- Coming up on this special edition of Microsoft Mechanics
we're joined by a Microsoft 365 VP, Omar Shahine,
for a tour of all the recent
and upcoming updates in Microsoft 365,
including the brand new employee experience platform,
Microsoft Viva.
So thanks again for joining us, Omar.
- Thanks, Jeremy. It's great to be here.
- And it's really a privilege to have you on.
So your team is pretty much the cornerstone
in terms of everything that we do
that incorporates content experiences in Microsoft 365.
Now this includes Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, OneDrive,
and also aspects of the brand new Viva platform.
But with so much of what we do day-to-day,
especially with more of us working remotely,
we're all really reliant
on being able to securely work on files and content.
So what can people look forward to then
with the latest round of updates?
- Yeah, that's a broad question.
There's a ton to cover, of course.
There are a number of cool updates
that we're bringing to you,
with new files experiences across OneDrive
and Microsoft 365, as well as new admin controls.
That said, there's a lot that I'm excited about
to share around the work with how we're doing to help people
and organizations to stay connected and work together.
- There's a lot of intelligence really infused
into those experiences.
So this is going to be an action-packed show,
but can we take a look at some of this stuff?
- Sure. So let's start with an early look
at shared channels and Teams.
This last year has really highlighted
the importance of remote work.
So it can be a challenge connecting
and sharing securely beyond an organization's boundaries.
Now, just to underscore the significance
of what we're solving for with shared channels,
let me show you the current experience.
As a user, we've had the ability for awhile to be part
of multiple organizations and their teams.
In the past, you'd need to log out
of your primary user account and log into guest accounts.
For example, here, I'm part of the Contoso organization
and I'm in a team with Fabricio Johns,
who is a guest user from Fabricam.
So he'd have to be logged into
that account to see my message.
And if I flip over to Fabricio's experience,
I'll log him in using a guest account
and that gives me a view of just the Contoso teams he's in
and he can see my message and respond,
but he's taken out of his flow
in his own Fabricam environment.
- How do things change then with shared channels?
- So let me flip back over to my account
and I'll show you the shared channel experience.
With shared channels, you can stay in your primary account
but still chat and work on shared files
as a full-fledged member of that team.
So let me create a new channel
and show you how I can bring in external team members
from Fabricam into my team at Contoso.
This is really important.
You can keep your existing team structures
and create new shared channels in those teams.
You don't need to create a separate team anymore.
Just like any other channel, it starts
by clicking on the ellipsis, then add channel.
I'll give it a name and call it Partner Work.
Under Privacy, this is where I select Shared.
Then I'll hit Next.
Now I need to invite people to the channel.
I'll add Fabricio from Fabricam
and notice it says external, not guest.
So this is from Fabricam's directory service, not Contoso's.
Then I'll hit Share and finally Done.
And you can see the Partner Work channel
within our Contoso Marketing Team
and notice the shared channel icon next to it.
Now when I start a conversation, you'll see another notice
that the channel is shared with members from other orgs.
If I mention Fabricio, his account and Fabricam resolves.
So I'll type a message.
"Are you seeing this?"
Now, let me split my screen and show you the experience
from both the internal and external user's perspective.
On the left is my account logged into Contoso
and on the right is Fabricio at Fabricam.
You'll see the notification
that I shared in a channel with him.
If I expand for Fabricio's team on the left,
you'll see the marketing team at Contoso
with just a shared channel with Fabricio,
but you'll also see his Fabricam teams.
So he's in his normal primary account.
So I'll go ahead and respond and say,
"Yes, Omar, I'm in."
And you'll see, it shows up both in Teams on the left
and Fabricio's on the right.
So that's chat in the channel.
And this also works with files.
I'll go into the files tab.
Now I'll drag a PowerPoint file as me
to share it with members of the channel.
I'll go back to Fabricio's side
on the right and open the files tab.
You'll see a pop-up on Fabricio's side.
Now I'll open up the file as Fabricio.
And I can edit the file from Fabricio's account
even though it's stored in Contoso's tenants.
- Another thing worth noting here
is that for shared channels to work,
we're actually doing a lot of integration under the hood
between Teams and Azure Active Directory.
But I want to switch gears though and go through
some of the enhancements that your team is building
with core user experiences in Microsoft 365.
And why don't we start with Lists?
- Lists is one of my favorite new experiences
that we've built from the ground up
to modernize how you track and organize work.
Today, we have several ready-made list templates
designed to make it easy to get started
tracking and managing information
like events, issues, and requests.
Now, let me give a first look at something we are adding,
which is the ability for organizations
to define custom list templates.
I'll create a new ist using Northwind Traders'
Custom Recruitment template.
All I have to do is give it a name and it's ready for use.
And note, you'll be able to manage
which templates are available to which people
based on their job role.
- One of the great things about lists as well
is the native integration with Microsoft Teams,
especially as you work together on information.
- That's right and we're making
the Teams experience even better.
Here I'm in Teams with our Spring 2021 Recruitment List.
I'll click on schedule and open the calendar view.
This is great for when you're working on
hitting milestones on time and here under automate,
I'll create a rule in Teams.
So in this case
when a recruiting status is set to Offer Sent,
it notifies the interviewer automatically.
Now I'll jump into one of our candidates,
Aaron, and @ mention Mona in the comments area.
@ mentions are another powerful way
to get someone's attention.
And Mona will automatically receive an email notification,
as you can see here.
Now I'll jump back into the Lists web app
and show you something we've done
to make editing more efficient using the grid view.
I'll click into the field
and you'll see rich text editing capabilities.
Now I can easily change the status in my list fields
and grid view lets me get this done quickly.
And soon Lists will work whether you're connected
to the internet or not, because we're also
adding offline support to Microsoft Lists.
Additionally, Lists is also available on iOS,
as you can see here.
It's a full-featured app to create
and edit lists quickly on the go.
And we're also working on iPad support in the near-term
and a version for Android later this year.
- All right, so across web and mobile,
Lists are really a great way
to track information and organize work.
And I really personally love how easy it is
to automate alerts using rules, but why don't we move on
to managing files in OneDrive and SharePoint?
So what's new there?
- We're always improving the OneDrive
and SharePoint files experience.
And this is a service that backs
the files experience in Teams,
and now even the video platform in Microsoft Stream.
In January we announced the increased file size limit
to 250 gigabytes.
And here you can see I have a file cleverly named
250GB.file as an example.
And while I'm here, you'll see that we've enabled dark mode,
my favorite feature ever in OneDrive, on the web as well.
And you can set this in Settings menu here
and toggle between the two.
Also within OneDrive, you can create a shared library now.
Shared libraries allow you and your team
to store all your files in a location
that everyone can access so that
when a new team member joins or leaves
they automatically gain and lose access.
All you have to do is click Create Shared Library,
give it a name, "Mechanics Lib,"
and assign members or groups.
I'll add Adele and Nestor,
but I could also add a group if I wanted to.
Now I'll click Create
and I have a shared library to store my group files in.
I can add this folder as a shortcut within my OneDrive
so that it roams everywhere I'm using OneDrive,
on a phone, Mac, PC or browser.
In fact, you can see here,
the ones I have to denoted by the link icon
and the sharing column shows which people
or groups these are shared with.
I'm going to tab over to the shared library
with a few folders and files already in it.
Shared libraries have a special ability,
and that includes organizing files using metadata.
And so I can do things like filter files
based on metadata that we've added to the shared library.
Here, I'll click into status and filter by approved,
then apply it and you'll see everything
with an approved status.
And before I leave OneDrive
I have to show you the new Stream video player.
I'll jump into my recordings folder.
As you can see here, it's super handy to have
all your meeting recordings in one place.
I'll hit play on this Teams meeting recording video.
You can see it's fast on playback.
And as I mentioned, Stream will be using
the new SharePoint service to store its files.
In the coming months, you'll be able to see
and search the transcript for meeting recordings,
allowing you to catch up quickly on calls you missed.
And by the way, we'll be adding additional enhancements
this year for video experiences
in Microsoft 365, like chapters and transcripts.
We'll also bring viewer analytics, as you can see here.
And in the new Stream web app you'll be able to create,
upload, and find videos, and the entire experience along
with search is now tightly integrated
with the rest of Office.
- So last month we announced a brand new product
that's called Microsoft Viva,
and it's really a new way to deliver
tailored employee experiences.
So Omar, you and your team have really been behind
a lot of the capabilities there that feed into Viva.
So can you explain how this adds
to the Microsoft 365 experience?
- It's really exciting to be part of
this new product launch.
It's based on a lot of great customer feedback
since the pandemic started.
With Viva, we've taken a fresh look
at how we tailor our products and add new capabilities.
One thing new here is that you'll see is that
we are also working to bring search results directly to you.
Here, you can see an acronym, SOAR,
and instead of needing to go search for it
the information comes to you.
I can hover over it and see what it is,
that people connected to it, and some suggested resources.
If I click in, it'll take me
to a topic page with even more information.
And these are built automatically using AI
and are editable by the experts.
And of course, what you see aligns
to the permissions you have.
So all of your governance controls that you set
in Microsoft 365 are respected here.
What's also great here is that
when you ask a question it will call in an expert.
And if that question is asked again,
Viva Topics can also answer it automatically.
As it learns more, the richer
the content gets on the Topic page.
- And that's super impressive.
And really something related to that,
though you might need to catch up
on things like organizational news or find other resources.
And I know that you've done a lot of work
in that area as well.
- That's where Viva Connections comes in.
Navigating all the news and updates
you need to be up to speed on can be a challenge.
So what we want to do is modernize that experience to
stay engaged and informed, wherever you are,
whatever device you're using.
Here I am on my
company branded employee app in Microsoft Teams.
And you'll see the Connection shows me
all the relevant news announcements, videos,
and conversations for me.
This is all tailored based on my role and location.
So someone on the Marketing Team would have
a unique experience compared to someone
on the retail or factory frontline.
And if I show you the experience on a phone you'll see,
first, a feed with personalized news and announcements,
as well as a dashboard tailored to you
with links to answers to common questions
and tasks, like requesting time off.
And like I mentioned,
this is tailored to your role and location.
So what you're seeing on the right now
is the experience for a frontline worker.
In fact, with Viva Connections,
you can get started quickly today
with a SharePoint home site and Teams.
- And just to be clear, what you just showed with Topics
and Connections, those are a subset of Microsoft Viva.
If you didn't catch that announcement, you can find
out more information at aka.ms/Viva.
Now, before we end, and as a bonus,
given all the SharePoint and OneDrive admins
that are watching, can you share what's new
then for our admins?
- Yes, absolutely.
This is another area we've made good progress on.
In fact, based on your feedback,
we're consolidating the SharePoint
and OneDrive admin centers into a unified experience.
Part of the modernization effort across Microsoft 365
is to increase the centralized control that you have
as an admin over the content across your organization.
By unifying the SharePoint and OneDrive admin experiences,
you'll see more consistency with shared controls
and reports, as you can see here.
And beyond that, something else a lot
of admins have asked for, is better reporting for file sync.
With so many devices now using Known Folder Move
and syncing folders and libraries,
you can now see things like the number of healthy devices
and the number of machines with Known Folder Move enabled.
And these are just a few examples.
Using this information will help you
centrally correct common issues and efficiently reach out
to your users if you need to.
- Awesome stuff and it's really nice to conclude
on these updates for my favorite audience, the admins.
And this has really been a great end-to-end tour
of all the major Microsoft 365 updates from your team,
but what's the best way then to experience everything
that you've shown today?
- A lot of what I've shown today is either rolled out
or should be coming to your Microsoft 365
environment real soon.
So try it out and let us know what you think.
- Thanks so much for joining us today, Omar.
And thank you for watching.
Of course, the latest updates across Microsoft,
keep streaming Microsoft Mechanics.
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and we'll see you next time.
(Electronic sounds)