Manage meetings using Microsoft Teams

Table of Contents

1. Join a Teams meeting

To join a Microsoft Teams meeting from schedule or calendar, or if you want to sign in as a guest on the web, you can follow the below steps:

Join a Teams meeting from the application

From your Calendar, choose Join on a meeting before gets started. Alternatively, the meeting that is in-progress.
Turn your camera on then select Background filters, and select how you would like to appear. It will show you the following options:
- You can choose a custom background for video calls.
- Second option is Blur.
Now, choose the audio settings.
Hit Join now and you are all set.

How to join a Teams meeting on the web or browser?

If you do not have the Teams application, you still have the chance to join a Teams meeting. Following these steps:

In the invite of your email, choose Click here to join the meeting.

Here, you can use a dial-in number as well, and the conference ID from your email to call in.

Here, you will get three options:

- Download the Windows app: It will ask you to download the Teams desktop application.
- Continue on this browser: You can join a Teams meeting on the web or browser.
- Open your Teams app: This means, if you already have the Teams application, you can directly and attend your meeting.

Now, type your name.
Select the audio and video settings of your device.
Hit Join now.
Depending on the settings of meeting, you will get in immediately, or you will be redirected go to a lobby where the meetings host of the meeting will admit you.

2. Tips for Teams meetings

Using these tips of Microsoft Tams application, you can enhance and customize your meeting experience. Here are some audio, video, and collaboration tips, which you can use easily.

Preview your video

When you are already in a meeting, you can preview your video before turning on your camera. Here is how you can do this:

First, hover over “Turn camera on” option to preview the meeting video.
Click on preview and see how you would like to appear:
- Choose “Blur my background” to blur your background appearance.
- Choose “More background effects” to get a custom background. You can also add your own background here.
Now, when you are ready, choose the option “Apply and turn on video.”

Sharing your screen

To share your screen or content of your screen, you can do the followings:
- Your desktop screen
- Window or browser
- PowerPoint presentation
- Whiteboard

Raise your hand to show reactions

Under the Reactions, select how you can be engaged in a meeting:

Selecting “Raise hand”will let others know you would like to speak up or ask something without interrupting the entire conversation.
Select a reaction like Applause or Heart to show how you feel about someone’s statement or presentation.

Spotlight a video

When the featured speaker is talking, you can spotlight their video. It will become the main one, which everyone can see.

Right-click and select whose video you want to spotlight.
Select Spotlight > Spotlight once more to confirm this.

Choose a video layout

There are various video layouts for the meeting. Under the meeting controls, select more options (…) and select any one from the followings:

Gallery: Here, you will see the default view, which shows a 3×3 video layout.
Large gallery: Large gallery is a 7×7 video layout, which lets you see up to 49 other people at a time.
Together mode: This layout enables you to have an experience feel like you are in the same-shared space with everyone in the Teams meeting.
You can select Change scene to change the background for other members.

Create breakout rooms

Using this feature, you can do the followings:

Create and open breakout rooms to let your attendees hold smaller for more concentrated discussions.
Under the meeting controls, chose Breakout rooms.
Select how many rooms you want and also how to assign it to the participants.
Choose Create rooms>Start rooms.

3. Meet instantly

You can turn a team conversation into a meeting with some simple steps or clicks. You can add audio, video, and also share your screen.

Start an instant meeting

There are two options how you can start an instant meeting using Microsoft Teams:

Choose Meet in the channel.
If you want to keep the context of any conversation, choose Reply in a conversation thread.
Now, select Meet under where you would type your reply.

Join a meeting

Under the pre-meeting video preview, you can do the followings:

Toggle on your microphone and camera or you can set up your microphone and speaker.
If want give your meeting a name choose any then select Join now.

Invite others to a meeting

If you want someone to join your meetings, or ad-hoc meeting, follow these steps:

Choose “Show participants” to invite the members for your meeting.
Now, type a name or their phone number into the box.
Choose “Request to join” on whom you want to send invitation.

Manage your meeting

Using this feature, you can record your meeting, share content with the participants, and also share the recorded meeting when you are done. Here is how to do:

To record a meeting, choose More actions>Start recording.
To share the content, choose the Share content tray, and select what to show. For example- your screen, any open window, or a PowerPoint slide.
You can find your recorded meeting where you have first started your meeting in MS Teams. You can view, edit, and share this recording with other team participants.

4. Manage meetings

Manage meetings option lets you view, schedule, and manage the appointments and your meetings in MS Teams to keep your team on the track. Here are the options for you:

View meetings

Choose Calendar to view your schedules or meetings for the day, week, or month.
These appointments are synchronized with the Outlook calendar.
Choose a meeting invite to see what the meetings about, who is attending the meeting, and you can also respond to the meeting.

Schedule a meeting

Choose “New meeting.”
Type in a meeting title then enter the location.

An online meeting will be created by default.

Now, select start and end time of your meeting, and add details if required.
Enter the names of participants in the Invite people box to add them to the meeting.
You can see the attendees’ availability in the Attendees list. Also, choose a suggested time or select Scheduling assistant if needed to see more available time in a calendar view.

Under “Select a channel to meet in,” choose the drop-down arrow to manage or edit you’re the privacy settings of your meeting:

- Select None if you want to keep your meeting private.
- Select a channel if you want to open the meeting to the team members.

If your meeting is posted in a channel, you can see them under the Posts tab. Team members can also set meetings agendas, share document, and their add comments.

5. Schedule a webinar

With MS Teams webinars, you can register the attendees, run the interactive presentations, and analyze attendee’s data for more appropriate meetings.

From your Calendar, select the arrow next to New meeting > Webinar.
Select Require Registration and the audience you want.

There are two options for you to schedule a webinar:

A details page for the presenters and organizers.
A registration form for your attendees.

Details for presenters and organizers

Here, you can add title and the required presenters.
Add the time line you want presenters to attend it. This must be included time before the webinar to prepare, for example- 15 minutes before it stars.
Add notes for your presenters and organizers.
Select View registration form if you want to customize the registration form.

Registration form for attendees

Anyone whom you have invited to the webinar, can see these form details.

Add title and the webinar start time for the attendees.
Add more details about the webinar.
Add speaker’s names and their short biographies.
You can also Upload an image that will look like a banner graphic on the form.
You will find a few fixed fields in the registration form.
You can select Add field if you want to add more fields.

Select a checkbox if you want to make it a required or a mandatory field.

There is an option available to create a Custom questions.

Choose Copy registration link if you want to use this link in your invites and promotions for the particular webinar.
Hit Save and then you can review the registration form.
Close the registration form, and then select Send to send the invite to your presenters and organizers.

6. Add Q&A to the webinars and meetings

In case you are hosting a structured meeting, like a webinar or a meeting, which may have a large audience in MS Teams, you can add the Q&A app to organize how your attendees can ask questions.

Follow the below-mentioned steps:

Before the webinar

Go to the meeting invite and then choose Edit>Add a tab (+).
Search for the Q&A app or select it if it is already available, and then hid Add.
Select webinar settings if you want to give attendees some specific permissions.
Select “Moderate attendee conversations”to let organizers decide, which questions to publish under the Q&A space.
When you are ready, hit Save.

During the webinar

Your attendees can submit their questions while a webinar is in-progress. On the Q&A panel, you can see:

Under the “In review”tab, review submitted questions in a private moderator view. Choose and publish which questions you would like the attendees to see.
Under the Publish tab, you can view published questions.
Under the Dismissed tab, you can review any irrelevant or the duplicate questions.
For the published questions, you can select All conversations>Unanswered Questions, it will filter and address them for your review.
You can respond to a question and post them when you’re ready.
Once you have posted, all attendees can view the posted questions and the responses.
Select an important post to pin it. It will appear at the top of the Q&A panel, which everyone can see.

7. Show your screen during a meeting

In MS Teams, you can show your desktop, some specific apps, a whiteboard, or a PowerPoint presentation in a meeting. Here are the steps:

Choose Share content and then select if you want to share your systems audio.
Here you can choose what you want to share like the below options:

- If you select “Screen,” it will let you show everything on your screen.
- PowerPoint Live option will let you share the PowerPoint presentation.
- Microsoft Whiteboard and Freehand by Invision allows you to share a whiteboard where the participants can sketch together.
- Window options enables you to share an open window like a specific app, which you have opened.

After you choose what you want to show to the participants, a red border surrounds, which indicates what you are sharing currently.

NOTE: The participants of meeting won’t be able to see any notifications that might come in during your sharing time.

Select Stop sharing when you want to stop showing your screen.