, is preferable.<\/strong><\/p>\n Although Channel messages allow Planner tabs, and group Chat doesn\u2019t, both Chat and Channel messages essentially have the same functionality and collaborative capability. Teams stores shared files for Channel messages within a central location, while files shared within group Chats usually are stored in participants\u2019 OneDrive accounts.<\/p>\n Why so much busyness within Channels? Because of what Teams Channels are: gathering places where Team members focus on a specific area<\/a> within the larger Team \u2013 e.g., design, marketing or a budget \u2013 and engage in the aforementioned activities to achieve particular objectives. Channels are either standard, where all Team members can visit it, or private, where only invited people can view and access.<\/p>\n For people wondering about whether or not you can convert a Channel into a Chat or how to create a group Chat within the Teams Channel<\/a>, there is no such feature within Teams at present.<\/p>\n Before we dive into the different communication options in Teams, let\u2019s determine who your audience is and then discuss how to recognize when it\u2019s appropriate to reach out to one person based on their status.<\/p>\n Here are a couple of questions to ask yourself when thinking about your audience:<\/p>\n The needs of Teams members will determine if a Channel or a Chat is the right choice. Generally speaking, though, a Channel is meant to accommodate a more expansive set<\/a> of tasks, including communicating with larger Teams; collaborating on longer-form documents that require multiple replies; uploading and updating files when working together on documents or presentations; beginning projects to which specific Team members need access; and granting access to history and files, when necessary, to members outside of a group Chat.<\/p>\n If you decide a private message is the right way to send your communication, please make sure you check your recipient\u2019s status before you send it.<\/p>\n Chat uses status indicators to easily allow you to know whether or not a person is available merely by seeing the color that is associated with their profile. Here\u2019s a simple breakdown of what the different Teams status indicators mean:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Depending upon your company\u2019s culture, if the status of your intended recipient(s) is set to red or purple, you might want to shoot them an email instead of a private Teams message or schedule a Teams message to be sent when they are not busy.<\/p>\n In general, avoid using email for \u201cinternal\u201d conversations involving members of your department or Team where the Team includes everyone who needs to be in your conversation about the project or initiative you share.<\/strong> Making Teams the typical mode of communication in these instances can keep everybody\u2019s email inbox from overflowing.<\/p>\n Chat is the way to go for one-on-one talks or discussions with a particular person or group of people, where only those people can see the messages. It\u2019s especially good for off-the-cuff conversations in the office, where you can save the chat message in a thread that you can review if needed.<\/p>\n How urgent is communication, and do you need a response?<\/span><\/p>\n Carefully consider how fast you need to communicate information and whether you need a response quickly or not. Questions to ask yourself before continuing include:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Once you decide which members of your Team you need to notify, you can determine which communications option to use within Teams \u2013 whether your audience is internal or external and whether or not you need an immediate response.<\/p>\n However, the most important thing to remember is that notifications within Teams can overwhelm Team members very quickly. To be respectful of your fellow Team members\u2019 time and attention \u2014 and to make sure they listen and respond to you when necessary \u2014 try to keep notifications to a minimum and only alert people who are actually within your intended audience whenever feasible.<\/p>\n Microsoft Teams offers several options for group communications and notifications, including @team<\/strong>, @channel<\/strong>, and @everyone<\/strong>. This functionality is great because it allows users to notify an entire Team or narrow the audience down to a specific Channel. Just type \u201c@team<\/strong>\u201d or \u201c@channel<\/strong>\u201d from the desired Team in which you are communicating, and Chat notifies the audience without having to type the specific Team or Channel\u2019s actual name. The @everyone<\/strong> will alert everyone in a group Chat.<\/p>\n @team sends a notification to everyone who is part of your designated Team. A notification appears in the left navigation menu on the Activity icon, the name of the Team within the Teams pane becomes bold, and the channel name is bold with an icon of multiple people:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/a><\/p>\n As before, the Channel bolds its name but instead of the people icon, a list icon is used.<\/p>\n Think of this as a small fountain firework. Only those who are close by will experience the show. The notifications are similar to @team<\/strong>, but with @channel<\/strong>, only those who are following the Channel receive notifications. The conversation also will have this Channel icon on the right border.<\/p>\n Each Microsoft Team can include multiple Channels for different topics.<\/strong> But, because not all Team members need to see all topics, members can choose to \u201cshow\u201d or \u201chide\u201d a Channel by clicking the ellipses opposite the channel name:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Both @team and @channel are great options for communicating urgent or important messages to a large audience easily.<\/p>\n But don\u2019t forget: In some cases, it may be best to communicate by email or by sending a private message directly to a single person or small group.<\/strong> You don\u2019t want to overuse group communications, both to avoid bothering people unnecessarily and to make sure when you do have something urgent to communicate, your message gets noticed.<\/p>\n Also remember, if the message is significant, you can mark it as important or urgent within the team or channel.<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Now that you know how to determine who your audience is, how urgent your message is, and the best communication option to use, we\u2019ll explore:<\/p>\n Within @team<\/strong> and @channel<\/strong>, you can send a message to individual Team members using @mention<\/strong>, where \u201cmention\u201d is the person\u2019s name. Once you start a message and start typing the first name immediately after typing \u201c@<\/strong>,\u201d a drop-down will appear to help you select your intended recipient:<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n The notification the recipient gets once you send your message will look like the Team and Channel notifications, except only the specified user receives a notification.<\/p>\n Users can find these notifications by clicking the activity bell on the sidebar of Teams, which displays the name of the Team and the name of the Channel:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Clicking on a notification takes the user directly to the place in the conversation you \u201c@mentioned<\/strong>\u201d them. To continue the fireworks analogy I used earlier, this type of notification is more like a sparkler. People won\u2019t notice it unless they are right beside you.<\/p>\n Please note: This is the same type of notification you receive when you use the direct Chat or a group Chat.<\/strong><\/p>\n Whether it involves a Channel conversation or a Chat, there are different steps you can take to get the attention of an entire group.<\/p>\n @channel<\/strong> are great ways to communicate with employees who need to hear what you have to say, but keep a few additional things in mind:<\/p>\n Finally, sometimes your message may be so urgent you need to get people\u2019s attention quickly. Creating an announcement or using the \u201cMark as important\u201d feature are great ways to do this \u2014 but only when it\u2019s essential.<\/p>\n To create an Announcement, click on the \u201cStart a post\u201d icon, then click on the icon beside Post:<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Now you can choose Announcement. This will change the post by adding a headline section at the top. Use this to grab your audience\u2019s attention. You can even change the background color if you desire.<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n To use \u201cMark as important,\u201d click on the exclamation mark icon in the toolbar.<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n To be clear, this option is available within any form of chat communication inside Teams. You can also use it inside of a Private Chat.<\/p>\n (You can also employ a keyboard shortcut<\/a>, if you like, in lieu of selecting \u201cMark as important.\u201d)<\/p>\n Creating an announcement or using \u201cMark as important\u201d is like using a huge firework, which may startle people as well as get their attention. Sometimes that\u2019s appropriate, but often it\u2019s not. Use these features sparingly and only for communications that are truly important, urgent, or beneficial to a large portion of your audience. That way, you will avoid unduly alarming people, and make sure they do pay attention when you use these tools.<\/strong><\/p>\n If your peers tend to respond quicker to email, and the urgency of the communication is high, send an email rather than using Chat within Teams. If the opposite is true, and your peers respond to Teams Chat faster than email, then use the built-in features of Microsoft Teams to your advantage.<\/p>\n Only you can determine your audience and how best to communicate with them. When sending your communication, try not to set off a large firework when a sparkler will do.<\/p>\n Hopefully, this post provides you with a better understanding of notifications and Chat etiquette to help your Microsoft Teams<\/a> communications become more effective. Remember, the more respectful you are with other people\u2019s time and attention on Teams, the louder your voice will be whenever you communicate.<\/p>\n \n Channels vs. Chats: What\u2019s the Difference<\/h2>\n
Who is your audience, and when is it appropriate to message them?<\/h3>\n
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What do the different status colors next to a person\u2019s image or initials mean?<\/h3>\n
Email vs. Chat<\/h2>\n
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What communcation options do I have?<\/h3>\n
For when you have an urgent of Your Message<\/h3>\n
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Using @mention to call out individuals within Teams or Channels<\/h3>\n
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Taking it to the next level: announcements and \u201cMark as important\u201d<\/h3>\n
Creating an Announcement<\/h4>\n
Using “Mark as important”<\/h4>\n
Better Etiquette Makes for More Effective Communications<\/h2>\n