Teams Governance Settings:
Balance Collaboration and Risk

Establishing a standard taxonomy will help make Teams easier to navigate and encourage employees to use Teams and Channels in a similar way across business units and departments. Have a bias toward Channels. Only create a Team if a Channel in an existing Team won’t do the job. A Team is mostly just a group of Channels, so fewer Teams and more Channels is usually the right approach.

• Public vs Private Teams: Most Teams are Private, meaning that members need to be invited by the owner, and the onus is on the owner to ensure that only the right staff (or guests) have access. Public Teams can be seen and joined by anyone in the organization, so they are good for employee engagement and other purposes where confidentiality is not a concern.

• Standard vs Private Channels in a Team: Standard channels can be seen and accessed by everyone on the Team. Private channels have a separate membership list so you can hide a channel from everyone in the Team, but allow selected members access as needed. (Often managers in a group have a private channel to discuss confidential topics or share sensitive files not meant for everyone.)

• Here is a sample taxonomy that you can build on:
  • Departmental Teams
    • Use instead of traditional departmental file shares and email distribution lists.
    • Collaborate in channels by subject matter area combining channel chats, files, and relevant apps.
    • Use channel files in a similar way to subdirectories in a departmental file share.
    • The OneDrive client will allow staff to sync relevant file libraries to Windows Explorer or iOS/Android devices.
    • Membership can be managed by using existing Entra ID groups.
  • Project Teams
    • Use for collaboration on internal or external projects.
    • Centralize all project information, files, discussions, and decisions in the Team to minimize document versions, emails, and other disparate data locations.
    • Use a channel per subject matter area—if some channels need to have more limited access than the entire team, use a private channel with a separate membership list.
    • Guest access can be configured to allow collaboration with external vendors and access to common workspaces and files.
  • Cross-Functional Teams
    • Internal working groups or committees (Compliance, Security, Standards & Practices, etc.).
    • Employee interest groups (Wellness, Special Events, etc.).
    • Centers of Excellence: Create Teams to document training, employee development, and discussion groups for ongoing initiatives (Teams Adoption, Regulatory Subject Matter Expertise, AI Initiatives, etc.).