Permissions Are a Pain! (Episode 53 Transcript)

Following is the transcript from our recent 1,001 Business Problems Solved With Microsoft Teams podcast episode:

Happy Monday, you business adventurers! Everybody hates managing permissions, right? Today, I’m going to tell you how to set permissions one time and never mess with them again using Teams. It’s so simple that I bet you’ll wish you had learned this simple Teams practice back in 2017 when Teams first stormed the scene.

My name is Annie Rynd and I bring you a solution to a business problem every Monday and sometimes again during the week if time allows and I’m feeling more industrious than usual.

Oh, while I’m telling you who I am and that this is the 1,001 Business Problems Solved with Microsoft Teams podcast, I’d like for you to pause this episode and do me a huge solid by clicking the five stars rating in your podcast app. If you really, really like our weekly episodes, even consider leaving a review telling others what you like about it.

We’re still super young as far as podcasts go and growth depends on good ratings and reviews. Thanks in advance!

Anyway, back to that super simple solution for eliminating some confusion around permissions. Confusion around permissions has been a perennial problem in business, dating back to the 1980s when computers first burst upon the business scene.

With this simple fundamental lesson on Teams, you’ll learn how to set permissions on workgroup collaboration, files, and other applications one time and never have to do it again.

Now, let me start off by saying that if you’re using OneDrive for your shared workgroup files, please listen up. OneDrive is for personal work files. Files that are meant for a workgroup should always be stored in Teams or a specially designed SharePoint document library.

If you'd like to know more about OneDrive versus Teams for file storage, be sure to go back and listen to episode 31. It tells you when to use OneDrive and when to use Teams. If you're brand new to Teams, that one is a must-listen!

By moving shared workgroup files to Teams from OneDrive, you’ll eliminate a lot of permissions housekeeping, clutter, and headaches and you’ll never have to set permissions on files for that workgroup again. OneDrive isn’t built to do that.

So, get your notebooks out and take down some notes.

Most people don't know this, but when you create a Teams site, you get a Microsoft 365 security group behind the scenes. It not only applies to that Teams site, but it's available for you to use all across your three sixty-five environment. That’s golden.

When you create a teams site, you're also creating a container – the teams site – that will be open to all members of the team and closed to everyone else.

I know this is super duper elementary to you Teams veterans, but you’d be shocked to learn that most of our new clients do not understand this fundamental fact about Teams.

The benefit of creating this walled-off workspace for a workgroup is that you can rest assured that anything placed within that Teams site automatically inherits that team members only permissions. That goes for all files, communications, and apps you place inside the site. It's such a handy thing!

Yes, that’s right. You set the permissions once and never have to do it again.

So, for those of you who have just had a eureka moment, here’s what you can do to eliminate your permissions chaos for workgroup files. And please note that this also goes for those files you have on some 1990s physical server that you’re still paying for.

First, create a Teams site and add each workgroup employee as a team member.

Second, and this is a best practice we developed years ago, create a channel called Z archive. That’s z as in zebra, dash, archive. We put the z in front of the word archive so it's out of the way at the bottom of your channels list.

Third, explain to your team members that you’re going to move all workgroup files into that new channel and make sure they understand how to access it. That’s not a hard thing, but you certainly don’t want any disruptions to their work caused by confusion.

Fourth, move all your shared workgroup files into that z archive channel. Note that this is a temporary storage location until you strategically create your final channels and move the files into their final storage locations. It’s purpose is to immediately solve your permissions chaos and get your files off your budget-draining server.

If your files are on a physical server, simply copy everything over, keeping the original folder structure so your employees don’t get confused. Remember, you’re going to better organize later with your awesome set of channels, but this will at least get you started.

Now, here’s a huge cautionary warning. Please highlight this in your notes.

Since you’re working in a connected environment and a browser-like setting, there is always a chance of a dropped connection or other glitch.

For this reason, you should never drag and drop even though it’s an option. Also, don’t cut and paste files and folders into the new z-archive channel.

That’s because if your connection gets interrupted, you very well may lose important files forever.

Be sure to copy and paste the folders and files, then count the number of folders and files to ensure everything transferred, and only then delete files from the original location.

I know that’s an extra step, but you must do it.

We once had a motivated client who – on his own and without alerting us – tried to cut and paste all his files into the new location one weekend and lost many valuable files forever. There was no getting them back, no matter how hard we tried.

Let his mistake be your reminder to always copy, paste, and verify before deleting old files.

So, to summarize today’s solution…Build a teams site for your workgroup and add everyone to that team. Copy and paste all workgroup files into your z-archive channel, and never have to set permissions for another workgroup file.

Don’t forget that if you are brand new to Teams, go over to teams quick start dot com and take our free 30-minute online course so you can learn how to build out the rest of your teams site to streamline other group functions.

I hope this fundamental file management episode sets you on your way to finally getting control of your workgroup files. If it does, please refer it to your business golf buddies so they can streamline their own file management and have more time to meet you at the clubhouse!

Until next week, this is Annie, signing off!