How to Create a Team in Microsoft Teams (And How to Manage Teams)

Microsoft Teams is an enterprise level app. It can work perfectly fine for a small organization but it has features to support larger organizations with as many as 50,000 members.

Microsoft Teams can be deployed on a domain, but within that domain, multiple teams can be set up. The free, non-enterprise version also has the option to set up multiple teams.

How to Create a Team in Microsoft Teams?

When you first sign up for a Microsoft Teams account, you’re asked to create a team. You can then create additional teams, and normally, you can create as many as you like. 

A new team can be created from the Microsoft Teams app, and from the Microsoft Teams admin panel. We’re going to detail both methods.

Create Teams in Microsoft Teams

To create a Team from within the Microsoft Teams app, you must have the app installed on your desktop, or you must be signed in to the Microsoft Teams web app.

1. Click the Teams tab in the left column.
2. Click the ‘Join or create team’ button at the bottom of the Teams column.
3. Click the ‘Create Team’ button in the panel on the right.

1. Choose the structure of the team you want to create; a new team from scratch or one from an existing Microsoft 365 group or team.
2. Select the team type by privacy/visibility; Private, Public, or Org-wide.
3. Give your team a name, and click Create. You can enter a description of the team if you want.

Add Team members

It is possible that members are already added to your team when you create it. This tends to happen if you have created a team from a Microsoft 365 group, or if you have an org-wide team where everyone from the organization is added by default.

You can still add more team members. Here’s how.

1. Go to the Teams tab.
2. Select the team you want to add members to.
3. Click the more options button next to the team name.
4. Select Add member.
5. Enter members by email, and click Add.

Note: If you’re unable to add team members from outside the organization, check out how to add guest members.

Create channels in a team

A channel in a team is a group conversation. It’s flexible and can be used to center discussions around a particular topic. Each team has a ‘General’ channel created by default.

1. Go to the Teams tab.
2. Select the team you want to add a channel to.
3. Click the more options button next to the team name.
4. Select Add Channel.
5. Give the channel a name, a description, and choose its privacy settings (these can be changed later).
6. Click Add.

Create Teams in Microsoft Teams admin center

Users with an enterprise license for Microsoft Teams can access the Microsoft Teams admin center and manage teams from it.

1. Visit the Microsoft Teams admin center.
2. Select the Teams tab in the column on the left.
3. Select Manage team.
4. Click the ‘Add’ button.
5. In the panel that opens on the right, enter a name, and description for the team. Select team owners from within your organization.
6. Click Apply.

Add team members

To add team members from the Microsoft Teams admin center, follow these steps.

1. Visit the Microsoft Teams admin center.
2. Select Teams>Manage Teams from the column on the left.
3. Select the team you want to add members to.
4. Select the Members tab.
5. Click the ‘Add’ button.
6. Search for users from within the organization/team, and add them.

Create channels in a team

To add a new channel to a team from the Microsoft Teams admin center, follow these steps.

1. Visit the Microsoft Teams admin center.
2. Go to Teams>Manage teams.
3. Select the team you want to add a channel to.
4. Select the Channel tab.
5. Click Add.
6. Enter a name and description for the channel, and choose the channel type.
7. Click Apply.

Conclusion

Creating teams, adding members, and adding channels to Microsoft Teams is simple. The process for a free version or for an enterprise version is the same but enterprise licenses are subject to the configuration settings of the domain they’re connected to. As such, you may run into restrictions that have to be resolved by changing permissions for a user or team before you can modify a team.

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Fatima Wahab

Fatima has been writing for AddictiveTips for six years. She began as a junior writer and has been working as the Editor in Chief since 2014. Fatima gets an adrenaline rush from figuring out how technology works, and how to manipulate it. A well-designed app, something that solves a common everyday problem and looks

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