Teams

Microsoft Teams serves as an internal communication channel for students. Below are the teams and channels that you should follow daily during your studies.

Humak team

All communication concerning Humak students takes place within the Humak team and through its campus-specific channels. In addition, you will find channels in the team that deal with topics such as student well-being, RDI projects, and internationalization. The International channel is intended for international students, and the Open UAS channel is for students of the Open University of Applied Sciences.

All Humak degree students and staff are members of the team. Hide channels that you do not actively follow – this way, you will only receive messages about topics that are relevant to you.

Degree programme-specific teams

Communication related to your own degree programme takes place in degree programme-specific teams and their arrival group channels. Please note that you should follow several arrival group channels if, for example, you are progressing at a faster pace in your studies. In addition to students, the programme-spesific teams include Humak staff.

HUMAKO team

The HUMAKO team keeps you up to date on the student union’s advocacy work and events. This team does not include staff members (unless they also have student status at Humak).

Buddy Search team

In the Buddy Search team, you can find friends among Humak students for studying, sports, cultural experiences, or thesis partners. The team also includes staff who support student well-being.

Do you need your own team for a project?

You can also use Teams for group work and projects that are part of your studies at Humak by creating your own team for them. The founder of the team automatically becomes its owner and is responsible for adding other users to the team.

Properly configured notifications help you notice important messages without unnecessary interruptions. When you start using Teams, it is a good idea to configure both general and channel-specific notification settings.

First, check out Microsoft’s instructions:

• Key points about notifications
• Managing notifications

General notification settings

General notification settings apply by default to all channels.

1. Open Teams and click the three dots in the upper right corner → Settings and more → Settings → Notifications and activity.
2. Configure Missed activity emails: how often you receive notifications to your Humak email if you are not available in Teams. Recommendation: select Daily.
3. Then customize your chat and channel notifications as desired.

Channel-specific notifications

With channel-specific settings, you can override the general settings whenever needed.

1. Move your mouse over the channel name → three dots → Channel notifications.
2. Select the notification level according to the importance of the channel.
   • Banner and feed – a notification pops up on the screen and is visible in Activity on the left side of Teams.
   • Only show in feed – no pop-up, but visible in Activity on the left side of Teams.
   • Off – no notifications, but you can still follow the channel yourself.

Personal chat is suited for brief, one-to-one or small group communication. Use chat when the topic does not belong in a channel or when you need a quick reply from a specific person.

In chat, you can set a delivery option for your message via the + icon → Set delivery options:

• Important — the message receives an Important mark. Also available in channel posts.
• Urgent — the recipient receives repeated notifications every 2 minutes for 20 minutes until they read the message. Use only in genuine emergencies. Note: Available in chat only.

If needed, make a Teams call — but first check with a chat message that the call is convenient, even if the person’s status shows as available.

Clear communication practices help everyone stay on top of what matters. These guidelines keep our Teams channels functional and easy to follow. They apply to both channel messaging and personal chat.

Mentioning practices

A message posted to a channel is visible to all members without any mention. Use @channel or @team mentions only when the matter is genuinely urgent and relevant to everyone. Direct a message intended for a specific person with an @mention — this sends a notification only to them.

Reacting to messages

When you have read a message, add a reaction (e.g. ) – especially when the sender asks you to. A reaction lets the sender know that the message has reached you, and no separate ping is needed.

Subject lines

Always add a subject line to a channel post — it appears in the feed and immediately tells the reader whether the message is relevant to them.

Announcements

Important notices can be posted as an Announcement, which lets you add an image or background colour to the heading. Select Announcement (megaphone icon) as the post type → add a subject line and an image if you wish.

Important mark

You can add an Important mark to a channel post, which gives the message a red exclamation mark and the text “IMPORTANT!”. This is a good alternative to @channel mentions for urgent messages. The setting can be found under the + icon → Set delivery options → Important.

Replying and reacting

Always respond to the original message using Reply — this keeps the conversation threaded. React with an emoji when a separate reply is not needed. You can edit a message after sending it: hover over the message → More options (…) → Edit.

Choosing the right channel

Post your message in the channel that matches the topic. Before asking a question in a channel, use the Teams Search function (magnifying glass icon at the top) — the answer may already exist in earlier messages.