Forum Discussion
Schedule Teams meetings for other people without attending
Frank1960 OK, misunderstanding here. Who are you inviting? Only external org. users to have a meeting in your org? That doesn't seem reasonable. So when scheduling choose a person from your org. as a presenter from within the Meeting options so that person can change the role of the external user during the meeting. You don't have to participate, just be sure to set the lobby as needed.
You can also select "Anyone" as a Presenter, if you haven't noticed already.
"Anyone who has access to the meeting link will join the meeting as a presenter."
I tried this today and it didn't work. I had the meeting set up for "Everyone" and I still had to jump on the meeting, let my boss in and then leave the meeting. There has to be another way unless I am doing something wrong. Please advise.
Wow. I realize it may seem overwhelming, but there are REAL, well thought out reasons for this. If Microsoft just used the KISS method for everything, it would be a security nightmare, with every individual deciding what levels of rules, practices, compliance, and governance THEY wanted.....which lets face it, would be minimal. I understand user's put their jobs, and needs first, and that is important, but not at ANY COST. The companies that use the products may very well have other needs too, like not getting sued for some user's failure to enforce compliance policies. Thats why these things are typically more controlled in The TAC, and require thought, planning, and development. It's not all about just getting what YOU want done. It's about Much, much more.
SimC-S Sorry for the late reply here. Yes, I agree that there's much to take in when it comes to meeting settings, roles and options.
Basically, to keep it really simple, you can set that "everyone" (anyone with access to the meeting link) can both join and start a meeting. Check with your Teams administrator if you have that possibility.The above isn't the most recommended approach from a security perspective though hence why we use Teams roles and lobby, see below.
Roles in a Teams meeting (microsoft.com)
Change participant settings for a Teams meeting (microsoft.com)
ChristianJBergstrom Doesn't this demonstrate how overly complex all this is, and the need for huge simplification. Why a meeting organiser cannot simply set the roles for each attendee in the Scheduling Assistant, beats me, e.g. set an attendee, no matter who, as being able to start and host the meeting, and set themselves as non-participatory - for just that meeting. My wife is suffering from this at work, with the change from Zoom to Teams, with the departmental secretaries & she finding it exasperating trying to set up meetings for her to run and outside customers (normally non-Teams users) attending.
It seems Microsoft has never taken on board the mantra "if all else fails, do the obvious", but instead, "let's make it as hard and unintuitive as possible"! It all stems from MS trying to be too clever, which always fails.- The anonymous 'start a meeting' option that you've changed is located in the Teams policies and the other 'join a meeting' is under the Teams settings https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/meeting-settings-in-teams#allow-anonymous-users-to-join-meetings You only need to change the one's being used, the organizers, so perhaps not all users should have the former setting. Global being default. When changing these policies it takes some time before being active, have that in mind. Also, I added the "People I invite" link in my previous post, which solves many lobby scenarios.
ChristianJBergstrom Thanks Christian. In Meeting Policies, under Manage Policies we have 7 (presumably default) policies:
Open Access Yes
AllOn No
RestrictedAnonymousAccess No
AllOff No
RestrictedAnonymousNoRecording No
Kiosk No
Global (Org-wide default) NoI can (and did) only edit the first and last policy. Is there anything more I need to do?
Cheers,
Darryl
DarGar Hello, no worries. I get that this is causing headaches sometimes as it's kind of tricky depending on the tenant config and the user types involved. And there are quite some differences as to what's allowed and not for companies in general (policy, legal etc.) Basically it all comes down to your identity, are you trusted or not, and the lobby options that are set for the meeting.
When you have users outside of your own org. is when you usually have to give it some thought. The co-org. role you linked to will be a great addition, but will only work when being in the same organization. Meaning the co-organizer have to be in your org.
What would be the most seamless approach (not most secure) is to enable anonymous users can join a meeting and anonymous users can start a meeting. The first being under TAC Meeting settings and the latter in the meeting policy. And then set the lobby to allow 'everyone'.
Can also use PowerShell for the above.
Let me add the Lobby option "People I invite" too. See more details here
Change participant settings for a Teams meeting (microsoft.com)
ChristianJBergstrom Hi Christian. Thanks for applying yourself to this. We are an executive recruitment firm and it's common for us to set up (MS Teams) interviews between third parties (our client and our candidate).
Currently, we impose on our client(s) to create the MS Teams meeting(s), so that we don't have to attend simply to let the participants join from the lobby.
Is there an elegant way of achieving this currently? I've not been able to achieve this with the advice provided in this thread.
If not, will this be achievable with this functional update - https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/roadmap?filters=&searchterms=81391? Is this still slated for release this month?
Cheers,
Darryl
- Well, it's difficult to explain this when there are so many asking the same thing but rarely have the same Teams org. setup or use case. So, in your scenario for ex. Is the receptionist a delegate for this boss with the proper permissions too? And the "me and others" meaning users in same org? guest users? federated users? anonymous users? There isn't a one answer to these questions as how you do it without being present, but the person scheduling should focus on who can go through the lobby automatically and who can present.
Presenters
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/roles-in-a-teams-meeting-c16fa7d0-1666-4dde-8686-0a0bfe16e019
Lobby
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/change-participant-settings-for-a-teams-meeting-53261366-dbd5-45f9-aae9-a70e6354f88e ChristianBergstrom in this instance the user isn't the organizer. Scenario: boss calls receptionist and says,, "Set up a meeting for me and others" - The need is to be able to create the meeting and have to invitees participate fully (presenting, becoming presenter, sharing, etc.). The question is How do you do it WITHOUT participating AND WITHOUT being present to start the meeting/select presenters?
- I understand that it’s complicated. As you have anonymous users, federated users and guest users. Then you have the teams policies and the meeting settings and meeting options. For the record the co-organizer role is scheduled for general availability in September.
- Which user?
Gosh, no wonder everyone is giving up. There is always one more step to do. I am a relatively techhy small business owner but the number of micro steps buried deep in an admin center is very off-putting. I hope a business friendly fix for this will be put into the roadmap as the use case for this is I suspect quite common. For me I think I will just ask someone else to set up the meeting while I am on holiday but thanks for trying - You need to assign that policy to your user too. Go under Users in TAC. After that has been done you have to wait a couple of hours, perhaps even until tomorrow.
- All I could do was to creat a policy, and i that policy I let anonymous people start a meeting. THat policy was then added to my list of standard policies (which must be MS default ones). Having done all of that it still doesnt work. I left it an hour before trying again in case it takes time to work its way through microsoft servers but still no joy.
- You have to enter the meeting policy being used. Most likely the Global. Scroll down and change the setting. Can also use PowerShell https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/skype/set-csteamsmeetingpolicy?view=skype-ps
ChristianJBergstrom Going in from a new web browser helped me get in. I found the "anonymous users can join a meeting" flag and that was ok, but in the teams meeting policies I dont have the option you mentioned... see screenshot
- Just sign out or use InPrivate / Incognito and then back in.
ChristianJBergstrom Thanks for prompt reply. Not sure if the Teams admin center is down as when I enter it from my Microsoft 365 admin center I get cogs whirring then a blank page with "MSAL IFrame" at the top... will try again in a couple of hours to double check
- Have you worked it through with your Teams admin? When it comes to the anonymous settings (not guests or federated) there are two your org. needs to allow and it's the Teams org. setting "anonymous users can join a meeting" and the -AllowAnonymousUsersToStartMeeting in the teams meeting policy.
ChristianBergstrom The workaround you suggested doesnt actually allow someone from outside my org to start a meeting that me/my org originated.
I have all permissions set ok (I think, see screenshot) and yet others cannot start the meeting without me. In my case I am a consultant but I want my clients to be able to hold a recurring meeting that we have weekly without me while I am on holiday. They are not able to do so.
Or is there something else I need to change?
Dear Christian
I am also facing the same problem.
I am the organiser of all the meetings, so I have to create links and send to all the participants.Most of the meetings, i am not required to participate.
So can I admit participants to meetings without getting into the meeting.
I cannot access "meeting option" settings and its saying error.
Pls advise me urgently.
I would also appreciate if you can add my personal email id - mailto:Pallavikharade18@gmail.com while replying to my query.
Thank you so much
Pallavi
Hello, as already explained this can be accomplished. You can actually use this being rolled out right now https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/roadmap?filters=&searchterms=68730 and is by far the easiest way to do it! (People I invite)
And rather soon it going to be even easier when the introduce the co-organizer meeting role https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/roadmap?filters=&searchterms=81391
Anyway, if you haven't got the above setting yet it's all about who you invite (1) your tenant Team settings for anonymous join (2), meeting policies (3) and the particular meeting set up (4). Let's say I want to schedule a meeting with two anonymous accounts (i.e. Gmail) but I am not going to be able to attend, but I have to schedule it as no one else can and no one from my org. can attend either. As I am the organizer I need to configure the meeting options so it fit the scenario and allow "everybody" to automatically go trough the lobby and let anonymous start a meeting. If not choosing that they are gonna end up in the lobby only as there's no one to let them in and they can't initiate the meeting. In this scenario my org. must allow for anonymous join, anonymous can start a meeting and everyone can present in the meeting options "Anyone who has access to the meeting link will join the meeting as a presenter".
For refrence https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/change-participant-settings-for-a-teams-meeting-53261366-dbd5-45f9-aae9-a70e6354f88e
Note the "You won't be able to select someone from a different org as a presenter." This can instead be changed during the meeting by an organizer/presenter (role).CaryAbbott We have this too.
As a recruitment agency, we need to be able to set up all the interviews but not be present.
Did you ever get to the bottom of this?
- Hello, what's the use case here? Scheduling random meetings which you don't want to attend? If you need to second-guess perhaps somebody else should be the organizer.
Thank you for this information.
When I set up a meeting that I am not attending, it is inputted on my Outlook calendar. If I try to remove it, I'm canceling the whole meeting. Is there another way to schedule others without scheduling myself? I don't want to constantly second-guess which meetings on my calendar I need to attend vs. which ones I do not.
Thanks again for your help.
