Overview
While Microsoft Teams and Zoom Meetings are similar and have some overlapping capabilities they focus on and cover two very different areas for Smith & Howard. At a high level they are both for collaboration, but deeper down Microsoft Teams is focused inward on the Firm and Zoom Meetings is focused outward toward client collaboration.
Goal for Zoom Meetings
Zoom is first and foremost a voice and video collaboration platform for us. We are using it to replace our WebEx, 1-800-Conference, and all other conference and collaboration platforms we have had, or you may have used that was provided by the Firm.
Zoom is set to become the tool we use for external meetings with clients, our meeting platform for when we need phone and dial in service. We are effectively consolidating down to just the Zoom platform with plan to expand our offering to include Zoom enabled conference rooms in the office in the future. Finally, it is also the tool we will use for client facing Webinars and virtual events that will be put on by the Firm as we move forward into a post COVID-19 world.
Zoom Meetings can be used internally and is good for larger virtual meetings or when looking to extend an internal meeting to a larger virtual audience.
Goal for Microsoft Teams
Teams is our new internal collaboration and chat platform. It will first and foremost replace Jabber for chat, but not for phone. While it can do video chat and voice chat it is not enabled to allow people to call in from a phone and it does not include the ability to do Webinars. It will not support external non-Firm users. It will however integrate with Microsoft Office, our Office 365 tools including SharePoint, Planner, and Streams.
Microsoft Teams is to be used only with internal personnel and chat, with some video and voice capabilities.
Comparison of Teams and Zoom
Below is a quick comparison of Teams and Zoom to help you know when to use each
Feature |
Teams |
Zoom |
|---|---|---|
| Supports non-S&H users | û |
ü |
| Client, Vendors, & non-S&H users can be invited to a meeting | û |
ü |
| Client, Vendors, & non-S&H users can invite you to a meeting | ü |
ü |
| Chat | ü |
~1 |
| Persistent chat/history | ü |
û |
| Group chat | ü |
û |
Mobile Device chat |
ü |
~1 |
| Persistent Team Groups | ü |
û |
| Discussion Channels | ü |
û |
| Document Storage | ü |
~1 |
| Document Co-Editing | ü |
û |
| MS Office Integration | ü |
û |
| Outlook Integration | ü |
ü |
| # Of Simultaneous Users | 100 | 300 |
| # Of Simultaneous Video on Screen | 8 | 50 |
| Phone dial in/ Phone only conf | û |
ü |
| Presenter only mode (one-way meeting) | û |
ü |
| Instant Meetings | ~2 |
ü |
|
Webinar Broadcast |
û |
ü |
| Password protect meetings | û |
ü |
| Manage who can enter the meeting “room” | ü |
ü |
|
Features such as Polls and Questions |
û |
ü |
| Replaces Cisco Jabber | ü |
û |
| Replace 800-Conference, GoToMeeting, etc. | û |
ü |
| Support meeting recordings and download | û |
ü |
| Support Breakout Rooms | û |
ü |
~1 Zoom has chat and document sharing while in a meeting for all participants but is not intended for general chat and does not fully support this, especially on mobile devices. All chats and documents are lost when the meeting is ended unless saved or recorded/
~2 Microsoft Teams allows for instant meetings, but only with other Smith & Howard personnel