[ad_1]
Credit: Microsoft
It was too good to be true. Microsoft won’t add support for multi-user sign-ins to Teams in December 2020, at least not in the way that most of us expected. Instead, the true login with multiple work accounts in Teams sounds like something from 2021.
Earlier this week, a newly added Microsoft 365 roadmap item made it seem like Microsoft was finally delivering a long-requested Teams feature: the ability to switch between different work accounts in a single client. Teams (without having to resort to several workarounds)). Like other Microsoft observers, I wrote about the plan and more than 700 people liked my Tweet about that. It is definitely a pain point for many.
But as the week progressed, Microsoft quietly added a warning to that roadmap item:
“We are adding support within the Teams desktop to be able to add a personal account, along with a work / school account, change your profile picture, and switch between accounts and organizations through Settings.”
Note: This wording was not in the original Teams roadmap item. Thanks to Michel de Rooij and some others on Twitter who pointed this change out to me.
So while it is true that you will be able to switch from your work / school account to your personal account on the Teams desktop by December 2020, you will not be able to switch between multiple work accounts this year. My contacts say that’s something from 2021. (I haven’t heard if H1 or H2).
I asked Microsoft for a comment on the change of the roadmap and the date for the change of work account of several users and did not get a response.
Update (November 5): In response to one of several threads requesting the ability to log into multiple work accounts in Teams, this thread has almost 29,000 upvotes, Microsoft Teams engineering has added this update:
“The engineering team continues to work to add support for multiple accounts on desktop clients. We will first launch support for 1 work / school account and 1 personal account so that users can enjoy Teams for work and personal in parallel. MacOS. Support for multiple work accounts is still in progress and will come at a later date. ” (Thanks to Mark Allan for heads-up.)
Microsoft encourages people to try using Teams not only for work, but also for home or family projects. Microsoft began adding Consumer Teams functionality to its Teams clients for iOS and Android earlier this year. Consumer Teams features are available in preview for the Teams desktop, also, in the short term, according to Microsoft’s corporate vice president, Jeff Teper. I guess this shift between a one-time work-home account feature coming in December is part of that plan.
Switching between work accounts in Teams has been a top UserVoice request for years. I’d love to know the reason it’s not available in Teams yet, even though it’s available in Slack, as several people on Twitter have emphasized.
While we’re still waiting, Microsoft MVP Vesa Nopanen has some solution tips for those struggling with the need to log into Teams with multiple identities / accounts.
[ad_2]
