In recent years, Microsoft Teams has become a vital component in Microsoft’s productivity arsenal. It is often the go-to app for the company when it wants to add collaboration tools to Microsoft 365. However, Redmond clearly sees value in combining Teams features more deeply into Outlook. It seems Microsoft is seeking to make its simple for users across all services. If someone uses Outlook, they should have access to Teams tools with necessarily needing to go into the Teams app. This integration across apps could arguably allow Microsoft to stand above its core rivals. On the workplace chat front, the core competitor is Slack, while in video and meeting communication its Zoom. Neither of those rivals can tap into a suite of applications in the way Microsoft Teams can.
Importance of Integration
While Teams has undoubtedly boosted Office 365/Microsoft 365, there’s no doubt Microsoft 365 apps return the favor… especially Outlook. And so, with this week’s update, the email app is now much more integrated with Microsoft’s meeting experience. Some of the new features added include:
Meeting Insights in Outlook will allow users to see all the information they need about meetings in one app. Microsoft says the inbox now surfaces more information on meetings. Users can efficiently move between meetings and messages, while also see attendee lists. One-tap join for online meetings. Users can now sync their personal calendar in Outlook with their work calendar. Microsoft says Outlook users can now schedule when they receive an email. For example, users can choose to not receive mails out of work hours, or during vacations. Similarly, a new snooze feature allows workers to snooze a message.
