Course description

Your organisation uses Microsoft 365, and your team has moved, or is about to move, its files and conversations into Teams and SharePoint. This course shows you how to work there with confidence: where files really live, how to run channels people actually use, how to share without oversharing, and how to keep a workspace tidy once it's built.

It's written for office workers, team leads and the person in a small office who ends up helping colleagues with IT. You start with the map: how Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive fit together, and why a file sent in a chat isn't stored in the same place as a file posted in a channel. You then learn channel habits, meetings, co-authoring, SharePoint libraries with columns and views, version history and the recycle bin, sharing links and permission levels, Microsoft Lists, syncing and working offline, search, naming plans and security habits. Menus move and the new and classic layouts differ, so the lessons describe each feature by what it does as well as where to find it.

There are 10 sections and 50 written lessons, each with a worked example, common slips, questions people often ask and a short exercise to try, and each section ends with a short quiz. You follow Merula, the office manager at a made-up firm of building surveyors in Lincoln, as she moves the firm off its old shared drive, and in the final project you help a made-up food charity set up its own workspace. Every section has a practice pack with a worksheet, example answers, a cheat sheet and worked examples, plus reference sheets, step checklists, planning worksheets with answer keys, sample naming and permission plans, diagrams drawn for the course and made-up Word and Excel files for practising uploads.

What you'll learn

• Getting started and where files live: how Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive fit together, where chat and channel files are really stored, finding your way round the Teams window and a first-week plan.
• Chats and channels: when to use a chat and when a channel, standard, private and shared channels, naming and planning channels, and keeping up without overload.
• Posting, replying and good manners in channels: posts with clear subjects, replies that stay in the thread, mentions, formatting, tone, response times and a team charter.
• Meetings in Teams: scheduling from the calendar, a chat or a channel, joining, sharing your screen safely, recording and transcription, and notes with actions.
• Files in Teams and working together: uploading and creating files, opening them in Teams, the browser or the app, co-authoring, comments and moving away from email attachments.
• SharePoint sites and document libraries: team and communication sites, finding your way round a site, libraries and folders, metadata columns and views that sort, filter and group.
• Versions, sharing and permissions: version history, the recycle bin, the kinds of sharing link, owners, members and visitors, and sharing safely with people outside.
• Lists, syncing and working offline: Microsoft Lists, building a tracker, syncing libraries to File Explorer, Files On-Demand and avoiding duplicate copies.
• Finding things, keeping tidy and staying secure: searching Teams and SharePoint, a naming plan, archiving and retention basics, security habits and a tidy-up routine.
• Final project: a small team's workspace: planning and setting up a workspace for a made-up charity, from channels and library to permissions, naming and handover.

Who it's for

Office workers who use Teams and SharePoint at work, team leads who set up channels and libraries, and small-office IT helpers who look after them. You need a work or school Microsoft 365 account and to be comfortable with the basics of a computer, email and Word. No experience of SharePoint is needed.

What this course is, and isn't

This course is for people who use and organise Teams and SharePoint, not for administrators. It explains what admins control, such as sharing settings, guests, retention and who can create teams, but not how to change those settings. Menu and button names come from Microsoft's own support and Learn pages, read on 1 November 2026, and may look different on your screen. Data protection is explained as general information, not legal advice, and your organisation's own rules come first. It doesn't cover licences or prices. Wymark Quorley Ltd, Cobwell Community Larder, Merula and every other person and file in the course are fictional.

What will I learn?

• Explain how Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive fit together, and where chat files and channel files are stored
• Choose between a chat and a channel, and plan standard and private channels with clear names and descriptions
• Write channel posts, replies and mentions that are easy to follow, and agree a short team charter
• Schedule, join and share your screen in Teams meetings, and follow up with notes and actions
• Upload, open and co-author files in Teams, use comments, and share links instead of attachments
• Find your way round a SharePoint site and organise a document library with columns and views
• Restore earlier versions and deleted files, and share files with the right link and permissions
• Build a simple tracker in Microsoft Lists, sync libraries to File Explorer and work offline without duplicate copies
• Search Teams and SharePoint, write a naming plan, keep a workspace tidy and follow good security habits
• Plan and set up a small team's workspace from channels and library to permissions, naming and handover

Frequently asked questions