SharePoint lists and libraries and Teams recently received a new automation feature that makes building real workflows simple. And you do it directly from within the list or library or channel. And hey, it's called: Workflows.

You can automate a variety of actions from SharePoint into Teams or vice versa, like starting a new chat in Teams based on a new list item that gets created. It also includes triggers and actions for Outlook (i.e. Send an email), Planner (i.e. Create a task), Copilot (i.e. Prompt an agent), and more. Pair this with a flight of new Quick steps and Approvals features and you’ve got a growing set of automation tools meant for everyone.

“The updated Workflows experience in SharePoint brings automation directly into the context of the content you’re working with, whether that’s a document library or a list … discover, create, and manage workflows without leaving your flow of work.” — John Mighell, Director, Product Marketing, Microsoft SharePoint and OneDrive, Microsoft

The video below showcases workflow creation from within a list, creating a post in a specified Teams channel each time a new list item gets created. You’ll see what it’s like to create a new workflow, run it, edit it, and see the output. Plus, you’ll get a peek-and-prove that Power Automate is the true engine behind it all AND that flows can be modified within the Power Automate design canvas.

Just look for the “Workflows” button

You’ll find it within the top command bar of SharePoint lists and libraries. And in Teams, it hangs off a channel’s “…” menu or within lists and libraries that are added as channel tab apps.

Whether you are in SharePoint or Teams, you can create and manage workflows directly from your files and lists, and it’s the same user experience (UX) across apps. You can start with ready‑to‑use templates that already understand your site, list, library, or team context. Or, you can build from scratch using a manual Mad Libs® style approach to select preferred triggers and actions. And, no matter where and how you start, you can extend further in Power Automate when.

The below example is a workflow, in edit mode, that gets triggered when a list item is modified and then creates a new task in a specific Planner plan, assigned to a specific user.

🎓 Learn more

• “Automation updates for smarter workflows & business processes” by Nate Tennant (SharePoint community blog)

In the end …

My hope for you after reading this article and watching the above video, is that workflow becomes your road more taken. Do not agonize over app-switch decisions. Do not miss out on the actions of others. Automate your work life.

Don’t think twice. And that will have made all the difference.

Cheers, Mark “in the flow of Flows” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now

One question with lists and libraries is often: How can I get this to work better for me? To do more for me. This can emerge as aspirational ‘automation’ AND equally effective reliable ‘notifications’. No matter, it’s all about being informed and taking action — with fewer clicks (and fewer doubts).

To do this better, enter Quick steps: Putting automation and notification “where work happens”, inside SharePoint lists and libraries, for your items and files respectively. You define them according to your business processes, with very little setup.

Plan to do more for yourself (and your team members). Quick steps can Draft an email, Start a Teams chat, Set a value, and Execute a flow all from the comforts of your list or library (slippers optional). Below is how to get started…

So, here are the (quick) steps to using Quick steps within the Quick steps column, along with a few (quick) tips and (quick) tricks…

1️⃣ Add a new Quick Steps column: From within your list or library, click Add column > ⚡️Quick steps. In the right-hand edit pane, type a name for your column and then click Add a quick step under the Quick steps section.

TIP 💡 If you create a Quick step with a SharePoint document library, you get a few extra step choices. Two being: Move file or folder and Copy file or folder - both of which give you some nice, actionable content’able outcomes at the click of a Quick steps button.

2️⃣ Define your Quick step using a Mad Libs® style approach: Sort of like saying, "Give me a verb ending in -ing," you’ll type in and point and click to choose the data and behavior of your quick step.

In the example pictured below, I wanted a quick step that would set the value of the Status column to the established choice: Published. You can name the quick step (what then visibly appears on the button in your Quick step column). Then, in practice, when I click the We’re done! button, it updates the list item’s Status to “Published".

TIP 💡 Set a condition to make the buttons appear, or not. This is useful when certain actions don’t make sense once an item or file reaches a certain phase or status (as shown above).

Try it and I’m certain you’ll soon be a SharePoint Mad Lib® prompter saying, “Give me metadata ending in a conditionally-based Choice column.” [mic drop] 😉

3️⃣ See the Quick steps button(s) appear within the new column: Once you’ve created your new column and established at least one quick step within it, it/they will then appear as clickable button(s) in that column. And note that the top items don’t show any quick steps since they are all set to status: Published. AKA, they no longer (conditionally) need to be there.

NOTE 📝 From my testing, a Quick steps column only works in list view. AKA, they do not work in Gallery, Calendar, or Board views. 😐

4️⃣ Quick steps, once created, also appear at the top of the Integrate menu: A quick history lesson | Before the Quick steps column was released, you created quick steps from within the then Automate menu. They would then dynamically appear at the top when you selected a list item. A few months ago, Microsoft removed the Automate menu and consolidated its actions into the all-powerful Integrate menu.

Thus today, quick steps appear at the top of the dynamic Integrate menu (see image below). And they obey your set conditions. If an item doesn’t qualify for a quick step, by your design, you won’t see it listed/appear for that list item or file.

BONUS | Ready to see all this and more - in action?

Here’s a thorough 14+ minute demo video 📺 Microsoft MVP, Giuliano De Luca, that showcases how Quick steps work in SharePoint lists and document libraries: How to create and manage them, including various scenarios and his own helpful (quick) tips:

Learn more 🧐 Create a quick step for your list or library (Microsoft Support).

Additional resources

• “Automation updates for smarter workflows & business processes” by John Mighell (SharePoint community blog)

• “Introduction to modern automation features in SharePoint“ by Nate Tennant (Microsoft Community YouTube)

Cheers, Mark “Automaton” Kashman 🤖🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now

It’s time to “talk to SharePoint!” That’s the big takeaway from my chat with Cory - you can, and should, talk to SharePoint. Its natural user interface (NUI) is ready. It’s the new face of productivity. If you’re exploring all the things Copilot can do within Microsoft 365, this chat highlights what to expect when your Copilot license lights up SharePoint.

I got the chance to catch up with Cory Newton-Smith about all things Copilot in SharePoint with clarity on core value, recent releases, and use cases that bolster internal collaboration and communication. Cory leads the AI efforts within the SharePoint product team at Microsoft focused on "AI-first content solutions and enrichments." She’s been in the AI business, starting with Viva Sales > Copilot for Sales > Sales Agent, recently joining the SharePoint team a little over two years ago to up level their AI game!

In the discussion, Cory and I talk about:

• Copilot in SharePoint as it is now, June 2026.

• The naming journey: Knowledge Agent > AI in SharePoint > Copilot in SharePoint. [Trivia: It was originally “Copilot in SharePoint” back in May 2023 😀]

• Using AI to work with lists, libraries, and pages.

• Skills, Agent Assets library, and how to get started.

• What’s ahead on the roadmap 🛣️ [hint: things might get visual, HTML’y and dashboard’y]

If your Copilot license is in hand or on the horizon, SharePoint is a great first/next use case. Turns out, the best person to ask about your SharePoint content is SharePoint.

Give it a try. Happy ShareChatting!

🔗 Helpful resources

• “AI Skills Are Now in Public Preview: Teaching AI in SharePoint What to Know and How to Act” (Tech Community)

• Introduction to Copilot in SharePoint (YouTube)

• Microsoft 365 Copilot in SharePoint help & learning (Microsoft Support)

• pnp | sharepoint-skills repo (GitHub) - A curated library of AI skills for the latest AI features in SharePoint.

• Zach Rosenfield’s SharePoint AI (YouTube) - 23 videos and growing.

Get more from Mark Kashman in the Substack app

Available for iOS and Android

Get the app

Now, if you want to add a little personality to your site, know that you can. This article focuses on both a top-down method — the SharePoint brand center, the middle-down — theming of SharePoint hub sites, and the side-out options for every site owner — the coveted “Change the look” panel. To round it out, we’ll end things covering numerous other “design” features for SharePoint pages.

OK, let us discover the creative, colorful side of SharePoint. 🎨

SharePoint brand center (Custom fonts, colors, and images)

Every organization has a brand — a set of colors, fonts, and images (ref. organization asset library), that make your communications look and feel like you. The challenge is making sure everyone across your organization can leverage it all consistently.

You can establish a SharePoint brand center as the central location to store and publish numerous brand building blocks to manage and apply your brand.

The result: everyone spends less time searching for or applying the right colors or fonts. The choices will simply appear for them in a managed fashion that makes IT and broader brand ambassadors happy.

Learn more about SharePoint brand center.

Inherit a site theme from a SharePoint hub site

One level down from brand center are hub sites. Hub sites have special powers. You get shared navigation, scoped search across the hub and associated sites, and the ability to roll up content from associated sites with web parts like News, Highlighted content, and Events. And in the context of brand adherence, a SharePoint hub site shares its theme to all its numerous associated sites.

When you associate your site with a SharePoint hub site, your site inherits the look (theme) of the hub site; less design freedom for individual site owners, which is actually a feature (consistency), not a bug. And you can inherit themes and colors from the above-mentioned Brand Center that then can be applied to the hub that then flow right into all its associated sites — a true top-down design model.

NOTE: Sites associated with a SharePoint hub site don’t inherit the permissions of the hub site by default. Users who have permissions to the hub site but not to the associate site don’t see any content from the associated site.

Learn more about SharePoint hub sites.

Site settings > Change the look (Theme, Header, Navigation, Footer)

While your organization’s Brand Center sets the overall standards for your brand and SharePoint hub sites further support consistency, individual site owners may want a bit more control over how their specific site looks and feels. That’s where the Change the look panel comes in.

Change the look is a simple edit pane in SharePoint that lets site owners customize the appearance of their site without needing any special design skills. From the Change the look pane, a site owner can adjust:

• Theme — Choose a color palette for your site, either from your organization’s pre-approved options or from SharePoint’s default selections.

• Font — Choose the font style (typography package) used throughout the site and for the site title (adjusted in the Header tab).

• Header — Control how the top of your site looks: how tall it is, whether the site logo and title appear, and whether you want a background color or image behind them.

• Navigation — Site menus can run horizontally or vertically, and whether they expand into a larger “mega menu” style.

• Footer — Add links, a logo, and a background color or image (for communication sites).

NOTE: What you see in Change the look may be shaped by what your organization has already set up. If your IT or brand team has defined approved themes or fonts through the Brand Center, those will appear as your options. If you don’t see the Change the look option, either: 1) You’re not a site owner, or 2) The look and feel is being inherited from the parent hub site.

Learn more how to change the look of your SharePoint site and awareness of how to change the look of a hub site and its associated sites.

Additional page design and layout options

Page templates | Microsoft has been rolling out a gallery of new page templates covering common scenarios like training, how-to, trip report, project check-in, and event recap — a healthy set to get a sense of the art of the possible (just know you have to adjust a lot to make them your own).

Sections and columns | You can split pages into one, two, or three columns, add full-width sections, use vertical columns, apply background colors to sections, and use flexible sections to resize and overlap web parts. These are probably the biggest design levers most page creators don’t fully use.

Images & Visual Assets | It never hurts to put an image on the home page. Microsoft offers a wide variety of stock images for your use throughout your intranet. And don’t forget about ALT text for anyone searching for the page or viewing via a screen reader. Last an FYI: You can select a custom background image for your page sections vs. solid colors.

Conditional formatting in lists and libraries | Take design steps to reduce the cognitive load of working in a list or library. Apply colors, visual indicators, and styling automatically based on the data in your list. This helps people scan the information better. Form + Function; my favorite.

In the end…

Beyond making SharePoint fashionable, the look and feel should improve content discovery and add context and clarity to the age-old worker question, “Where am I?” In the workplace, consistency goes a long way. Always test your designs with leaders and peers, across multiple devices. Ensure readability and accessibility. Keep things dynamic. And don’t forget about mobile.

You’ll be surprised at what you can do to shape SharePoint. And be mindful of when you don’t have to.

Cheers, Mark “I play a SharePoint designer on TV” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now

My hack is 95% out of the core box + a smidge 5% of AI in #SharePoint.

The power of out of the box capabilities configured with a specific use case can go a long way. In this case, I created a single SharePoint list and configured multiple views used across multiple SharePoint pages - all within the same site to create a simple "application" to help our marketing team stay organized, add context and resources for the various marketing content types, and keep it engaging and actionable. I also took advantage of a unique SharePoint agent grounded on a set of video transcripts, the new Quick Steps column to add clickable/actionable buttons right into the list, and simple navigation to all the pages within the common left-hand navigation, and more. NOTE: There is also use of the new Workflows capability but had to cut it from the video for time (8 min submission limit); it sends a Teams chat when a new item is submitted off the list form (which is shown).

Below is my demo video submission. And under the video, I listed (pun intended) the main components and how I configured them:

What’s in the demo (AKA, the tech I used to create this solution/hack)

• One master list in a SharePoint team site: This is our primary list of marketing activities configured with numerous columns, views, and simple automation. We had this list prior to the hackathon, and I used it as THE root of the hack.

• Several SharePoint pages: I created one, configure the design of layouts, web parts and some header elements. And then I saved time using +New > Copy of this page; huge time saver. In the end, they all look similar and are connected in/by the site navigation.

• Common nav element within the team site left-hand navigation: Pretty easy use of nav… one main node, “Marketing” (which links to the main lists, and in the nav, it contains several sub links to each page + the Lists form. Since the pages look alike, the visual context switching is lessened.

• Lists form to “Request marketing support”: I used a native Lists form, when you click “Forms” at the top of the list, to collect a subset of columns so the requestor needed to only fill out the basics with added context of triage and SLA for reply. Each submitted form creates a new item in the list which also triggers a simple workflow.

• Workflow: Using the new UX, I created a simple flow that starts a chat within the Marketing > General channel in Teams when a new item is created or submitted, with a link to the new item/submission.

• Quick Steps column: I added this so there would be two buttons: 1) Start a chat (in Teams), and 2) “We’re done” which sets the Status column for an individual item to Published. I also took advantage of the conditional appearance based on Status; if item is Published, don’t show buttons.

• SharePoint agent - using the Agent Link web part: We already had created an agent that was grounded in all the final written transcripts of each episode. That’s 140+ files that provides the model for asking very specific questions about our Ask Sympraxis bi-weekly webinars. I used the Agent Link web part, selected to link to the Ask Sympraxis transcripts agent. When you click it, it opens the familiar Copilot experience on the right of the page, ready to ask questions about Ask Sympraxis.

I’m certain you’ll come across an idea that can be solved with a list, a page or two (or five), a little sprinkle of AI, and your own business imagination.

Cheers, and can’t wait to see everyone else’s submissions and connect during the SharePoint Hackathon 2026 Award Ceremony on Wednesday, March 25th:

[NOW ON DEMAND]

- Mark “I’m Hacked” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now

Good training services bring it all together. They bring the training at your fingertips - fast skills, less friction. And some have the contextual awareness of the app/service you’re using right there and then. Less tabbing, more learning.

Let’s dive into three examples that take a good approach. I’m sure there are a number of others. It’s a big category. All of the below take little investment to get started. Take less time than most to implement and maintain. And work well from an end user experience, imo.

Have you tried the VisualSP’s 🆓 “Adopt365” browser extension?

VisualSP offers inline, contextual help for end users. Their free product is called “Adopt365” - a browser extension. Once installed, it surfaces Microsoft Learn and Microsoft Support content using AI and contextual awareness of the application you're using.

As you can see in the screenshot below, the interface makes it easy to navigate and read “Help” assets for Microsoft 365, Copilot, and Dynamics 365. While I was setting up the screenshot, I was in SharePoint working on a page. Take a look at the right-side Adopt365 pane: You can see it knows I’m in SharePoint. I can search and refine. And I can ask Vic, their inline AI assistant, to refine down and find ‘how to’ content using natural language.

And when the Adopt365 pane is closed, it’s represented by a small, always-there, moveable tab; in the above example, it’s the tab where it says, “SharePoint Help”. And if I was in Outlook, it would say “Outlook Help” and be loaded with kinetic Outlook help energy.

Try their free “Adopt365” browser extension: Edge and/or Chrome.

How to take it further | It’s easy to install the free version and there is clear value for the upsell to their Digital Adoption Platform to add in-app notifications, custom walkthroughs, add custom training videos, track analytics, and more.

Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways

At its core, it gives you a central training center that you can grow and take as far as you like.

Admittedly, this one takes a little more to set up and is easier than it’s ever been to set up. And it’s worth it. Let’s break it down.

Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways is a free and customizable on-demand training solution designed to support custom training to increase the skills of people using Microsoft 365 services in your organization. By providing structured, customizable learning playlists, you improve adoption, foster innovation, and ensure everyone is in the know through times of change.

Learn more about Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways.

How to take it further | Out of the box, the focus is on Microsoft product training. Now, go further: Customize it with your own training materials. Build your own learning playlists. Add context around your training. Share the site and share individual training offerings, linked within your internal comms.

Microsoft Viva Learning

Similar to Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways, out of the box you get the full library of Microsoft Learn and Microsoft 365 trainings plus 300+ courses from LinkedIn Learning. And it installs as a native app within Microsoft Teams. There is an element that comes for free and more that you can get with additional licensing (see below).

How Microsoft pitches it: “Microsoft Viva Learning empowers employees to make learning a natural part of the day by bringing learning into the flow of work within the tools and platforms they already use. Discover, share, and track learning across various sources from a center of learning in Microsoft Teams.” (Microsoft Learn)

Learn more about Viva Learning.

How to take it further | With additional licensing, Viva Learning can aggregate content from multiple 3rd-party systems — like SAP SuccessFactors, Coursera, and Pluralsight — and you get learning adoption reports, content featuring, and learning academy curation.

In the end…

Skills grow fastest when the help you need lives where your work happens — in Microsoft speak, “training in the flow of work.” With a smart mix of custom guidance and built‑in content, you can lay the foundation for you and your colleagues to get skilled and stay productive.

No matter what, offer training rather than let people sift in the darkness of not knowing what they should know; what you need them to know, to do what they do better, with guidance, with confidence, with the tools they and you need to be successful.

Thanks for reading and sharing,
Mark “wait… how do I do that again” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Subscribe now

Share

Joao isn't just any SharePoint enthusiast—he makes Lists and SharePoint look so good; people react exclaiming "that doesn't look like SharePoint anymore!" And he built a Microsoft To Do clone entirely in Lists to create an automated alert systems. That’s pure JSON magic pours from his fingertips. You’ll hear more and get inspired in the replay (+ link to his solution below).

For the roadmap solutions, he's built an entire system using Lists (naturally), Power Automate, and custom browser extensions to track and publish updates for SharePoint, Teams, Copilot, and Viva. He even experimented with AI-generated podcasts, though listeners keep asking for his actual voice instead of Google's; I agree here, aka, always more João!

The conversation rounded out with AI adoption. The surprising insight? Newer Microsoft 365 customers might have an easier time adopting Copilot than mature ones—less content means less governance anxiety. Seems, the biggest fear isn't the technology; it's the perception of oversharing and finding the happy medium of reality beyond perception.

Keep up with João Ferreira

• LinkedIn / Bluesky

• HANDS ON tek (João’s website & blogs)

• To Do List formatting solution

• SharePoint Hackathon | “Explorer Intranet” submission

Thank you

Thank you for tuning into this KashBox LIVE, now on demand! And thanks to João for sharing his points of view. Keep an eye out for his unboxed SharePoint Server 2001 DVD at the next MVP Summit; Jeff Teper signature pending. 🖊️😉

Get more from Mark Kashman in the Substack app

Available for iOS and Android

Get the app

Every other Wednesday at 9:30am PT / 12:30pm ET, our team digs into real-world Microsoft 365 challenges, solutions, and important FYIs—from SharePoint governance and Teams collaboration to content management and migration strategies. Whether you’re a seasoned admin or just getting started, each 30-minute session delivers actionable insights you can use and evangelize in your org immediately.

Up next | LIVE | Wednesday, January 7th, 2026

• Session 💬 What the *BLEEP* is Work IQ

• Date/time 🗓️ Wed., Jan. 7, 2026, 9:30am PT / 12:30pm ET

• Location 📺 https://symp.info/AskSympraxisMeeting (link takes you directly into the live Teams meeting)

Give us a try. Join live and participate in the discussion—no registration required.

OK, now for all the links and resources, plus a list of previous sessions to give you a sense of what we cover (or to catch up from the archive).

The Ask Sympraxis basics | Learn more and join in

• Download the recurring Ask Sympraxis calendar event.

• Join directly into the Teams meeting without downloading the event.

• Submit your questions in advance and subscribe to our newsletter.

• Learn more and review past episodes, incl. our YouTube channel.

• Follow /in/Sympraxis-Consulting on LinkedIn, incl. #AskSympraxis announcements.

Example episodes | 7️⃣ recent and previous topics

• Microsoft Ignite 2025 Recap

• Preparing for 2026 “Out of Support” products

• What’s new with Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways

• Maturity Model for Copilot: Agents

• PnP Modern Search

• External Sharing in SharePoint Online

• Migrating File Shares to SharePoint Online

Our promise: No selling. No hold music. Just 30 minutes of unfiltered talk about Microsoft 365 - its challenges and best practices. Join us live or catch the recording—either way, you’ll leave with answers (and a giggle or two).

Can’t wait to see you on a bi-weekly basis, Mark “One of the Answerers” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now

So, grab your favorite beverage and let me scroll-walk you down through my top five SharePoint features of 2025—the ones that made me think “that helps!” And in the pace of change, choosing five was tough. So, the article rounds out at the end with honorable mentions, a few related tech winners from OneDrive and Teams, and yes, a moment of silence for products and services we lost this past year. #RIP

If you don’t Share (your top five list), what’s the Point?!? Grab a seat—we’re countin’ ‘em down. 🪩

#5️⃣ | Preview mode for SharePoint pages and news

What it is | It’s time to remove the guess work. Preview mode lets creators get a better sense about how their page or news post will appear to their readers across devices—and even in the Outlook inbox. It gives you time to tweak how things look and flow, on a desktop, mobile screen, or formatted in email.

Why I like it | This one is a no brainer, imo. Preview Mode not only shows you the look, it also highlights the guardrails. You see how SharePoint will adapt across devices and email. SharePoint knows itself well. And it’s nice to see it helping us predict the outcome before hitting send.

Learn more.

#4️⃣ | Editorial Card web part

What it is | The Editorial card web part helps your content stand out and resonate. You can highlight a new campaign, whitepaper, a group of people — with flare. You have lots of layout choices, levels of text, imagery, and actionable buttons/text. And it’s a big part of making your comms, your SharePoint pages and news, beautiful. 🤌

Why I like it | This is pure editor’s choice. Most often, you are both writer and editor of your comms. And the Editorial Card web part makes you look good. It’s simple information presentation — in a visual way that feels professional, without needing a master’s degree in UX design.

Learn more.

#3️⃣ | SharePoint Quick Steps

What it is | Doing something manual once is okay. Manual it twice without automation? Well, that’s like leaving metadata on the table. SharePoint Quick Steps put a little quick in your steps for repetitive tasks; get multi-step actions done in a single, custom click. From list or library items, do things like start an email, send a Teams chat, set a value — keeping the context of the content within the value of the flow. Yep, Quick Steps are backed by Power Automate, so they are real flows flowing for you.

Why I like it | It helps speed things up, with accuracy, without missing a step or mis-tapping a keystroke. Once programmed, it just does what it does, in One. Quick. Step. And they use the already-common sentence-builder experience, like in Lists and SharePoint rules.

Learn more.

#2️⃣ | Approval workflows for lists and libraries

What it is | A toggle that adds the ability to have a functioning approval/reject workflow tied to a list item or file. They are built-in and easy to use and connect to the broader Teams Approvals app - The hub for approvals across apps and services. Select your content, set your approvers, and let SharePoint handle the rest.

Why I like it | It started with Lists and expanded to document libraries, with good user experience consistency. It removes the barrier to entry, making a review and approval process an easy-to-implement review and approval process. And it keeps everyone in the approval loop with status updates along the way.

To get started: Click on the Automate drop down > Configure Approvals > Toggle Enable Approvals (on any list of library).

Learn more.

#1️⃣ | Flexible sections

What it is | It’s a new section type when building out your pages. And it blends well with structuring or un-structuring the content of your SharePoint pages and news. We are no longer stuck to three columns across. Rather, this section type gives you a canvas (technically 12 columns) with greater flexibility to move things around, resize them (yes, resize SharePoint web parts), and overlap things to your designer-hearts content.

Why I like it | They take a second to get used to, and no, I wouldn’t recommend using them as your only and forever-more section layout type. There are still good-structure reasons and room to use one-three column types. And it’s always nice for your readers to break it up a bit; let variance be one of your communication strengths. Flexible sections give you choice, among choices we have and have seen expand — as SharePoint becomes a core communicator’s tool.

Learn more.

And now a few quick-hit lists for the year’s runners-up, two related techs, and a few tears for those 2025 RIPs.

5️⃣ Runners-Up

• SharePoint: FAQ web part

• SharePoint agents; incl. Knowledge Agent (thanks, Vlad Catrinescu for the great video)

• SharePoint Advance Management (SAM) included in Microsoft 365 Copilot

• Forms in document libraries (thanks, Laura Rogers for the great article)

• Improved News feed in Viva Connections

BONUS | 2️⃣ each from related tech: OneDrive and Teams

OneDrive ☁️

1. Hero link - Each file gets one persistent URL that you update and manage with required/preferred permissions anytime. Gone are the days of multiple links or dead links. It’s one link and you manage the access it grants.

2. Copilot agents in OneDrive - Turn your OneDrive folder(s) into sources for custom AI assistants. AKA, helpers grounded on your personal work files to help answer questions and create content based on your work, over time.

Microsoft Teams 👥

1. Activity in other accounts and organizations - View and respond to activity across multiple tenants without switching accounts. This speeds up chat triage simply by popping up an Activity window cross-tenant chats in their own window.

2. Facilitator in Microsoft Teams meetings - Takes notes that everyone can co-author, manages the time and agenda, and surface relevant information from the web or the conversation itself. It takes notes really well. And you can ask it questions along the way - like a smart meeting assistant that’s always listening. NOTE: Don’t forget to start Facilitator or it’s really not that helpful 😏.

#RIP | Sad to lose ☠️

Before we close out the year, let’s take a moment of silence for the features and apps we lost; they may be gone, but our finger-clicking-muscle memory that remembers where they were in the M365 app launcher will last forever.

• Viva Topics | Retired February 22, 2025.

• OneNote for Windows 10 | Retired October 14, 2025.

• Microsoft Lists mobile apps | Retired mid-November 2025.

• Viva Goals | Retired December 31, 2025.

• Transitioning notifications from SharePoint Alerts to Power Automate.

For all the above in 2025, and all that 2026 is for sure to bring, a final, BIG kudos to the SharePoint team for tweaking, innovating, listening, and plugging away at this platform/app that sells itself year after year.

I wish thee well. Have yourself a merry little happy holidays year-ender! Time to relax knowing you’re all caught up and ready for next year’s onslaught of top new tech (after topping off with some good rest after Dec. 31, 2025). 🥳➡️😴

See you in 2026, Mark “sharer of top five” Kashman

👋🏻___🧔🏻‍♂️___👍🏻

Share

Subscribe now

Let’s take a moment to discuss, infer, relate, associate, and guess – to understand – the value of semantics in technology. Semantics is a bridge feature; one you use nearly every day whether you know it or not. And like most bridges, it takes time to build and cross them. Now, YOU might say semantics are gap fillers, the meaning of and the reasons for bridges. To which I say, great! It IS semantic. We’re talking semantics. We mean the same thing. And, imho, it is semantics that makes people and technology go ‘round and ‘round – and grow. At least that is what I’ll infer throughout this article. 😉

Semantics can be one of those tricky words, like “quantum.” Use it once or twice and it feels uncertain and unknown. Put it in front of another word and it sounds academic, smart, but out of reach. But it’s important. Semantics in language help convey meaning and make communicating interesting. Semantics in technology is a magical middle layer that takes raw information and turns it into knowledge – aka, something relatable and clear; a bridge to understanding.

So, let’s explore it from a few angles and make sense of it together. In this article, we’ll explore three semantic steppingstones:

• Human Communication – How we naturally use context and meaning to understand each other.

• Microsoft Interactive Media Manager (IMM) – An early (2007) SharePoint-based media solution that leveraged a third-party semantics engine to manage video content metadata through its lifecycle.

• Semantic Index for Microsoft 365 Copilot – How it connects unstructured data to a structured information architecture in modern AI.

Along the way, consider how semantics fills the gaps between unstructured data and more mature information architecture.

Human Semantics: How We Understand Each Other

Semantics are fundamentally human. Every time you hold a conversation or read an article (like this one!), you’re relying on semantic knowledge to make sense of language (and my writing style). You don’t stop to assess each word literally; you interpret meaning based on context and nuance of what you know and understand.

Consider this: If I say, “I hope my manager goes to bat for me,” you understand I mean I hope my manager defends or supports me, not that they literally grabbed a bat like mighty Casey. We don’t pause and consider these semantic leaps – like a clever turn of phrase, or joke, or bad pun (I know this area well) - we just “get it.” And maintain our goal of not striking out! 😊

And hey, it’s what we’re now trying to teach these machines – to bridge the gap between raw input and meaningful output. We want our software to do what we do effortlessly: Understand. And I think it’s the underlying message of the recent Microsoft term: Work IQ (explainer blog and video); new branding for some of the previous technology – like the semantic index covered below, the original platform for Office Delve, and the end user side of Microsoft Graph; we’ll table that as more details about it unfold over the coming months.

Instead, let’s start in the way back machine and review early progress I got to be a part of: The Interactive Media Manager.

A Blast from the Past: Semantic Metadata in Interactive Media Manager (IMM)

Long ago, in my work past, I worked on a solution called the Interactive Media Manager (IMM), a Microsoft experiment with semantics designed for media customers. Essentially it was a digital asset management (DAM) system built on SharePoint 2007. It was an exciting project that brought modern media workflows to SharePoint AND introduced a semantic approach to search and inference to managing video and audio content. And, personally, it was my first break as a product manager.

The IMM solution included an Ontology Editor built on a third-party component that let administrators define how their metadata got structured: what are the entities and how do they relate). This was cutting-edge for 2007 and made for a heck of a demo at NAB 2008: Instead of just tagging videos with flat keywords, we showed creating a meaningful graph of metadata through the lifecycle of a large media file. It facilitated smarter search and content reuse – linking data (videos, in this case) through meaning (who’s in it, what it’s about, where it’s set) so you could retrieve and recombine content in new, smart ways.

And then, years later, along came the Semantic Index…

Semantic Index for Microsoft 365 Copilot: A Map for Your Data

The design of Copilot’s semantic index combines general search and Microsoft Graph to generate context and relationships within your data and documents.

“Instead of data sitting in silos or requiring manual curation, the Semantic Index enables a layer of order and meaning on top of it.” If you ask Copilot, “Find that email where my colleague praised the new design,” a traditional search might struggle if you didn’t use the exact words “praise” or “design” in the email. But the Semantic Index will include conceptually related terms (maybe “excited,” “impressed,” etc.) to retrieve that email without you having to guess the exact wording.” (Microsoft Learn)

The Semantic Index is essentially a map of your data that understands content by meaning, not just by keywords. It was introduced to bridge the gap between unstructured data (documents, emails, sites, chats, etc.) and the structured answers or insights people need.

With Copilot, semantics fills the gap between the unstructured ways we often store information and the structured way we retrieve and comprehend it. The Semantic Index provides a smart mapping of all the data and content in your organization – “enabling Microsoft 365 Copilot to deliver personalized, relevant, and actionable responses.” It gives you more-natural wiggle room to find what you’re looking for and create what you need.

💡 Learn more: “How Semantic Index for Copilot works in Microsoft 365” (Microsoft Mechanics) and “Semantic indexing for Microsoft 365 Copilot” (Microsoft Learn).

NOTE: SharePoint plays a crucial role in grounding Copilot. It is one of the primary content services that can help better organize your documents and knowledge and all the related metadata — all while establishing and maintaining good governance and permissions management. If used right, it’s THE grounding source for mature information architecture. And if you achieve that, and you can, Copilot’s reliability goes way up, too.

In the end…

It’s all about making sense of your data AND having your data make sense to others. Content and communication are more than just text – it’s context – a shared understanding; we wish to understand and not be misunderstood. I believe at least it’s important to understand some of the magic in the middle layer. Or like me: Simply trying to understand what makes the tech tick today. In Microsoft 365, the noise to good-signals ratio is the difference between Copilot being useful and Copilot being a useful idiot.

Or is it all just semantics?

Cheers, your peer, Mark “Cementing the Semantics” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now

My hope with this article is that you learn a trick or two that brings the busy of the world to your attention, when you want it to - and at times, need it to. As I age, I’ve become more open to accessibility features, either by necessity or simply because I’m open to discover that they are handy in a pinch. And I can turn them on and off at will. And my non-agist view: Accessibility features can help us all.

OK, let’s dig into three accessibility features that have come in handy with my iPhone in hand - to speak aloud, recognize when your name has been called, and listen live.

Subscribe now

Speak aloud

When you’re on the move, it can be easier to hear something spoken aloud rather than try and bouncy read it. The Speak aloud feature provides a new menu item that appears across applications and experiences: Speak. Long-hold on a text message and select Speak. Highlight text of a written article in a third-party app and select Speak. Or highlight text on a page within the mobile browser and select Speak. I think you might see, or better, hear the pattern here.

If you see something, let iPhone Speak something. And then simply listen and keep on bouncy walking. This works great when you have headphones or buds in but does not require it.

To start | Go to the Settings app on your iPhone > Tap Accessibility, then tap Read & Speak > Turn on and customize. Learn how to hear iPhone speak the screen, selected text, and typing feedback.

Bonus Speak aloud tip: If you are reading an article in Safari on an Apple device, you can say “Hey Siri” ➡️ “Read this” and it will read aloud the full page like a built-in podcast. (Kudos to Brooke Tierney for this bonus tip - from her “10 COOL Siri Features You’re Probably Not Using but Should Be!“ video. Her channel is worth a subscribe 🔔, imo; great ‘how to’ content).

Name recognition

What about when you’re in a noisy environment and your attention is not entirely tuned to when someone calls your name. Or you’re hard of hearing it. Here’s a scenario: You walk into a coffee shop, order your favorite 12-ounce oat milk latte - not too hot, and give them your name for the order - in my case: Mark 🧔🏻‍♂️. And then, you wait. Tap toe. Twirl thumbs. Hem and haw. Don’t you want to get back to that podcast you were listening to, or that call you were on, or digesting that tidbit of news…? Most likely yes. So, do.

But you don’t want to miss it when they call your name. Cold coffee is the worst!

This name recognition feature does just that. It listens for your name being spoken, and when it hears it, it sends you a time-sensitive notification (see screenshot below). This feature is particularly fun for me at the start of a race, “Runners to your Mark…” Joking aside, it’s also a feature you can add to Control Center to easily toggle on and off. My tip: Turn it on when you walk into the coffee shop and turn it off when you leave. It can send false notifications; not 100% foolproof — might I say it can be a little off the Mark, at times. 🥁 (joking aside, again)

To start | Go to the Settings app on your iPhone > Tap Accessibility, tap Sound & Name Recognition, tap Name Recognition, then tap Set Up Name Recognition. Learn more how you can get iPhone to help recognize your name when it’s spoken aloud.

Bonus: If you like this feature, there’s another part of it that can recognize sounds using iPhone — to help detect the things like barking dogs, doorbells, a siren, or a crying baby. This one does work AND can send a lot of notifications, especially if you have it listening for a lot of different kinds of sounds. Again, quickly turn it on or off by adding it to Control Center.

Live Listen

Disclaimer | This requires headphones or ear buds of some sort, full specs in linked article below.

OK, now that that is out of the way. Let’s highlight the value of Live Listen - A feature that “can help you hear a conversation in a noisy area or even hear someone speaking across the room.” It’s based on your iPhone microphone and proximity to the subject or noise that you’re trying to hear. It can also help visually as it has a nice feature where you can read a real-time transcript of what live listen hears; works well in my testing.

Add Live Listen to Control Center. And when you want to use it, open Control Center > Tap the Live Listen button > Place your iPhone or iPad in front of the person that you want to hear. Learn more how to use Live Listen with AirPods or Beats on your iPhone. Note: If you don’t have your ear buds connected via Bluetooth or wired headphones connected, you won’t see the Live Listen option.

So, whether you’re addressing a newly discovered challenge or simply curious, I hope these features offer a nudge, when you want one, that brings the world to you, so fewer things pass you by. 🙉🙈🙊😉

Cheers and happy accessing a little more bliss, Mark “I can hear you now” Kashman

Share

I listened to the latest episode of the SyncUp podcast about the new OneDrive feature: Audio overviews. And I thought I’d give it a try.
☁️📄🤖➡️🔊

What is the audio overview feature in OneDrive?

“The audio overview feature in OneDrive, powered by Microsoft 365 Copilot, enables users to generate audio summaries of their files, such as Word documents, PDFs, and Teams meeting recordings in OneDrive mobile and web. This feature is particularly useful for those who prefer auditory learning or need to multitask while consuming content.”

(Above quote is an AI summary of the “Generate audio overviews with Copilot in OneDrive” Microsoft Support article)

Using the feature to learn about the feature ⚙️

To create the above playable AI-generated mp3 audio file, I copied the written transcript from the full, original 32 minute 21 second episode of SyncUp, “Audio overviews in OneDrive” and pasted it into a blank Word .docx, saving it to my own work OneDrive. From the new Word doc’s “…” menu, I chose: Copilot > Create an audio overview > Switch to podcast style. I then clicked on the “Save to OneDrive” option, saving the mp3 to my Recordings folder. This new, AI-gen’ed version is a 9 minute 25 second podcast with two AI-voiced hosts. Last, I uploaded this unedited, as-Copilot-created mp3 file into Substack, published as an “audio post.”

My take 🤔

Audio overviews in OneDrive provide enough of what you need to know about, but not necessarily master. A few scenarios: It’ll be great for SOWs if I’m coming in mid-project, revisiting key points in a project proposal before the next call, or digesting a set of supporting documents. Get informed and save time. Reserve your deep, full, end-to-end reads when you need to be the absolute subject matter expert.

Listen to the original 🎧

Even though the AI-gen version is great for saving time, I’d encourage you to listen to the full, original 32:21 episode from the OneDrive team, Stephen Rice and Arvind Mishra speaking with guest OneDrive PMs, Cass Weber and Cami Mejia, “Audio overviews in OneDrive” — so you get their real-people insights and jokes behind the scenes of Audio overviews in OneDrive:

Subscribe now

Share

And now, maybe you listened to their latest episode twice’ish. It might not have saved you time this time, but I’m betting OneDrive audio overviews will save you time in the future.

Cheers, Mark “previewing the previews” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

The genesis of this article stems from two recent stimuli:

1. SharePoint pages are for communications, big and small. So, what’s a good use case that represents “small” comms? The idea: A page that introduces you to your team; a thoughtful, fun “About you” page. And hey, maybe it plays a dual purpose: When it comes time for people to grab your preferred name, title, biography, and profile photo - have all that in there, too (including a hi-res version of your photo; not a crappé, low-res version someone might find in the depths of an online search).

2. I’m pleased to announce that I joined Sympraxis Consulting, today (Oct. 1, 2025), as a Principal Microsoft 365 Consultant: 🧔🏻‍♂️💼 (at your service). And so, put your money where your mouth is, right? Or is it put your money where your metadata is? Either way, I wanted to share this news with everyone who might be interested. I look forward to representing them online and at events. And I’m bringing this use case to bear; I’m building the below screenshot-demo portion from my real-world scenario — I just published the below Who is: Mark Kashman page to the internal Sympraxis intranet. Practice what you preach. Or in this case, practice what you post.

OK, on to the how to create a SharePoint page to introduce yourself out to your team members/organization/company AND generate a link about you that you can send to anyone internally to share your common details for various events and communication purposes.

Share

Who is: [You] [[Hey, that’s me below]]

Let’s take a look at the real-world example I just published. Below, I’ll take you through each of the six numbered segments and share context of choices I made throughout the page and relevant tech insights behind doing it. And remember, it’s SharePoint. You can do pretty much whatever you want for the way you want to introduce yourself. I went with a Banner style title region and two sections below it: The top section uses a One-third left layout, and the bottom section uses a Two columns layout.

#1 The title region: Keep it simple. Keep it visual.

First impressions are everything, so make it quick and easy for people to get the “who really is this person” right off the bat. There’s a lot you can do with the title region of a SharePoint page, similarly what you can do for the header of a site - it’s all choices you make to really set the stage for what to comes as someone begins to scroll The Who of you.

For my title region, I kept it simple. I made a combination of two images, saved as a wider banner-style .jpg. I took a picture of my old friend, Echo Kitty 😻, and my newest friend, Peanut 🐶. It was a no brainer, if you want to start to get to know me, know that four-legged friends play a big part in my heart. And hey, doesn’t everyone like pets in the workplace - in the background of Teams calls and top billing on my “About me” page. A picture is worth a thousand purrs (and wags).

Again, there are many choices for this part of the page. Choose from various styles, add an image, put in your page title, add author, date, etc.. I kept the author off this one (since it’s about me, by me — you simply “x” out the author and don’t put someone’s name in) and I chose to not show the date — so it’s more evergreen.

And that’s it for the title region. Make your choices and move on to the core content.

Learn more how to customize the title area of a SharePoint page.

#2 Your preferred profile picture: Visible and downloadable. 🤳

This is a twofer section for me. First, I wanted to have my image a little bigger - bigger than the standard way people might see you in an on-hover Profile card (more on that below) or a small image on a title slide you once published or among the really tiny images of you and 30 other people on an org-chart-eye-chart-slide some lucky person created for an all-hands PowerPoint. So, I went with a bigger view of me AND it’s my preferred image I chose to have represent me — not just what’s aging in the GAL.

The second reason was to have this work for me for those scenarios where someone needs my headshot for an event or newsletter. It’s right here for them to reference and download in hi-resolution. In fact, I added a button below the Image web part that takes the person directly to download the full MarkKashman_Profile-image.jpg file. And it’s the same file I uploaded into SharePoint - into the Image web part; the URL download path is simply a “Copy link” off the file where SharePoint put it once I added via the Image web part; hint, it gets stored here: Site contents > Site Assets > SitePages > [Name of your page] > [Name of your image] (then … Copy link).

Again, a twofer — two-birds-one-image-stone kinda thing.

Learn more how to use the Image and Button web parts.

#3 FAQs that get into the details of YOU. ⁉️

Now it’s time for people to get to know me, to get to know me better through a few frequently asked questions that cover everything from my professional background to my personal interests and working style. And so, I leveraged the new FAQ web part and trained it on me, that I then could tailor and tune to what I wanted to share and sprinkle in a bit of my personality.

I selected a few questions people commonly ask about other people, to learn about a person’s work experience, their approach to work, and what makes them tick. And since this was about me, I treated it like an ice breaker at an offsite or workshop and had fun with it. “OK, for the next 5 minutes, we’re going to get to know Mark. Hi, Mark. Tell us a bit about yourself.” Can you hear, and see, the ice breaking?

The FAQ web part allows you to quickly generate structured FAQs with a little AI-powered assistance from Microsoft 365 Copilot, either from scratch or by analyzing existing documents and content. You can then refine, reorder, and customize the questions and answers before publishing them on your SharePoint page. It becomes an a-sync on demand AMA; in my case an Ask Mark Anything (with tailored questions Mark asked himself).

Learn more how to use a FAQ web part in SharePoint. Note: A Microsoft 365 Copilot license is required to create and edit the FAQ web part, but viewers don’t need any special licensing to read the published FAQs.

#4 Important links where you share, or what you care about. 🔗

What about pulling in existing sources of information — about or by you; things like your LinkedIn profile, Twitter feed, your blog, Instagram posts, etc…? No problem. Choose whatever you want to link out to so people can learn more about you, follow your work, or grab the info for others. Take the opportunity to program in the ones you want to put front and center AND take the guess work out of others finding your correct social feeds.

The Quick Links web part helps me display selected links with various styling options and layout choices including compact, filmstrip, grid, button, list, and tiles; I chose Tiles in the above example. You have complete control and flexibility over how your links are presented to others. And remember, you can program any valid link — to a feed, an individual article, a video, a playlist — internal or external — heck, you can even Rick Roll (and troll) discreetly if your humor falls into the “never gonna give it up” category.

Learn more how to use the Quick Links web part.

#5 The basic ‘grab and use’ information. ℹ️

This is the most basic, most time-saving choice I made, to have a section that has my primary pay-it-forward details: My preferred name, title, and bio - right under my preferred image. It’s a huge time saver to point someone here to grab it themselves, any time, instead of repeatedly copy/pasting it into an email or chat. Send a link and let ‘em grab what they need knowing it’s already approved, and managed, by you.

I used the simple and powerful Text web part. And kept it simple: Emoji and title using the Heading 2 style for the top text and then a bulleted list with light formatting — all within a single Text web part.

Learn more how to add text, tables, and images to your page with the Text web part.

Extra bonus tip: If your manager or skip-level manager often speaks or gets quoted, create a similar page for them, and validate it with them and their business manager or exec admin. They then have an approved set of info that can be more easily managed, found, and shared. It’s easy to use the one you created for yourself as a “template” — Choose Copy of this page (of your “About me” page) to create a new “About them” page that has the same web parts and content as the existing page - then adjust all text, links, image(s) to be about them, get it approved, and publish.

#6 The power of the on-hover Profile card within the People web part. 👤

You might want to sit down for this #6 segment; it might get a little meta (with a lowercase “m”). Profile cards in SharePoint and throughout Microsoft 365 appear when you hover over (on hover) or select someone’s name or profile picture; it pops-up and expands to reveal contact information, org relationships and documents they have been working on; essentially you get a Microsoft Graph view of key details about people (who they work with, what they work on) without leaving your current page, and without breaking any information or document permissions.

Here’s the meta moment: The Profile card is a company-managed glimpse “About you” within your self-created “About me” page. Beyond inception, Profile cards bring in your day-to-day actions, plus your office location, telephone number, etc. — it’s what you get from the service, alongside what you design for the sections of your page. By including it, people viewing my page get more of me, on hover, with fewer things I need to manage or add to the page. Profile cards are dynamic, tied to Microsoft Graph, showing a slice of your work at any given point in time; and they are, imo, a hidden gem in Microsoft 365 — designed by a creative engineering team.

To get a Profile card to appear on a SharePoint page, you add a People web part to display a selected person, you, on to the page. Once you have the People web part on the page, type in your name. It does a real Global Address Lookup (GAL) as you type, and you select your name. You can then choose between Small, Medium, and Large layout options to show less or add more; I chose Medium so I could add my LinkedIn profile link AND type in a short tagline about me: “2️⃣0️⃣ years of Microsoft insider knowledge. 🤔” (see above screenshot)

Learn more about Profile cards in Microsoft 365.

And then, when you’re feeling confident… 🗞️

… publish your page as a SharePoint news article: 📢 Promote > 📰 Post as News on this site. It remains as a page where you created it, but as news (now) that gets pushed out to various internal news feeds; greater visibility. 👀 And when anyone asks about you or needs your particulars, grab the page link and send it to ‘em. Done!

In the end…

It’s the you of being you and letting people in on the surprise — and joy — directly from the you who is YOU! I’m grateful to Sympraxis for taking me into their circle of trust AND hope they get to know me a little more today (or whenever they might read my now-published Who is: Mark Kashman news post that started as a SharePoint page).

It only takes a few minutes. And who knows, you might inspire a co-worker to do the same. And then lucky you, you get to learn a little something about them in return. A less mysterious co-worker is oft someone you’re more likely to collaborate with. Remember, you get to introduce yourself how you like. So, get creative and have fun — there’s a ton of SharePoint web parts and ways to configure them to present the creative, multimedia YOU that you want to share.

Fewer silos. More insights. That just might make the work world go ‘round with a little less guess work. And if you are inspired to design and publish your own “About me” page, would love to see it (at least know about it). Post-a-pic and/or at-mention me on LinkedIn, Twitter, and/or Bluesky; don’t forget/redact to cover the bits you can’t share.

Cheers, Mark “The You’est YOU you can be” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Subscribe now

Share

Take inventory and focus on developing your technical growth and understanding, and hopefully - personal fulfillment on the job. Your industries demand a lot. You give a lot. It’s time to take a little (time for yourself). Skill expansion and skill honing are tools you control to ensure future responsibilities, nab new roles, and find the YOU in you as you seek them.

Below is a quick-scroll reference article of six skill-building resources (and one bonus) to help you discover durable, dynamic resources designed to help you do just that: Know thy skills and grow them. Your command of them puts you in demand.

Share

Structured learning: Microsoft Learn | Spark possibility.

Build skills that open doors. And benefit from curriculum experts to do the knowing for you. From awareness of documentation to skill-building hands-on training, through to industry-leading certifications – Microsoft Learn helps you get the most from Microsoft products.

Microsoft Learn, accessible at learn.microsoft.com, is a dynamic platform designed to provide structured, interactive learning experiences for individuals at all levels of expertise. It offers a wealth of resources, including hands-on labs, tutorials, and certification paths, empowering the Microsoft tech community to discover the latest technologies and advance their professional skills. 🤔

Review the AI learning hub as a great, recent example. Plus, one of their ‘how to’ samples, Create your own collaboration governance plan.
Visit Microsoft Learn to discover more.

User enablement learning: adoption.microsoft.com

The Microsoft Adoption Center at adoption.microsoft.com offers invaluable resources for technologists, providing comprehensive guides, best practices, and community support essential for the successful deployment and adoption of Microsoft technologies. By leveraging these tools, professionals can stay ahead of the curve, ensuring seamless integration and maximizing the potential of their Microsoft solutions.

Microsoft Learn helps you understand how to use technology. The Adoption center provides tools and materials to ensure durable deployment and use of your technology investments.

Review the Microsoft 365 Copilot adoption hub as a great example of what to expect. And learn deployment and enablement best practices for “How Microsoft does IT.”

One unique skill-building offering you can use from adoption.microsoft.com is the Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways solution. It is a customizable, on-demand learning solution designed to increase usage and adoption of Microsoft 365 services – from within your organization. At the end of the day, the solution is a fully customizable SharePoint communication site within your Microsoft 365 tenant – a training portal to house your organization's help, support, and community content, to help build digital skills in bite-sized trainings.

Learn more about the Microsoft 365 Learning Pathways solution and how to deploy it into your own tenant.

Subscribe now

Learning within Microsoft 365: Viva Learning.

Where Learning pathways focuses on Microsoft technology, Microsoft Viva Learning fosters skill development within an organization – giving you the ability to aggregate various learning services, like LinkedIn Learning, Coursera, and Skillsoft, and your own custom training. 🤯

By integrating learning directly into the flow of work, it empowers employees to continuously upskill, driving both personal growth and enhancing organizational value. Viva Learning not only supports individual professional development, it cultivates a culture of continuous improvement and innovation with the ability to track assignments, recommendations, completions, and learning collections.

Learn more about Microsoft Viva Learning. It’s a great skill-building resource you can deploy directly within Microsoft Teams.

support.microsoft.com supports you

The Microsoft Support website at support.microsoft.com offers a wealth of help and how-to content, empowering you to efficiently accomplish tasks with Microsoft products. It provides step-by-step guides and videos, troubleshooting tips, and comprehensive resources that cater to both novices and advanced users, ensuring everyone can leverage Microsoft tools to their fullest potential. 👐

The authors and producers of Microsoft Support content work closely with product makers, giving you both accurate and timely information when new features launch and as changes come to your Microsoft 365 production environment.

Visit support.microsoft.com to get “help and how to” across all Microsoft products. Check out Microsoft Teams help & learning or Microsoft Copilot help as two great examples of what you can expect to find; and one of my biased favorites, Microsoft Lists help & learning.

Microsoft Tech Community

The Microsoft Tech Community site is a vibrant hub for the best community in tech, offering a treasure trove of technical blogs, engaging events, webinars, AMAs, and lively discussion forums. In my opinion, it should be a near requirement to sign up and establish an MTC user profile, not only to search and consume, but to engage and share. It is an essential platform where members exchange ideas, seek expert advice, and stay updated on the latest technological advancements — fostering a culture of collaboration and continuous learning. Being a learn-it-all is a two-way street.

Check out some of the main site locations to discover what the Tech Community offers:

• Blogs

• Events

• Plus, a sampling of the nearly 100+ communities:

  • Microsoft 365 Copilot

  • Microsoft Security

  • SharePoint

  • Azure Data

Create your own profile and join the community. Sign up and sign in today.

Find your next event: CommunityDays.org

Events, big and small, all offer opportunities big and small. The opportunity to learn. The opportunity to share. The opportunity to engage at a much deeper level – having the kinds of conversations that offer follow up, back and forth, and grounded understanding.

CommunityDays.org is a great platform for discovering upcoming in-person and online events tailored to your interests; it follows the “for community, by community” model. Whether you're looking to learn from industry experts, network with like-minded professionals, or promote your own webinars and calls, CommunityDays.org gives you an evergreen map to decide where and where to connect. 🌍🌎🌏

I wanted to call out a sampling of five upcoming events to give you a sense of what you’ll find as you peruse the CommunityDays.org site:

• CollabDays - Bletchley Park | Sept. 24, 2025 | Milton Keynes, UK

• Memphis Microsoft Community Days | Oct. 2-3, 2025 | Microsoft Office, Memphis, TN

• Experts Live US | Oct. 10 | Microsoft Office - 11 Times Square, NYC, NY

• CollabDays - New England | Oct. 17, 2025 | Burlington, MA

• Copilot Community Conference | Oct. 29, 2025 | Online

BONUS SKILL | Invite someone to coffee (or tea)

Sharing is caring. Sharing coffee (or tea) with others is caring a lot. Sip responsibly.

Ask questions and share what you know. It’s a two-way street and caffeine paves the way for great connections; maybe a sweet or two – as they say, “Two birds, one scone.” ☕🍵🥐 Open up the possibility to sync with another Microsoft 365 community member to discuss the latest features and updates, share tips and tricks for maximizing productivity, commiserate on some frustrations, or exchange ideas on best practices for solution building.

And hey, share your “what to do in this city” with each other to promote a work/life balance that’s balanced with lasting memories. You never know when the free flow of ideas fosters a long-term professional relationship — dare I say friendship.

I hope all the above helps navigate where and how you want your skillset to grow. Remember, your Microsoft 365 expertise is your competitive edge. Sharpen it. These resources are evergreen and provide centers of gravity to assess where you stand, fill the gaps, and build skills - new and old. Your future self—and your career—will thank you.

Cheers, Mark “Ya got mad skills, kid!” Kashman

Subscribe now

Share

The design goal of SharePoint: To be the “content service for Microsoft 365.”

The design of Teams + SharePoint: To “collaborate, sync, and share content and ideas.”

OK, the top-level marketing taglines and “what are they” assertions out of the way. Let’s dive into four areas you can take advantage of today — so that the work you and your colleagues do requires a lot less context switching and takes full advantage of the tools at hand.

In the 4️⃣ sections below, we’ll take a look at working with four core SharePoint content components:

1️⃣ Files

2️⃣ Lists

3️⃣ Pages

4️⃣ Agents

… within Microsoft Teams.

Share

1️⃣ The default document library, in Teams, is the “Files” tab (soon to be “Shared”).

We start simple. A file here. A conversation there. A conversation about a file, and we’re off to the races. It’s easy to work on files in Microsoft Teams. It’s a native experience and powered by SharePoint content services. This provides value to your files when working with your peers in Teams channels. And more so than ever, the functionality is on par with what you can do natively in OneDrive and SharePoint document libraries - Creating new documents, sharing, using columns (filters and views), automation, and more.

In my opinion, it’s good to see the common files experience promise evolve into a reality we can use each day.

Within each Microsoft Team there are one, or more, channels where focused discussions, “Posts”, take place. Each channel has its own file folder where you can share files with that channel. To access that folder, go to the channel and click the Files tab. Note: The Files tab in channels will soon be called "Shared" (reference roadmap item below AND pictured above). In addition to files that are currently shown from the document library, this new experience will also show all the files and links shared in the channel conversations. This makes it easier to find content all in one place. The In posts ‘filter’ will display all files and links shared in channel posts.

And that’s the point. When working with files, team members can upload existing files, create new ones, and collaborate with other in near and real-time knowing the content is already shared with all owners and members of that team.

Note: each channel you use and/or create is associated with a unique folder within the group-connected SharePoint team site document library. It is already in place, connected to Files tab(s), and brings with it the powerful content service of SharePoint.

Learn how to collaborate on files with your Team. Plus, reference the upcoming change: Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 470597.

2️⃣ Creating and editing a ‘Contacts list’ - all within Teams.

Whether it’s a simple list of potential clients to follow up with or a broad laptop asset check in/out solution, Microsoft Lists are the backbone of keeping track of things manually or via workflow – with the intent that everyone who views and interacts with them is up to date with the information and status they provide. And just like files above, lists are powered by SharePoint content services.

Now, imagine you’re at an event or meeting with a potential client, and you want to create a simple ‘Contacts’ list and add to it - to keep track of who they were, a way to contact them, and the context of what you were talking about. This is all possible to do within Teams, within Teams the entire way through. The below screenshot was created, designed, and used — all within Teams.

I used the Lists app within the “Add a tab” action - clicking the “+” button at the top of a Teams channel. You then give your new list a name, choose what columns you want (Contact name, Image (you can upload a photo or use your camera on mobile), Email, Context or Question, and Follow up (Yes/No)). And further, I was able to create a new Microsoft Lists form, a rule automation, and a new Gallery view (pictured) — again, all within Teams.

Once added, you get the full power of the list to navigate views, filter columns on list items, see full item details, and more – plus all the visual column formatting comes through.

Learn how to get started with Lists in Teams.

3️⃣ Create a ‘Welcome’ page in SharePoint and as it as a tab in Teams.

Imagine the first day for a new team member: Instead of a whirlwind of links and lost emails, they’re greeted with a vibrant, info-packed welcome page—right where the team (now including them) works every day — you ensure that newcomers instantly feel at home, find everything they need, and start contributing with confidence from day one.

For the below example (screenshot), I first started in SharePoint — in the Teams team ‘connected SharePoint team site’ — to build out the Welcome page. I chose the new “Team Introduction” page template to jumpstart my creation. I then used Clipchamp to record a simple welcome video (all within the browser) and added that to the page. This template in particular uses the new flexible section layout, and I did just that, I moved a few things around, flexibly, until I got a nice “Welcome to the Green Team” page welcoming a new member of the Green Team. 🌱

Then, it’s an easy step to add your new page as a tab in Teams. Within the desired channel, click the “+” to add a new tab. Click on the SharePoint tab app. Under the list of Pages – click on the [Welcome] page, and then click the “Save” button. The full page now appears as a tab in Teams. And if you have Edit permissions to the site where the page is stored, you can Edit it directly in Teams going forward.

Learn more how to add a SharePoint page, list, or document library as a tab in Teams.

4️⃣ Using a SharePoint agent to ‘ground a group chat with knowledge’ from a specific SharePoint site.

Imagine your group chat with a tireless new teammate: A SharePoint agent. Instantly, your posts become supercharged with real-time access to the collective wisdom stored in your SharePoint site. Just at-mention the agent to ask about policy details, project resources, or the latest team news, your SharePoint agent is a part of the conversation and can deliver answers straight from the source, making collaboration smoother and smarter for everyone.

For the below example, I created a SharePoint agent called “Inquiry” and grounded it on two distinct document libraries filled with 20-30 documents — not the whole site. The use case is to best work as a team when supporting a specific client (redacted to hide customer name) based on all the intake materials and generated content - aka, all we know about them and the desired project outcomes. With the agent in place, in Teams, we can now ask questions, without having to do go to and hunt through those document libraries. The answers lie at our fingertips with an at-mention prompt to our friendly teammate, “Inquiry".”

The nuts and bolts for how to create a SharePoint agent and add it to a Teams group chat:

• Select the Copilot icon at the upper right from any SharePoint site, page, or document library.

• Find the agent you want to share from the agent list.

• Select the ellipsis and then select Copy link for Teams.

• After you send the share link in a group chat, meeting chat, or a channel within Teams, you will be prompted to add the agent to the conversation; click the Add to this chat/channel button.

• Now, start chatting with the agent by at-mentioning it and asking your questions.

Watch an introduction to SharePoint agents — including a demo segment of “Agents in Teams.”

In the end...

Try it all! These tips highlight integration between two apps teaming (and SharePoint’ing) with productivity gains. And it’s all backed by world-class security and compliance to meet the needs of every team across your organization.

Note: If your SharePoint site is not yet connected to Microsoft Teams, you can connect them in one click right from your team site home page in the lower left-hand corner. That’s the power to “teamify” your SharePoint site; clicking Create a Team from within SharePoint will add a new Microsoft Teams team and connect it to the Office 365 group already associated with that site. Note: this action cannot be reversed.

Cheers, Mark “As a tab in Teams” Kashman 📑🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now

Whether your sellers see the latest messaging or training, or support teams to catch the latest customer intake reports, audience targeting helps tailor the experience. It’s a more “hey that’s for me” experience, rather than one that feels passive and irrelevant – with emphasis, too, on what active consumers don’t see.

Kudos to the Sympraxis Consulting team, for the inspiration, and their recent targeted webinar, for their audience in a most targeted fashion. Check out their related Ask Sympraxis webinar, “SharePoint Audience Targeting: Better Practices”:

The remainder of the article breaks down how audience targeting applies to pages and web parts, navigation, and libraires and lists.

Subscribe now

SharePoint pages and web parts: Same page, differing experiences

Two birds with one stone. In this case, the birds are your audience, the stone is SharePoint. Let’s throw that metaphor a little more explanation… 🐦

Audience targeting lets you roll out the red carpet, and bird seed, for the right group on your SharePoint pages. Simply head to your Site Pages library, tap the ellipsis for page settings, and choose “Audience targeting.” Select your audience group, and voilà—your content appears just for them – just as you programmed. Happy birds!

Whether you’re sharing unique updates or celebrating regional-based wins, only those in the spotlight will see what’s meant for them. The real technology behind is the use of groups including security groups, Microsoft 365 Groups, and AAD dynamic groups. Once you know the who – select groups – you then apply it to showcase the what.

A clear example is to leverage audience targeting within the News web part (as shown above). This “publishes” news posts to specific audiences on the page. When they land on the page, or consume in the mobile app, they see only news posts that were targeted at them. This means you can publish multiple types of news targeted to multiple audiences – all on the same page/site; everyone gets a tailored experience. Extra, extra, read “all that’s meant for you” about it! 📰

Learn more how to use the News web part on a SharePoint page – includes a segment on audience targeting, too.

Notes: You can do this with several core web parts: News, Highlighted content, Quick links, Events (through the backend list that gets created), and the Viva Connections Dashboard. And remember targeting controls visibility, not access; those with the link and permission can still get to the source beyond your targeted entry point.

Navigation: Promote links to specific audiences

Audience targeting helps the most relevant navigation elements get to the right audiences. By enabling audience targeting, specific content will be prioritized to specific audiences through navigational links – applicable to top Megamenu nav and left-hand, team site nav. This keeps things tidy and makes sure the right people can navigate to the right locations and sites, organizing by role or region for example, reducing clutter.

Once you enable audience targeting for your navigation element, you can then target individual navigation links to various audiences. The end result is clean navigation with only the relevant destinations visible to each individual audience member. 🔗

Learn more how to customize the navigation on your SharePoint site - including targeting navigational links to specific audiences.

Libraries and lists: Sharing files, pages, and information more discreetly

Document libraries – including the Pages library, and lists – often house everything from project plans, reporting on progress across teams, to policy docs – all of which are not for everyone, everywhere, all at once. Audience targeting lets you direct attention to the most relevant files, pages, and lists items. Turn on audience targeting in the library settings, pick your group, and your content becomes a curated collection. Rewatching James Bond’s “For Your Eyes Only” would be prudent right now. 🕵️

The true value shows up because of the “Audience” column that gets created. It then plumbs through to various end points – commonly the Highlighted Content web part mentioned above, where you can define what appears on the page. Audience targeting is then inherited, controlling what gets displayed to whom.

BONUS | Other features and apps that help craft the overall SharePoint and Microsoft 365 consumption experience

While the below list isn’t tied to the audience targeting feature, each feature or app represents a useful method for targeting your content with greater relevancy and reach.

• Multilingual | Target people from a language point of view.

• Viva Amplify | Choose to send to specific groups, sites, teams, and communities.

• News articles | Choose to publish them and how they flow up to hubs.

• List and library views | Show certain content in unique ways, for unique needs.

• Templates | Certain people can be assigned to use certain templates, and some people can't even see certain ones when creating sites/list/etc.

In the end...

Whether you’re sharing for everyone or quietly filtering things behind the scenes, audience targeting makes SharePoint feel like it’s working for you, and more importantly “them” - your audience(s).

Give it a try. Let your content find the right people. After all, in SharePoint, everyone deserves to be targeted.

Last, the benefits and drawbacks as you consider and plan targeting your audiences – as presented by Sympraxis Consulting. Learn how to craft the best SharePoint experience with audience targeting – with your targeted audience in mind:

Learn more how to target your audiences across the SharePoint experience in your own Microsoft 365 environment:

• 📄 Target navigation, news, files, links, and web parts to specific audiences. (support.office.com)

• 📄 Target content to a specific audience on a SharePoint site. (support.office.com)

• 📺 DEMO video | “Target content to specific audiences in SharePoint” by SharePoint Maven.

Cheers, and enjoy target practice – knowledge-sharingly speaking! 🎯

-Mark 🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Leave a comment

Published page(s) positively impact your return on intranet (the other ROI). The SharePoint team recently introduced a number of updates across page design, authoring tools, web parts, and methods of communication with impact. This article dives into the top five SharePoint page updates of 2025 (so far).

There are many times where email suffices: Info sharing with a non-recurring individual, Teams chats are just the thing for collaborating with consistent team members or groups or posting to Viva Engage groups to notify your communities of practice. But when it comes time to create a communication that’s easy to author, pulls in multiple media in a well-organized canvas, is easy to consume, easy to share, easy to discover as knowledge in a Search or Copilot grounded source — SharePoint pages bubble up as the tool of choice.

Share

#1 | The flexibility of Flexible sections

But can your SharePoint pages touch their toes. Why, yes, they can!

Flexible sections enable the imagination, helping authors craft bespoke intranet layouts that reflect their communication style preferences. Think of them as adding another dimension to your layouts — allowing the freedom to move, resize, overlap, and group web parts on their 12-cell grid. You’ll also get insight into how it all reflows on mobile (left-to-right or top-to-bottom) to ensure responsive experience for your readers no matter where they view your pages.

In essence, your pages become less confined and more beholden to how you want them to look and behave. You can still use the existing, more-fixed section layouts combined with flexible layouts all up and down the page; you choose and adjust any time. They are a new tool in your page layout toolbox.

To see them in action, take a moment to watch Darrell Webster, aka Modern Work Mentor, in his teardown video, “Unboxing SharePoint's GREATEST design feature since ages ago. Flexible Sections”:

And a quick FYI for developers: SharePoint Framework (SPFx) v1.21 brings support for third-party web parts in flexible layouts and Viva Connections card personalization. More choice, even great flexibility; SharePoint’s way of doing the Scorpion Pose in yoga. 🦂

Learn more about adding sections and columns on a SharePoint page.

#2 | Guide your reader with Editorial cards

OK, time to catch your reader’s eye with a touch of clarity and style - bringing them into the essence of what you’re conveying. With Editorial Cards, it’s possible to land ideas and present perspectives with intention — visually. Like its namesake, Editorial Cards help morph your SharePoint pages into magazine-style communications.

You’ll find this new web part easy to use with a lot of versatility. Editorial Cards have advanced image controls, custom call-to-action buttons, and varied layouts. As the author of the page, you can group text, images, and buttons into composite cards drawing attention to key resources. They fit pretty much wherever you need them - at the top of your page, in the middle, or top-to-bottom in a vertical section.

Here’s a fun end-to-end breakdown of the Editorial Card web part from Michael K. Malloy, aka SharePoint in :60 with his “New SharePoint Editorial Cards: Complete Setup & Configuration Guide (New Feature!)” video:

Learn more how to use the SharePoint Editorial Card web part.

OK, these next two focus on some of the latest AI innovation within SharePoint, with some authoring aspects requiring Copilot licensing…

#3 | The 🆕 FAQ web part

Anticipating raised hands is half the battle. Proactive, published answers boost knowledge base confidence and tames the turmoil. FAQs are important staples of product launches and internal campaigns or initiatives. And yes, they can be time consuming to gather, write, and validate… until now.

BOOM! The FAQ web part appears on the battlefield - Powered by Microsoft 365 Copilot. It helps automate discovery and creation of the right frequently asked questions, grounded in selected documents (like a spec doc or a draft communication) — with a human editor in the loop throughout. The FAQ web part reduces the manual uplift and upkeep, enabling you to keep things like help desks “learn more” pages and field sellers “what you need to know when you talk with your customer” guides.

The FAQ web part “page” brings some nice, dynamic, configurable experiences. It makes the As and Qs easy to see and expand. Plus, the ability to refine everything: Categories, questions, and answers - all of which can be reordered, added, or removed before publishing.

Here is Tina Chen, Senior Product manager at Microsoft, providing an, “Introduction to the AI-powered SharePoint FAQ web part“:

Learn more. Plus, a great ‘how to’ breakdown from Gregory Zelfond, aka SharePoint Maven.

#4 | Copilot-powered authoring

Beyond generating FAQs, what if you could re-author work you and your colleagues originally created—whether it came from early product development, executive pitches for a campaign, or a scattered set of prep materials for an event? With a simple, grounded sentence using Mad Libs®-style dropdowns, you can transform raw input into clean, cohesive internal communications intended for broader distribution.

Copilot in SharePoint allows you to get started with building great looking pages with just a single prompt. You can also create and fine-tune beautiful sections right on the page. Just provide another prompt, and Copilot crafts a section using relevant content, automatically adopting visuals and layouts that match your page.

Here is Giuliano De Luca, Microsoft MVP | Content Creator | Solutions Architect out of Munich, showing you, “How to create SharePoint pages in seconds using Copilot“:

Learn more about Copilot in SharePoint.

#5 | Increase audience reach using Amplify from SharePoint (Preview)

The above four features focus on creating beautiful, informative SharePoint pages, in a less time. But a page that’s important to you is nothing to anyone else until they search and find it (or never find it). It’s best when you “multi-channel-distribute it” — send it to them and it lands square where they are already working.

It’s the value of Viva Amplify — to better reach and engage employees — coming to a new starting point: Amplify from SharePoint; imo, closer to where you’re already crafting your comms. This means you can publish SharePoint news posts and amplify them via email, Viva Engage, SharePoint sites (News web parts), and Teams. And then track effectiveness with integrated analytics to monitor campaign performance across channels.

This feature is currently in Preview. Soon, you will be able to share your Pages to multiple channels using Amplify without needing to navigate away from SharePoint. You can track rollout progress on the Microsoft 365 Public Roadmap ID #473450.

In the end…

In 2025, SharePoint page and news innovation progresses across authoring experiences, new web parts, and distribution methods. These updates help you put your best foot and footnote forward—with less friction and greater impact. I’m always a fan of new web parts and ways to make SharePoint more accessible to everyone. Put your information out there, let it work for you, and enjoy a little more down time.

BONUS

There’s also a full view across a lot of SharePoint and OneDrive innovation from the recent Microsoft 365 Community Conference, specifically a related segment with Maeneka Grewal (SharePoint PM at Microsoft) on all the new SharePoint communication features; jump to it here or below:

Cheers, Mark “Page’ing Dr. SharePoint” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Subscribe now

Automate, automate, automate! 🔁

Manually tracking project updates, deadlines, and status changes across your days and weeks is about as efficient as using a flip phone with a T9 keyboard to fill out and submit your taxes. Microsoft 365 has a whole bunch of everyday automation built in. With features like Microsoft Lists rules for organized tracking, SharePoint quick steps for content-oriented communications, Power Automate flows for higher-order automation — you can create a dynamic notification system that works for you and your colleagues.

The 3️⃣ below features aren't complex or expensive —they're practical, no-code tools that most people can set up in an afternoon. Stay away from the chaos of manual tasks that TASK YOU! Rather, stay informed exactly when and how you need to be.

Microsoft Lists rules: Point, Click, and Get Notified

Rule #1: Lists rules rule.

Rule #2: Try Lists rules.

Rule #3: Encourage colleagues to use Lists rule. #SharingIsCaring

Microsoft Lists rules take your basic information to the next logical level with nothing more complicated than writing a sentence. Think of rules as your personal assistant who never sleeps—watching your lists 24/7 and tap you on the shoulder exactly when something important changes.

It’s all found under the Automate menu within each list’s top menu: Automate > Rules > Create rule (or Manage rules). From there, create simple if/then rules, based on your list columns and ultimately changes to list information. This then helps set reminders and send notifications. Whether it's alerting you when a project status shifts to "Blocked" or sending a heads-up when inventory drops below a number threshold or awareness of date-driven items and activities — Lists rules help keep you and everyone in the loop.

Take a few minutes to see them in action:

Learn more | Create a rule to automate a list or library.

A small note: I was sad to learn about the peer deprecation of Microsoft Loop rules. They had great functionality, integrated with Power Automate, and complimented simple notification-style actions within the new fluidity of Loop.

SharePoint: Put a little *Quick steps* in your step

As SharePoint alerts are sunsetting into retirement, a new feature rises, one that that allows users to automate common tasks in SharePoint lists and libraries with a few clicks. They are essentially pre-configured actions that can be applied to selected items, streamlining workflows and saving time. And, like Lists rules, you configure them like crafting a sentence that describes the actions within the context and structure of your list or library.

Quick steps can be used to set up a predefined action for your list or library. And then it’s a quick step away to… Draft an email, Start a Teams chat, Set a value, and more. Once created, you will see your quick step available at the top of the Automate menu in the command bar and overflow menu when an item or file is selected.

To see it all in action, here’s Laura Rogers / IW Mentor video from her recent Power Hour session to explain how SharePoint quick steps can help you same time with one-click actions:

Learn more:

• Create a quick step for your list or library.

• “SharePoint Quick Steps: Automation Simplified” by Laura Rogers.

Power Automate flows: From Templates to Transformation

While Power Automate might sound intimidating, think of it as rules and quick steps’ more-ambitious sibling—still within everyone’s skillset when working with predefined flows and flow templates; ready to connect you and a lot more across Microsoft 365. It’s all about finding the flow you need, to then work for you routinely in the background.

The beauty lies in starting simple: Power Automate offers hundreds of pre-built templates that handle common scenarios like approval workflows, file management, and notifications without requiring you to become a workflow expert. That’s primarily the no-code approach, with more horsepower waiting if you flow’up into its low-code capabilities; this does require an additional skillset (or a hired vendor).

To compliment two items in this article, many Microsoft Lists templates come with flows already baked in—the Content scheduler template automatically reminds the author 3 days before the draft due date or publish date, while the Event itinerary template can send reminders to update named speakers. There, too, is the Approvals in lists and document libraries — for those common review/approve scenarios. AKA, don’t start from zero. Like a hero, you're configuring established workflows that already stitch together SharePoint, Teams, Outlook, etc.

Use the simple patterns of "if this, do that" scenarios. You can always evolve or create sophisticated multi-step processes as needed and/or when you are ready. Here is Jamie Keet’s Teacher’s Tech “Microsoft Power Automate for Beginners” video that explains all the “getting started” tech concepts in plain English, step by step:

Learn more | Explore the Power Automate page on Microsoft Learn.

BONUS | Outlook rules and reminders: Command your email inbox

Sometimes the best automation happens right where you (some of us still) live— in.your.inbox. Outlook rules and reminders provide an easy-to-use notification system with its "flag it, tag it" approach that most people overlook. Set up rules to automatically categorize emails from specific senders, forward urgent messages, or move project-related emails to designated folders. Or combine flagged emails with custom reminders to create your own email-based follow-up system.

In an email message, select the flag icon to uplevel it to a to-do item. Or right-click the flag icon and select Add Reminder to open the menu. Flag an email for follow-up, set a reminder for next Tuesday, and Outlook will resurface it exactly when you need it.

Learn more: Set Outlook categories, flags, or reminders.

In the end…

It’s time to free up your brain and time. All the above examples have simple setups and are designed to help you reclaim your focus. The minutia can be malicious to your timetables. Set yourself up for automation success. Move on to creative problem-solving and meaningful connections. You most likely already have these tools — Try ‘em, use ‘em, share what you know.

Let Microsoft 365 handle the routine stuff while you and your team handle the game-changing stuff. Your future self (and your stress levels) will thank you.

Cheers, Mark “Automate it!” Kashman

Share

Subscribe now

Putting aside concerns for the anatomy of the ear; I wanted to share a few in-ear insights about my switch from Samsung Galaxy Buds 2 ➡️ AirPods Pro 2. I last switched from wired > wireless and haven’t looked beyond Bluetooth since. As technology enables smaller form factors, improves battery life, and delivers new features, I finally got off my duff and went with a new brand (for me). Over the last few years, I’ve crept slowly into the Apple ecosystem, with iPhone and Apple Watch… and three months ago, I got quite the earful. 🍎😎🍎

“But why, Mark?” you may ask. Alas, how do I love thee pods? Let me count the (three) ways. 🪶

#1 | Cancel culture is great when it comes to solid noise cancellation.

I do love to city walk the street and footprint forest paths alike - with open ears - to let natural sounds (honks and tweets (the good kind)) pour in. But when I’m listening to music or a podcast, or on a conference call, I like to hear the music, the podcast, or the call without interruption. Noise cancellation is not new. And when done right, it’s a game changer. It brings the focus, the quiet, and the calm.

The AirPods Pro 2 are by far the best buds in the biz (for this), imo. I used to have an over-the-ear pair of Sony headphones; they were good. In comparison, these new buds are better — much better. It starts with a good, snug fit in the ears. And then, the tech takes it next level(s)…

The AirPods Pro 2 have several ‘adaptive modes’ that provide varying levels of canceling the culture around you, beyond “Off”:

1. (Active) Noise Cancellation: This is essentially the “all On” to the “Off” mode. This blocks out the outside world and immerses you into your iPhone audio. So, enjoy that music, that pod, that call - without hearing much anything else. Again, use this to cancel culture around you, and focus.

2. Transparency: Allows you to hear the outside world while listening to your audio; a half and half approach to tuning out, without quality compromise to tuning in.

3. Adaptive: AKA, Noise Cancellation + Transparency modes, automatically adjusting the level of noise control based on your surroundings. You hear more of your environment in quieter areas AND enjoy noise cancellation in louder environments. Oncoming police sirens be gone, auto-adaptively.

+ Conversation Awareness: A fun feature that works OK - sometimes not fast enough; it knows when you’re talking with someone and turns down the volume. It then goes back up when the conversation ends.

+ Personalized Spatial Audio: After a little “head check” and tutorial, this helps adjust the sound based on your unique ear shape and head movements.

🤫

“Noise-cancelling microphones and a rear vent are optimally placed to quickly detect sound coming in, working together to counter noise before it reaches your ear.” — Apple.com

#2 | Finger taps and gestures (after getting used to them) are super helpful.

Wield the power of your fingertips.☝️ Once you get used to what’s possible, and build the finger muscle memory, it’s priceless. And, on cold days, might I recommend fingerless gloves; I don’t trust those “made for touchscreen” glove tips.

The touch control for the AirPods Pro 2 is on the stem of each pod (see below pic). Pressing or swiping the stem allows you to do things like pause and resume playback, skip tracks, answer calls, and use Siri. And when out on walks, I highly suggest turning on Announce Calls and Announce Notifications.

One of the nice things are the accompanying sound effects as you gesture and tap to and fro. My favorite sound effect is when you long-hold tap to get into Noice Cancellation mode; it sounds like a glass bubble donning upon you like the classic “Portable cone of silence” from Get Smart. 🕵️‍♂️

The gestures I use most, and how I programmed per each pod:

• Answer a call: When you receive a call, press the stem. Everything else stops/pauses and takes the call. Double tapping ends the call.

• Pause/Play: When you are listening to music or a podcast, press the stem to pause playback, and then tap again to resume. It makes a nice “click” sound each time.

• Adjust volume: Lightly swipe up or down on the stem. This is the trickiest gesture - takes a few to get used to. And when you get it, it makes a quick, satisfying “bloowop” sound; kinda fun to flick up a few bloowop/bloowop/bloowop in a row to raise the volume a few notches.

• Switch between Noise Cancellation modes: You can set either of your AirPods to perform this action when you press and hold the stem. I programmed my left pod for this; again, makes the above-mentioned ‘cone of silence’ sound with a slight variation when turning Noise Cancellation “On” (don cone of silence) and “Off” (remove cone of silence).

• Activate Siri: You can set either of your AirPods to perform this action when you press and hold the stem. I programmed my right pod so I can summon Siri to ask a question, play music, make/accept/decline incoming calls, announce notifications, and more.

One multi-gesture scenario: Ordering at the Coffee Shop | Walk through the door. Tap a stem to pause podcast. Long hold left pod to exit Noise Cancellation; enter Transparency mode. Order a 12-oz double oat milk latte (and maybe a maple bar; maybe). Bloop-tip-pay with Apple Watch. Tap a stem to resume podcast, staying in Transparency mode. Await hearing “Mark, 12-ounce oat milk latte.” Say, “Thanks.” Long hold left pod again to reenter Noise Cancellation. Mosey on out and get in some quiet sipping-steps. ☕️🚶‍♂️

“Touch control lets you manage playback functions from the stem. Swipe up or down to adjust volume, press to play and pause music or mute and unmute yourself on calls.” — Apple.com

Note Reference guide for all gestures across all versions of AirPods.

#3 | Nod and shake (your head) for true hands-free, voice-free operation.

Pre-pods, I got an Apple Watch — so I didn’t have to take out my phone for simple, small, at-a-glance actions. It granted me a hands-free approach, while not cracking my screen.

Cut to Siri + AirPods Pro 2 and my phone almost never leaves my vest/chest pocket while walking, biking, or yard working. Now I balance between wrist turns and head nods/shakes. I can take calls, or not. I can hear texts read out loud, or not. And I can dismiss various notifications.

Scenario 1 — Incoming text message

Siri: “Mary (my mom) sent a long text message. Would you like to read it?”

Mark with AirPods Pro 2 in ear: [Nods head] 🙂‍↕️

Siri: [Reads the full text aloud, including all the peppered-in emojis] 😉

Scenario 2 — Incoming call

Siri: “Incoming call from an unknown number, would you like to answer it?”

Mark with AirPods Pro 2 in ear: [Shakes head] 🙂‍↔️

Siri: [Ends call] ☎️

Mark: [Right back to where I was]

“A new hands‑free Siri experience. With Siri Interactions, you can simply nod your head yes or gently shake your head no when Siri asks if you’d like to answer an incoming call, hear a text message, or manage a notification.” — Apple.com

BONUS | 4️⃣ related AirPods news bits from #WWDC25 #AppleKeynote

1. Pause and resume recording | Nice to take a hands-free approach to the capture-create side of the iPhone. Calling all podcasters! 🎙️

2. Control your device’s camera by tapping the stem | Use that MagSafe on a metal sign for those out-and-about self-selfies 🤳; expect an “erase AirPods from photo” feature to follow 😏.

3. Pause media when asleep | For those times when music or podcasts brings on the 💤’s… and if they do, less guessing/scrolling back to where you dozed off.

4. Automatic switching with CarPlay | A nice awareness of transition, with less manual tapping to move from in-ear 👂—> in-car 🚘.

▶️ ON DEMAND | The full WWDC 2025 — June 9, 2025 keynote; lots of AirPods nuggets sprinkled throughout the iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS 26, watchOS 26, visionOS 26, and tvOS 26 announcements: 🍎

3️⃣ helpful resources that helped me compare, decide to purchase, and then how to use.

There are so many other things these bud gems can do - Auto-read texts, Live Listening, a clinical-grade Hearing Aid feature, and great battery life. Plus, the case is next level, with MagSafe charging and audible speaker with Find My integration. All these things are covered in detail within the below resources:

1. “AirPods Pro 2 Tips, Tricks & Hidden Features | YOU MUST KNOW!!!” from Hayls World. Hayleigh Chamberlain dives into everything that’s new and great about them, from the cool case features, live listen, battery widgets, and more. Not only did this video help me decide to move on beyond Samsung, it also uncovered a bunch of features that would’ve taken me a few months to find (if ever):

2. “AirPods Pro 2: Long-Term Review“ — drill down by Mundane-Complex-1902 posted to r/airpods. (Reddit). This article covers two years of use and gets to the heart of many pros and cons, from design, to sound quality, battery life, updates compared to previous version, and more.

   

3. “Apple AirPods Pro 2 v/s Samsung Galaxy Buds2 Pro: Which One is Right for You?” by NWI via LinkedIn. They posted an easy-to-read article with a nice comparison chart - pitting my “previous” with my “might gets."

   

I love thee (pods) with the passion put to (daily) use.

Cheerios, Mark “The quiet nod” Kashman | #APP2, FTW! 👂

Share

Subscribe now

I want to take a moment to thank two people who made The Intrazone what it is.

Chris McNulty, my incredible sports-referency co-host, has been more than just a voice alongside mine—he’s been a sounding board, a thought partner, and a great friend. His insights, his humor, his willingness to go along with my humor, and his tech curiosity made every conversation better - for you and me, and I can truly say this podcast wouldn’t have been the same without him.

And Lisa Gray, our wonderful producer from the get go, aka -- the driving force behind the scenes, who turned our ideas into polished, engaging, coherent episodes week after week. Lisa’s dedication, creativity, and sharp editorial sense made this podcast something I’m truly proud of—something that, at times, kept me going. Knowing that Lisa was there, ensuring everything sounded just right, wasn't too long, not too many puns, not too many acronyms -- it really, truly made all the difference.

To Chris and to Lisa, thank you, thank you, thank you. What a wonderful journey and wonderful experience working and being with you on The Intrazone.

Stay in touch

Mark Kashman | LinkedIn | Substack | Bluesky | YouTube | Twitter

Chris McNulty | LinkedIn | Website | Twitter | Polaris Pathways Podcast

Lisa Gray | LinkedIn

• Discover and follow other Microsoft podcasts at aka.ms/microsoft/podcasts.

• Discover and share past episodes of The Intrazone: aka.ms/TheIntrazone.

Work/Life moves on

Cheers and thanks for listening and engaging with us. Dare I say I'm moving into the Extrazone. Much more to come. Stay tuned to The KashBox.

— Mark “It’s been my pleasure” Kashman 🧔🏻‍♂️

Share

Subscribe now