The Biggest Microsoft Teams Updates from 2022

Microsoft Teams is always evolving and changing the way it connects workplaces, especially in a constantly growing remote-working environment. It’s no surprise that Teams must change its colours to keep up with everything that needs to be ironed out and perfected as we work from home more and more. 2022 has been no different, with some exciting new features and updates being added to Teams to make our experience all the better. Let us look at some of the biggest updates we’ve had so far...
 

1. Speaker Coach

This feature is incredibly exciting for any presentation buffs out there. Teams is including the new Speaker Coach feature, that will help anyone doing a presentation with messages to work on their speech, tone of voice and how they carry themselves. This smart update will surely help speakers working on their skills the more presentations they do.
 

2. Transcripts from Pre-recorded meetings

We’re sure this update will save lots of time. If you have your meetings pre-recorded, Teams will now create a transcription of your meeting for you when the meeting is finished. This means you won’t have to run your meeting through an external app to get a transcript, and you won’t have to listen through it and type everything down into a document either. A great time saving feature that we’re sure will come in handy.
 

3. Joining a Teams meeting from a Team room

A feature that so many users have been crying out for. Teams will now finally allow a person to join a Teams meeting from a Teams room if said person has been given a meeting ID and special passcode. A big ask, finally being fulfilled by Microsoft that should make that transition from a room to a meeting easier and without hassle.
 

4. Collaborative annotations in meetings

Screensharing during meetings is a useful tool but what if it was even more so, especially during collaborative sessions? Users will now be able to make annotations on your shared screen through meetings, whether it is posting sticky notes or highlighting certain parts of the screen that need to be pointed out. This is massively useful for group projects and general reminders, and something that anyone can get some great use out of.
 

5. New updates to the Forms tab

You may have noticed that the Forms tab has been given a new look, as well as being renamed to Polls, with a new type of form added in for good measure. This is the Rating form, which allows you to gain insight from others on what they think on a question you have posited, rating from 1-5 for example. Not a huge change in terms of the name, but this new ratings feature may help you understand your colleagues’ views on certain things a little better.
 

6. Chatting with yourself

You can now create a chat with yourself, which might not sound useful on the surface, but think of this feature as if it’s a handy new personal notebook. You can leave important links and assets here, like your own personal drop box, or even give yourself reminders for upcoming tasks and To-Do lists. The world is your oyster with this feature, and even if you have your own way of doing these things, it’s nice for Teams to give you the option.
 

7. Video clips

The video clip feature is in the works with a release date pencilled in very soon, so keep an eye out for this one. This will allow you to record, review, send and view short, video messages in Teams chat from both desktop and mobile. This should be a very handy tool for getting quick visual and personal memos to someone, rather than having to jump on a call or to type a long-winded message out to them.
 
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