This entry is part of our Feature Review Series. These short, to the point blogs, strive to provide a quick snapshot of information to a user looking for a quick overview of a feature, how it’s managed or configured, some insight into how a business/organization would use it, and provide links to resources or tutorials for a deeper dive.
Collaboration is a critical component of many organizations in our current world. Between users spread out geographically and the fact that many users are on the go, the ability to collaborate with colleagues is a staple necessity.
Much of this collaborative effort centers around Microsoft Teams, but in many cases organizations want the ability to have collaborative interactions with colleagues about their sales, customer service, or really any kind of business records stored within their CRM system.
This integration is being rolled out, and it looks fantastic. Enabling options for both Teams Chat and Teams Channel integration, users now have a great deal of flexibility to condense their core systems by leveraging these powerful features.
In our previous entry, we covered the Teams Chat integration and showed how that’s set-up. In this article, we’ll focus on the Channel integration feature, allowing users the ability to pin reviews or records into Teams so they can access the records without leaving the Teams experience.
How to Enable D365 Record Integration
To enable this feature, navigate to the admin portal (admin.powerplatform.com) and select the D365 environment you wish to enable Teams integration within.
Once in, expand the Integration section and click Teams Integration Settings.
Clicking this will load a new tab in your browser and provide several options to choose from, as shown below.
There are several options available:
- Turn on the linking of Dynamics 365 records to Microsoft Teams channels. This feature permits the pinning of records or views only from within Microsoft Teams.
- Turn on Enhanced Microsoft Teams Integration. This extends the functionality to pin records or views from Dynamics 365 as well.
- Turn on Confidential Labels. This option is only available when the enhanced integration is turned on, and allows for the creation/use of private Teams and the addition of sensitivity/confidentiality labels. Clicking this will ask the administrator to sign in and approve the use of several features.
Let’s explore what happens when you turn these features on, starting with the basic integration (first item noted above).
How to Set Up Basic Integration of Dynamics 365 app + Microsoft Teams
When this feature is enabled, users can install the Dynamics 365 app within Microsoft Teams. To do this within Teams, users can click the ellipses on the left to add an app, and search for Dynamics, then click the Dynamics 365 icon that appears.
This will install Dynamics 365 within Teams for the user. Before the user begins, they will be prompted to click the Settings tab to enter some information.
Clicking Settings will prompt them to select the appropriate environment and app to use within the integration.
Once these have been identified by the user and Save Changes has been clicked, the user can navigate to the My Dashboard tab and Dynamics 365 will load as if you’re looking at the standard web-application. The user can now interact with the system as they normally would, opening records, inputting data, and reviewing their dashboards.
Basic Integration Continued…
Alternatively, a view or record can be added to a Channel within a Team. To do this, navigate to the Team and Channel you wish to add the record or view to and click the + symbol to add a new tab.
Search Dynamics and click Dynamics 365.
A new window will appear asking for the user to select either a record (Entity Selection) or a view (View Selection). In our example, we’ll embed the Active Accounts view.
Clicking “Save” will embed this view as a tab within the Channel.
The integration of D365 and Microsoft Teams brings together two of the tools an organization user can use to navigate their day and be productive. By increasingly the level of collaboration amongst team members, organizations can position themselves to win more deals and delight customers.
Need help integrating these tools? Looking for a Microsoft consultant? Reach out to our team at C5 Insight!
