Reply to post: Teams has lept 2 organisations I work with afloat through Covid

Teams has lept 2 organisations I work with afloat through Covid

Whilst all the usual Microsoft haters are piling on I think there is room for the opposite view. When the Pandemic hit I was working in a County Council Social Services Department implementing new the finance modules of a care management application. We had to go from 300-400 concurrent remote workers at any time to over 3000 in a matter of days. We also moved from mostly Face to Face meetings with very occasional teams meetings to all meetings being on teams. Whilst I don't love Teams its no worse than most other corporate comms systems I've used. I was able pretty much able to decamp home, buy another monitor and better webcam and hook up a hi fi to my docking station and just work.

I have had issues like everyone else but working from a rural location with occasionally very dodgy broadband and no 4g signal to fall back on I've been very happy with the product. Mid Pandemic I changed roles to lead a systems Implementation in the NHS this has been a roller coaster project and we use teams not just within the project team but across 3 health trusts and 3 external providers. Its been an absolute life saver with most of both Our and the vendors teams still working remotely due to Covid Safety protocols.

During the implementation we've trained 1500 colleagues in the use of the new system, recorded videos for future reference and support using teams and provided 1-1 support using screen sharing as we could not use floor walkers. On a project spread across several hundred square miles doing this virtually has been a huge efficiency.

This working method is likely to become the norm over the next few years as the Trusts do not have the physical capacity to accommodate project teams across their existing estates and Teams will be the foundation for the delivery of projects, not having to hire additional office space for project teams will be a significant saving. I know I'm picking up the costs of running my own office but at a personal level it means I dont have a 2-3 hour a day commute I typically have on projects and I have my Labrador snoozing under the desk to keep me company.