Microsoft Teams vs O365 Groups vs SharePoint

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I have spent too many hours trying to find a SIMPLE explanation of when to use which of the subject options. I've watched videos, I've read white papers and I've looked at slide presentations... and I'm more confused than ever. It's kind of frustrating actually, Microsoft is always coming out with something new... don't get me started on Communications sites, MS Flow and PowerApps. As an O365 admin, I'm struggling to keep up and be knowledgable enough to advise the users I support. A lot of users are creating Groups, which now come with an associated SharePoint site, and we (admins) have no way to govern these sites. They aren't even listed in the SharePoint admin center.

 

I can't stop users from creating new groups (btw, most aren't even using the SharePoint teamsite that comes with a group). But I need to be able to give advice on when they should use SharePoint instead!

3 Replies

You can definitely stop users from creating Office 365 Groups and associated team sites.   Here is one way of doing it - Control who can create Office 365 Groups.  With this in place, only the people who are in a security group that you create, will be able to create Office 365 Groups in these apps (Outlook, Planner, SharePoint, Yammer, and Microsoft Teams).

 

I agree there could be better guidance on the different options available and the best use of each one.  It's worth remembering Microsoft Teams are built upon Office 365 Groups.

Hi Allison, this is the new world, a constantly change cloud service with lots of different ways to achieve the same thing. No one answer is right in all circumstances.

 

For us, Groups fully replace the need for DLs, Team sites, file shares, public folders and shared mailboxes. It saves us a fortune in admin costs by replacing all of these older, admin requiring service with simple self-service. There are specific reasons why you might still use the previous types of service, but I would only do this by exception.

 

 

The caveat here is that all organizations are different. Some can replace multiple older technologies with Groups, some can not. For instance, a hybrid organization with some on-premises servers will find it really hard to move DLs to Groups.

 

Think about it like this:

 

1. Groups is just a way of declaring that you have a set of people who need to communicate and collaborate (a group).

2. The group has different options as to the software they use, depending on their needs and backgrounds.

3. Groups that come from the world of Exchange and are email-centric will find that the Groups integration into Outlook probably matches the way their users work.

4. Groups that have used Yammer in the past will be happy to find that new Yammer Groups pick up the resources available to other groups, like SharePoint team sites.

5. Groups who might like the chat-centric communication that you see in Slack and Facebook will find the same kind of communication in Teams.

6. All of the various Groups share common resources (SharePoint, Planner, Exchange). The difference is how people interact within the group.

 

Microsoft has a hard time communicating this message because they:

 

  • Need to keep existing communities (Exchange, Yammer) happy.
  • Need to be seen as new and fresh in the collaboration space (Teams)
  • Need a framework to build off for other applications (Planner, Stream, etc.)

The point is that you should look at how people work today and figure out how to bring these technologies into their work in as non-disruptive manner as possible. And because you know your users and your company better than any outsider, make your own mind up about which is the best route forward.