Microsoft Teams Naming Convention

[Badal Ratra]

Hi all,

What are the steps and how would you recommend to setup the prefix-suffix naming policy for team in MS teams? What are the limitations and issues we should be considering as part of planning for o365 groups naming policy automation for team in MS Teams?

As per the following resource - https://www.metalogix.com/blog/5-best-practices-office-365-group-naming-policies I found that these are default attributes available to apply using o365 group name policy Azure Active Directory attributes, including: [Department], [Company], [Office], [StateOrProvince], [CountryOrRegion], [Title], [CountryCode]). How it will be used to identify and setup the custom prefix and suffix as per below scenarios.

I understand that above attributes are limited, What are the automate options and steps for setting up o365 group naming for some of the below examples?
Scenarios
1. Setting up naming prefix or suffix for Organisation with Organisation Code
2. Setting up naming prefix or suffix for Business Unit and department both with the business code and department code
3. Setting up naming prefix or suffix for the Location with the location code
4. Setting up naming prefix or suffix for the process or project with the process or project code

Also, just wondering I am planning to setup the restriction on office 365 group creation within MS Teams. How automation of prefix-suffix naming policy work in above scenarios? Also, any best practices I should be taking care in my planning?

Many thanks for your help.

[#2]

I do believe that using naming policies with groups created with Teams is in Private preview still!
I guess that even with restricted group creation this will be applied but not if the users creating the group is an global admin or user account admin..
Make sure not use long attributes..I think max is 53 characters for total name..
The supported variables is:
Department], [Company], [Office], [StateOrProvince], [CountryOrRegion], [Title]
Make sure the used attributes are set on the user!
Custom attributes aren’t supported but you can use fixed strings for that

Adam

[#3]

Thanks Adam for the info and your response. Much appreciated.

Did you mean if I setup the naming policy via o365 groups for team creation the prefix and sufix will not be displayed in Team UI for the Team Name. For Example, If the Team name value with prefix is - "Community - CMT". The office 365 group name will be created as "Community -  CMT" and the team name in the Microsoft Teams UI will be displayed as only "CMT"?

Also, just wondering how the fixed strings group policy will work when the team will be created by the restricted group using the MS Teams UI? If you know any resource about this can you please share?

What are the steps to setup the team name prefix (for example, community prefix for functional team, process id prefix for process related teams, project code for project related teams and business unit for business related teams). On what logic this information will be picked dynamically while creating a team based on o365 group policy?

Regarding the 53 character limit did you mean maximum limit for office 365 group name with prefix and sufix?

If using o365 naming policies groups created with Teams does not display the prefix and sufix in the Microsoft Teams user interface then is this the expected product behavior for some benefits? What is the sharepoint url in this case with or without prefix or suffix?

What's your recommendation for MS Teams pilot or roll-out for small user group, what would be a good approach should I setup first the naming policy using o365 groups for the team names or should be ok to start without setting the o365 naming policy but create the team name with the naming convention manually from UI once office365 groups created with the naming convention then remove the prefix and suffix using MS Teams UI in the display name to avoid process delays at the moment? Do you see any issues with this apporach.

Many thanks for your help mate.

[#4]

I’m on a kids party so I’ll answer the first part now :)
If you create a group, not from teams the policy applies and the group gets named according to the rules! So when you connect the group to teams there is no difference from normal: you see the entire group name! This also means the SharePoint url will be the same ( the whole group name) I’m suspecting, the policy won’t apply when you create a team in teams directly!
Please read up on how you create the policy here:
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/office-365-groups-naming-policy-6ceca4d3-cad1-4532-9f0f-d46...

Adam

[#5]

Hi Adam,

Hope you are well. Could you please help to confirm the results for the below placeholders ‘??’ when the team name get created using Teams UI with enabled office 365 group policy:

Sample Team Name	Created by	Team Name Value (Based on naming convention)	Office 365 Group Name (Assuming it picks automatically prefix based on group policy)	What team name will display in Teams UI? With prefix or without prefix	Team SharePoint URL (With Prefix or without prefix?)
Services	Self Service Users using Team UI	Community - Services	Community - Services	???	???
Services	Team Creator group using Team UI	Community - Services	Community-Services	???	???

As the supported variables are only these - [Department], [Company], [Office], [StateOrProvince], [CountryOrRegion], [Title]. How fixed strings can be used to dynamically set the business unit, location, process and project when we create the team using Teams UI? I am just wondering how group policy will identify for which team to use business unit, location etc. when we create via Teams UI? What are the options to create the team and how it will impact on Team naming?

I am planning to introduce the naming convention for the following levels Org, Business Unit, Department, location, project, process and initially it won’t be controlled via group policy but soon I will like to enforce via group policy. What do think about this approach? Any recommendation I should take care while defining the naming policy framework as a future proof considering group naming policy capabilities or best practices?

Many thanks and look forward to your reply.

[#6]

For what I know you will see the total name while you are creating a group!
For strings there’s no way that I know of that makes it apply in a automatic way! Once set, this will apply to all! While the attributes apply on what the creating user has as a value for it in Office 365!

Regarding the table the suffix and prefix gets applied to the name itself and will display as a normal group name in teams, also same for url

[#7]

Hi Adam,

Sorry, I am confused did you mean total name for team name with prefix and suffix will be displayed everywhere in team UI, o365 groups and for SharePoint URL?

If the strings can’t be applied in automatic way does that mean there is no other custom way attributes can be applied automatically for the naming convention example, prefix project ID or process ID for project and process related teams etc.

And I understand that attributes apply on what creating user has a value for it o365. Does that mean group policy only works with self team creation not with restricted user group?

What’s your recommendation how I should approach to set the naming convention at different levels business unit, project, process etc?

Many thanks.