
Fotolia
What is a SharePoint document conversation?
Businesses that move to SharePoint Online may not be making the most of the migration. One feature that is gaining popularity is SharePoint document conversations.
Efficiency is one of the keys to success -- especially if you're working in a fast-paced industry where every click counts.
SharePoint made collaboration and communication more efficient with a feature called SharePoint document conversations. SharePoint document conversations have existed for a few years now, but they've gained popularity as more companies migrate SharePoint content to the cloud.
Many organizations are just now reaching a point in migrating their SharePoint content to the cloud, where they're aware of SharePoint document conversations and able to make optimal use of them. Businesses rarely accomplish a full migration from SharePoint on premises to SharePoint Online, as they often can't migrate legacy customizations, and SharePoint Online has been slow to replicate many features of the traditional platform. Content migration is typically piecemeal, and businesses adopt the document conversation feature in the resulting hybrid implementations.
Benefits of SharePoint document conversation
A SharePoint document conversation is the result of Microsoft's integration of SharePoint Online and the Yammer social network that enables users to share ideas, feedback and opinions around documents stored in the SharePoint content management system.
Perhaps the most convenient aspect of the document conversation is that users don't have to open another app to initiate it. Users can seek feedback or expertise by commenting directly within the document.
This is particularly useful in the context of Teams, the lightweight successor to SharePoint's classic collaboration suite. Project participants can readily review and discuss documents generated within Teams. For all of this to work, the user must configure Yammer as the default social network of the enterprise within Office 365.
SharePoint document conversations are not limited to only documents; users can initiate them from images, videos or any other content objects stored in SharePoint. The document conversation functionality itself is not just limited to SharePoint, but it's also available in OneDrive for Business.