Convert SharePoint Team site to Office Group

[Martin Mueller]

Dear Experts,

is there a way to extend existing SharePoint team sites so they become Office 365 groups? There is already a migration option for distribution list but I suspect some customers rather have team sites as a starting point for a group purpose.

[#2]

What do you mean to convert to a SharePoint Team site? As part of the Group you already have a SPO Site (A modern one) and AFAIK, there is no way to delete the Group and keep the site

[#3]

thanks Juan - correct - we have found the Groups have too 'loose' document controls so want to shift back to a SPO site in order to provide better document governance.

Am wondering how I remove the group from appearing in members Outlook?

[#4]

Hello Juan,

Again I can't agree with you :) Your theory with my practice do not match :) I've got SP group site originally created as should be with a group, but now group is deleted. Unfortunately button "group Conversation" is still on the site, not working and there is no way to assign another group.

regards
Slawomir

[#5]

@Brad Crawford

To be clear:

As Juan said, when you create a (modern) team site, you will automatically get a Group associated with the team site. There is no official way to delete the Group without deleting also the associated team site. There have been reports of sites lingering after the deletion of the associated Group, but this is a bug, not a feature...

On the other hand, you can still create a (classic) team site, i.e. without an associated Group, in the SPO admin center, but at some point in the future all classic team sites will be "groupified", i.e. associated automatically with a Group. It's not clear at the moment if such "groupification" will be mandatory or optional: we will see...

So, it looks like, in Microsoft plans,, Groups and team sites will be indissolubly connected each other.

All this said, we come back to your post. You say that you found that "Groups have too loose document controls". What do you mean exactly? Wich controls do you think are more "tight" in classic team sites? Just curious...

[#6]

Is this feature still a WIP?

[#7]

I sure hope so. I am betting we'll see some big Teams announcments at Ignite in a few weeks. 

[#8]

Looks like this has now been implemented and will be pushed out to everyone in the coming months.

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/SharePoint-Blog/Work-better-together-with-SharePoint-team-sit...

 

Connect an existing SharePoint team site to a new Office 365 group

You can now connect an existing SharePoint team site to a new group in Office 365, to improve your team’s productivity with the content and resources of an Office 365 group, including:

• A shared mailbox for group conversations in Outlook  
• A shared calendar to track deadlines, events, and team vacations
• Planner to manage tasks, and
• The option to create a team Microsoft Teams for as a hub for collaboration.

The site retains its URL, settings and permissions site owners, members and visitors can work without interruption. While existing pages are not automatically updated, you can begin modernizing your team site already, today. You can create new pages and even make one of the new pages the home page of your site.

We suggest properties based on your current team site. Here’s a look at what happens:

• Your existing team site will be connected to a new Office 365 Group 
• Your existing site content, hierarchy and permissions remain the same 
• We'll help you select group members based on your existing site membership. No site permissions will be altered; we’re simply adding the new Azure Active Directory (AAD) group object claim.

Site owners can connect existing team sites to new Office 365 Groups.

When you connect a site to Office 365 groups, a new group is created. Group owners and members are suggested based on your existing team site's membership. You can add or remove people from the group. Of course, you can update group membership at any time. 

Group membership is managed separately from site membership, but group members always have access to the team site. You can continue to add users to the site’s owners, members and visitors group to give them access to the site without granting access to other group resources.

[#9]

No, it's not....look at the FAQs at the bottom of the blog post:
Q: When can I expect to see the above-mentioned innovation within my Office 365 tenant?

A: Much of what is mentioned above will begin to rollout to Office 365 First Release customers before the end of calendar year 2017, except for the ability to connect existing team site to a new Office 365 group and SharePoint hub sites – both are targeted to begin rollout within the first half of calendar year 2018.

Indeed I don't have even in a First Release tenant the ability to add a group to a existing SPO classic site

[#10]

"targeted to begin rollout within the first half of calendar year 2018."

This means it's being pushed out in the coming months :)

[#11]

I completely understand what it means and what I say is that the feature is not ready yet even for Targeted release, so there is obviously a delay in the roll out

[#12]

Are there any plans to "groupify" subsites or is this still only targeted for site collections? Subsites make up the vast majority of our sites, so the ability to groupify a site collection will not be very helpful. 

[#13]

Do you know if its a thing or still no ETA?