Microsoft Teams and Telephony – Flexibility and Collaboration.

The past few years have brought unexpected and rapid change to many organisations. As a result, we have faced the challenge of making home-working a reality, while balancing the unpredictable nature of a turbulent business climate. Now a new debate is ongoing: home-working v. ‘get back to the office’ – and the simple answer is hybrid!

85% of employees currently working from home want a ‘hybrid’ approach of both home and office working in future (Source)

Now we’re not saying it’s always easy and there are nuances for every workplace, but hybrid working is already here and businesses need to adapt.

“At its best, hybrid working is about matching the task to the location and doing the right work in the right place.” (Source)

Microsoft Teams For Improved Employee Productivity

In the wake of the pandemic, employees are much clearer on what they want from their workplace and organisations have to understand the role that technology can play in delivering that – or risk losing good people.

Microsoft Teams has emerged as one of the top collaboration and productivity tools in recent years, reaching 270M monthly active users in the last quarter of 2021, and that was even with growth slowing since the early days of the pandemic. (Source)

Technology must encourage flexibility, productivity, engagement, and collaboration for their employees, but organisations also need to: 

We have helped a vast number of businesses adopt hybrid working solutions and have found Teams to be a great tool for both organisations and their end-users.

Research has shown increases in employee productivity and commitment, even in sectors where working from home has previously been unpopular (Source)

Employees need to be able to work no matter where they are located, including making and receiving phone calls. Even though Teams has become so well known, some users are unaware of the Microsoft Teams Calling add-on previously known as Microsoft 365 Business Voice.

Truly Unified Communications

Microsoft Teams Calling allows businesses to have a complete telephony solution that lets them make and receive calls from within the Microsoft Teams platform, whether they are using laptops, tablets, mobile devices, or desk phones.

You can see an example here of how we helped one of our legal clients use Microsoft Teams Telephony to facilitate a fast and secure solution for a business-critical department in the firm.

These options provide a cloud-based phone system with features such as hold, blind and consultative transfers, and reporting features for professionals who manage calling solutions. 

Key benefits include: 

Easily connect to partner compliance recording solutions.

Quickly enable calling in Teams using your exisitng Telecom Operator.

What Can Teams Telephony do for you?

We are a Microsoft Calling for Teams Advanced Specialist. Our 5-step enablement process can help you deliver a modern solution for your business that maximises collaboration for your employees in a rapidly evolving world.

Making a move to Microsoft Teams Calling is an obvious choice for many organisations. As Microsoft Calling for Teams Advanced Specialists, we have helped many of our clients adopt Teams Calling and have extensive knowledge to help you fully utilise the technology.

Our certified Microsoft 365 experts can help your organisation smoothly transition to Microsoft 365 Teams Calling and provide ongoing support through our Managed Service offerings.

Many businesses are still finding their feet and looking at new strategies for working. Our team is ready to discuss your options and help you improve your business operations and communication, employee experience, and customer service.

If you are interested and want to hear more about how Teams Telephony can improve your business, contact our Client Commercial Manager, Gordon Boyle today for more information.