Microsoft has detailed its best practices for creating successful company meetings with Teams, utilizing all the latest features it has rolled out since 2020.
Last year saw the introduction of Large Meetings and Webinars on top of the existing Teams Live Events option for hosting large meetings. But to make it a successful meeting, users should follow Microsoft’s new recommendations to ensure everything goes smoothly from both a social and technical standpoint.
These features currently allow 1,000-person meetings, where invitees can use chat, audio and video, or a view-only setup that supports up to 10,000 participants. In these scenarios, Microsoft recommends organizers hard mute video for attendees to reduce video bandwidth on a network and remove unintended video sharing.
SEE: What is Agile software development? Everything you need to know about delivering better code, faster
It’s also outlined best-practice pointers for organizers and presenters, IT admin and support staff, and tips on how to create more interactive and engaging meetings.
Microsoft recommends defining presenters in advance of creating meeting invitations for Webinars and Large Meetings. This way, attendee mics and cameras will be disabled when joining, which helps create an orderly meeting and avoids people talking all at once or over the presenters.
“During the interactive portion of the event, attendees will speak one at a time at a defined location that has a microphone,” Microsoft notes. “This translates nearly verbatim to Webinars and Large Meetings where people are “handed” the microphone by Presenters or Moderators.”
This is done by meeting presenters promoting other attendees to the presenter role. Microsoft Teams also lets users define a co-organizer.
Testing the network is also vital on a corporate network and from home. Microsoft recommends running the Microsoft 365 network connectivity test several days before an event. Presenters working from home should also check if other devices are using the network. They should ideally used a wired connection for more reliable audio, video and screen sharing.
Other useful tips include ensuring all users are on the latest version of Teams. And users should do a dry run prior to an event to check device, lightning or network issues.
Presenters should also use lobby controls and features like spotlight, PowerPoint Live, meeting recording, captions, and transcriptions to boost engagement.
IT admins can do their part on the network side through monitoring features, such as looking at real-time call quality analytics. IT admins can use this to interact with users in real time to address any network problems. Those monitoring a meeting should be set as presenters so they can disable rogue video streams, mute accidentally live mics, and even boot an attendee out of the meeting.
Microsoft notes that Webinars and Live Events can only be scheduled through the Teams client calendar, while standard/large meetings can be scheduled from the Outlook calendar.
Microsoft has also detailed the current capacity for Teams Large Meetings, Webinars and Live Events:
Teams Large Meetings (View-Only)
- Full interactive capabilities for the first 1,000 users, with subsequent users in view-only mode
- Expands the previous 300 user capacity up to 1,000
- Meetings from 1,001 to 20,000 are view-only
- Configurable Interaction Options
- Disabled by default and must be enabled with PowerShell
Teams Webinars
- Up to 1,000 participants
- Registration that can be public or organization-only
- Configurable Interaction Options
- Disabled by default and must be enabled with PowerShell
Teams Live Events
- Broadcast to large audiences
- Moderated Q&A for interaction
- Supports advanced production capabilities
- 20,000 user capacity that can be expanded up to 100,000
- Disabled by default and must be enabled with PowerShell
