Microsoft 365 Admin Monthly Digest

Welcome to the Microsoft 365 IT admin blog, your monthly source of tips, insights, and best practices for managing and optimizing your Microsoft 365 environment. In this edition, get ready for the next AMA on Microsoft 365 Copilot, learn about Bing Chat Enterprise, and the latest enhancements to the Microsoft 365 admin center. We'll be hosting the next AMA focused on Microsoft 365 Copilot and Bing Chat Enterprise on August 10 in the Microsoft 365 Copilot Tech Community. Particularly for Microsoft 365 admins, Microsoft 365 Backup was introduced to help you back up and quickly restore your organization's data to a prior point-in-time after a catastrophic event or unforeseen data loss. You can access the service through the Microsoft 365 admin center, Org settings > Microsoft Edge to configure Microsoft Edge browser settings for your organization and apply these settings by group assignment or group policy. In continued efforts to make it easier for IT departments to manage change with greater predictability, Microsoft recently made feature release status in the message center for Teams, and Outlook on the web, and Microsoft 365 admin center available worldwide to customers. As always, stay current with the latest updates Microsoft 365 admin center from the Microsoft 365 roadmap and the message center. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3OLLJH3 Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Introducing Teams Essentials and Teams Phone together, now available at a special price.

To help SMBs improve their collaboration, Microsoft is now making it easy to buy and adopt Microsoft Teams Essentials and Microsoft Teams Phone at the same time with a special promotional bundle and a choice of calling plans. Teams Essentials is a stand-alone, cloud-based Teams app, for SMBs who do not have an active Microsoft 365 Business subscription-facilitating online meetings, chat, and collaborative file sharing all in one app-available on desktop or mobile. Teams Phone is a cloud-based phone system built specifically to compliment Teams. Learn more about Teams Phone and newly available features. For new customers, we are introducing special promotional offer that includes both Teams Essentials plus Teams Phone with a choice of calling plans. For businesses that already have Teams Essentials or Microsoft 365 and are actively using Teams today, you can add Teams Phone with a choice of calling plans. The discount offer is available to new and existing customers who license a 12-month Microsoft Teams Essentials and Microsoft Teams Phone bundle through Direct and CSP direct channels between July 17, 2023, and January 17, 2024. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/43EiOss Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Business Blog

Fighting crime in real time Microsoft The Intrazone podcast

In this episode, we dig into two real-time, data-driven public service scenarios - both about systems and people that support policing at-scale. You'll hear solution-oriented clips pulled from two episodes of the 'Public Sector Future' podcast, with show host Olivia Neal - Director of Public Sector Center of Expertise at Microsoft. Then a conversation with Joseph Courtesis, former Inspector of the NYPD who helped rationalize millions of data points from multiple data sources to save police time, in real time. Watch your head as we head down to the precincts and learn how tech and people are working on solutions to help fight crime. Be sure to visit our show page to hear all episodes, access the show notes, and get bonus content. Stay connected to the SharePoint community blog where we'll share more information per episode, guest insights, and take any questions or suggestions from our listeners and SharePoint users. The Intrazone, a show about the Microsoft 365 intelligent intranet. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/43MLZJL Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

View and edit shape data in Visio for the web

Today, we're excited to announce that users with a Visio Plan 1 or Visio Plan 2 license will now be able to view and also edit shape data in the Visio Editor. Here, they can easily view and also edit the existing shape data, which is accessible in the Shape Data pane by right-clicking on a shape in the diagram. To view shape data for an object in a diagram via the Visio Editor, right-click the shape and then select Shape Data from the drop-down menu. How to edit and add shape data in Visio for the web. An image of the Shape Data pane demonstrating how to select and edit existing shape data. An image of the Shape Data pane demonstrating how to add shape data. Check out what features are in development or coming soon on the Microsoft 365 Roadmap, or view roadmap item View and edit shape data in Visio for the web. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3rLAZ2g Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

June 2023 content updates for Microsoft 365 learning pathways

We are happy to announce new content updates to Microsoft 365 learning pathways, our free and customizable, on-demand training solution. The June 2023 update included new playlists for Microsoft Loop and Microsoft Viva Goals, under the Microsoft 365 training section. Since 2019, M365LP has been helping drive healthy usage and adoption of Microsoft 365 apps and services, providing customers with content streamed from Microsoft for key services such as Microsoft Teams, Office apps, Planner and more. Microsoft 365 learning pathways, your customizable, on-demand training solution. Our upcoming releases will include Viva Engage and Yammer in August, and Viva Insights and Viva Topics in September. Use this new content and our upcoming releases as an opportunity to update your app and re-engage your users. On-demand, micro training is a great way to help people learn in the flow of work. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3OqGZ9w Source: Microsoft Tech Community Driving Adoption Blog

Introducing a new SharePoint Web UI kit!

Today we are excited to launch our first modern UI toolkit to help our customers to confidently design their SharePoint sites and pages. We've used Figma, the industry standard tool for web design, to deliver a set of web parts, styles, and templates that make creating engaging sites much easier than was previously possible. The first iteration of the SharePoint Web UI kit will allow you to design a company and organization news communications site based on the example provided in the SharePoint look book. Add and configure web parts with ease the Figma components for each web part include sizes for each section type. Edit the web parts and add your content to finalize your design. This tool kit includes detailed guidance on how to update and modify the content for each part of the site including the header and footer, sections, and web parts. We will be publishing regular updates to the toolkit, and plan to add more templates and capabilities, including Team sites, more web parts, and multiple form factors including mobile. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3XWHGdE Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

Bing Chat Enterprise FAQ

At Microsoft Inspire, we announced Bing Chat Enterprise, AI-powered chat for work that lets organizations confidently take their first steps generative AI. Bing Chat Enterprise, available in Preview, gives your organization AI-powered chat for work with commercial data protection. Once they do so, they'll see that Bing Chat Enterprise has a unique design that distinguishes it from the consumer version of Bing Chat. Bing Chat Enterprise offers the generative AI capabilities of Bing Chat with commercial data protection. Bing Chat Enterprise with commercial data protection means user and business data is protected and will not leak outside the organization, chat data is not saved, Microsoft has no eye-on access to it, and chat data is not used to train our underlying models. Just like Bing Chat, Bing Chat Enterprise answers complex questions by distilling information from multiple web sources into a single response. Initially, chat history, plugin support, Bing Image Creator and Visual Search in Chat are not supported in Bing Chat Enterprise. Users can provide feedback on specific chat responses as well directly from the Bing Chat Enterprise interface by giving a 'thumbs up' or 'thumbs down' and providing more specific comments. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3K5iig9 Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

SMB security New innovations from Microsoft Inspire 2023

Microsoft 365 Business Premium and Microsoft Defender for Business bring enterprise-grade security to SMB customers and partners in tailored solutions that are affordable and easy to use. New security product innovations to help you stay secure. Mobile Threat Defense protects your business from threats on mobile devices, Automatic Attack Disruption defends against sophisticated attacks, and Security Summary Reports provide visibility into security health. Security partners are in an especially important position when it comes to helping customers understand the value of the security solutions they offer. These reports allow partners to easily demonstrate the value of their security investments by highlighting the threats prevented by Defender for Business, the status from Microsoft Secure Score, and recommendations for improving security. Whether you are an established security solutions provider building your own Security Operations Center or want to resell security services, our suite of tools and integrations provides the perfect starting point. Microsoft 365 Lighthouse Innovations - security baselines and configuration drift reports. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3DgPRbg Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Business Blog