Use the Whiteboard for Brainstorming

Locked lesson.

Upgrade

About this lesson

Use the whiteboard to brainstorm ideas and collaborate with team members. 

Quick reference

Use the Whiteboard for Brainstorming

Create a team whiteboard that all meeting participants can collaborate on and review after the meeting has finished. 

When to use

We use the whiteboard app whenever we want to have a digital canvas to brainstorm ideas that everyone in the meeting can edit. 

Instructions

Something else we can share in a Teams meeting is a Whiteboard.

Whiteboards are a new addition to Teams and are a separate app in their own right. In fact, we already have access to the Whiteboard app via our Microsoft 365 portal. 

The Whiteboard app has been integrated into Teams to make brainstorming ideas on a digital canvas seamless. Whiteboards can be created on the fly in a meeting or can be prepared before a meeting commences and shared with all participants. 

Completed Whiteboards can be reviewed after the meeting is over and are stored in OneDrive. 

Create and Share a Whiteboard in a Meeting

We need to be in a meeting to create a whiteboard. 

  • Click the Meet now button. 
  • Choose meeting settings and click Join now. 
  • Click the Share button. 
  • Choose Microsoft Whiteboard. 

This opens an infinite, digital canvas. We can use this canvas to type, draw and sketch ideas. We can use the scroll wheel on our mouse to zoom in or out of the canvas. 

Draw with Pens

At the top of the Whiteboard is a gallery of pens. We can use these to draw on our canvas. This work best for people using touch screen devices with a stylus. This gallery also contains an eraser tool to remove annotations. 

Add Text, Notes, Shapes, and Reactions

The Create panel shows the other types of content we can add to the Whiteboard.

Click the Text tool to type text. Use Notes to add a post-it note style graphic. Draw circles and rectangles using the Shapes tool. Register your opinion by posting a Reaction. 

Anything added to the canvas can be resized using the resize handles and moved via drag and drop. 

Add Images, Documents, and Templates

We can also add Images and Documents we have saved off to our PC to the canvas. If we want a bit of a head-start, we could select a Template from the gallery to quickly create, pre-styled todo-lists, project plans, brainstorming, etc.

Collaborate on a Whiteboard

Everyone in the meeting can add their own ideas and thoughts to the whiteboard. When someone else is typing on the canvas, we can see their profile photo in a small circle. 

To ensure that others can edit the Whiteboard, click the cog icon and toggle on Other participants can edit. We can change the color of the canvas from here by choosing Format background. 

Review a Whiteboard

When the meeting is over, Whiteboards are saved for review later. 

  • Re-open the meeting. 
  • Click the Whiteboard tab to see the Whiteboard. 

We can access all Whiteboards we have created by logging into the Microsoft 365 portal and choosing Whiteboard from the App Launcher. 

Hints & tips

  • Whiteboards can be exported as png images from settings. 
  • We can only see the Whiteboard from the Teams calendar once the meeting is over. If the meeting is still in progress, the Whiteboard tab will not be visible. 
Login to download
  • 00:01 A couple of lessons ago, I showed you how you can
  • 00:06 share content when you're in a meeting.
  • 00:10 You can attach a file to a chat conversation,
  • 00:13 you can share your screen, or you can share a specific window.
  • 00:17 But those weren't the only options that we had when it comes to sharing content.
  • 00:22 We can also share and collaborate on a whiteboard.
  • 00:26 And I really wanted to make sure that before we collaborate on a whiteboard,
  • 00:31 we knew how to schedule a meeting, because that is quite
  • 00:35 important when you're trying to understand how whiteboards work.
  • 00:39 Now, if you're wondering what exactly a whiteboard is, and how it can be useful
  • 00:44 in Teams, well, it solves one of the main challenges of online meetings.
  • 00:49 And that is having productive and creative brainstorming sessions.
  • 00:53 Prior to Teams, if I want to collect ideas from my team,
  • 00:57 we'd probably jump into a meeting room and gather around the flip chart or
  • 01:01 whiteboard, and brain storm that way.
  • 01:05 And this environment has effectively been recreated in Teams using Whiteboard app.
  • 01:11 And the Whiteboard app is effectively a digital canvas.
  • 01:15 We can draw, sketch, and write on the whiteboard, and
  • 01:18 all participants in that meeting can join in.
  • 01:21 So we're really collaborating in real time.
  • 01:22 That whiteboard is then available even after the meeting has finished.
  • 01:28 So in this lesson, we're going to take a look at how this whiteboard works.
  • 01:32 Now, the first thing that you need to understand about the whiteboard is that
  • 01:37 it's a separate app in its own right.
  • 01:39 But the app has been integrated very nicely into Teams.
  • 01:43 Now, you may or may not have noticed if you have a Microsoft 365 account,
  • 01:47 you have access to the Whiteboard app from here.
  • 01:50 So let's take a look at that, first of all.
  • 01:53 Now, I'm logged into my Microsoft 365 account.
  • 01:56 If I click on the app launcher, notice at the bottom here I have Whiteboard.
  • 02:02 Now, if you can't see it in your list, you might have to click on All Apps, and
  • 02:07 then scroll down in order to see it.
  • 02:09 Though if I click to open this, it's going to open up in a brand new window,
  • 02:12 and it's going to show me all of the whiteboards that I've created.
  • 02:16 And you can see here we've got a lot of different tests that I was doing before
  • 02:20 this session.
  • 02:21 Now, just keep this app in the back of your mind,
  • 02:24 because the way that you're most likely to use a whiteboard is when you're
  • 02:28 in a meeting to collaborate on ideas with the meeting participants.
  • 02:33 So let's focus on that, first of all.
  • 02:35 Now, I'm going to go back to my calendar.
  • 02:37 And notice here we have the Brainstorming Ideas for Project Alpha meeting.
  • 02:42 So I'm quickly going to join this meeting, and then wait for Olivia to also join.
  • 02:47 So let's open it up, click on Join, and choose Join now at the bottom.
  • 02:53 So I'm just going to wait for Olivia to join.
  • 02:56 There she is, on time as ever.
  • 02:57 And let's open up the chat panel and just say a quick hello.
  • 03:02 So once we're in the meeting, we can then create a whiteboard.
  • 03:07 So up to Share, and it's this one that we want to select, Microsoft Whiteboard.
  • 03:14 And this is going to basically open up a digital canvas that we can all work on in
  • 03:19 real time.
  • 03:19 And the main advantage of working in this way using a whiteboard is that it
  • 03:24 means you don't have to keep passing control between different people in
  • 03:29 the meeting for them to be able to type their ideas, or post their thoughts.
  • 03:34 Now, what we have here is just a blank canvas,
  • 03:36 and this canvas is pretty infinite.
  • 03:39 We can use the scroll wheel on our mouse to zoom in, or zoom back out.
  • 03:43 Also notice that we have running across the top here a little gallery of
  • 03:47 different pens.
  • 03:49 So if you're using a stylus or a touchscreen, it might be that you want to
  • 03:53 choose one of these pens and make some annotations in that way.
  • 03:56 Now, I'm using a mouse, so this is probably going to be a little bit messy.
  • 04:01 But also notice over on the left hand side, we have this Create Panel,
  • 04:05 where we can add different elements to this whiteboard.
  • 04:09 So if I want to add some text, I can click on this and then click on the canvas and
  • 04:14 type something in, for example, brainstorm ideas.
  • 04:18 Notice that while I have this text selected,
  • 04:21 I get this little menu pop up just above, where I can edit the text.
  • 04:25 I can do things like change the color, I can delete it, or
  • 04:29 I can copy it, or even add an image.
  • 04:32 And of course, with all of these different parts,
  • 04:35 you can move them around and even resize them.
  • 04:39 So maybe I want to make that a little bit bigger and place it up in the corner.
  • 04:44 I can add sticky notes, so this very much looks like a post-it note.
  • 04:49 I can do the same thing.
  • 04:51 I can edit, I can change the color, I can type in some text, and
  • 04:56 of course, I can move this around.
  • 04:58 I can add shapes.
  • 04:59 So maybe I want to add a circle to the canvas, or maybe I want to add a reaction.
  • 05:05 Maybe I want to tell Olivia that I really
  • 05:08 like the information that she's put on this post-it note.
  • 05:12 I can add my own images from here, and also documents.
  • 05:16 If I really want to take all of the hard work out of creating whiteboards,
  • 05:21 I could choose to load up a template.
  • 05:24 For example, if we go to the Brainstorming category,
  • 05:28 notice I have different whiteboard templates in here, which are really
  • 05:33 going to help me organize and give a bit of structure to my thoughts.
  • 05:38 Now as I mentioned, one of the coolest things about whiteboards is that everybody
  • 05:42 in the meeting can freely participate and make edits.
  • 05:46 Now, in order for that to happen,
  • 05:47 you do need to make sure that you have the setting toggled on.
  • 05:51 So if we click on the cog icon in the top right hand corner,
  • 05:55 make sure that you have other participants can edit toggled on if you
  • 05:59 want other people to be able to add their own ideas.
  • 06:03 Now, I think Olivia has something that she wants to add to the canvas.
  • 06:07 Notice as soon as she clicks on the canvas,
  • 06:10 I can see where she's currently clicked.
  • 06:13 And I can also see a little version of her Avatar, so that I know that it's her.
  • 06:17 Now, sometimes if you have a lot of people in this meeting, and everybody's adding
  • 06:22 things to the whiteboard, it can get a little bit crazy and out of control.
  • 06:26 So remember that at any point, you can click on that cog icon, and
  • 06:30 you can turn off this setting just here so that other people can't edit.
  • 06:35 I also have a format background option from here as
  • 06:38 well if I just want to change the background of this particular canvas.
  • 06:42 And if I want to export this out to a PNG image,
  • 06:45 I can choose to export the whiteboard as an image.
  • 06:49 Now, once we've finished collaborating on this whiteboard,
  • 06:52 where do these whiteboards get saved?
  • 06:55 Well, let's stop presenting, and let's end this meeting.
  • 07:01 Now, one place we can find this whiteboard is to jump back into the meeting.
  • 07:06 So if I reopen the calendar invite and click on Join, if I go to Share,
  • 07:11 and then Whiteboard, it is simply going to reopen the whiteboard that Olivia and
  • 07:17 I were working on the last time we were in this meeting.
  • 07:22 So that is one way you can get back to your whiteboard.
  • 07:26 Now, if I end meeting again, what you're more than likely going to
  • 07:31 want to do is review the whiteboard after the meeting is finished.
  • 07:36 So once again, if we go back to our calendar and open up the calendar invite,
  • 07:40 notice at the top here we have a Whiteboard tab.
  • 07:43 And if we click on this, it's going to show any whiteboards that we've
  • 07:47 collaborated on in that particular meeting.
  • 07:50 And of course,
  • 07:51 every whiteboard you create gets saved back into Microsoft 365 via OneDrive.
  • 07:58 So what you could do is access it online, as well via the app.
  • 08:03 So if we open up the app launcher again and jump into Whiteboard,
  • 08:07 we should find that this has updated with the last whiteboard that we created.
  • 08:13 And it's this one at the top here.
  • 08:15 It's being a bit slow loading the images.
  • 08:18 But if I click on it, it's going to reopen that whiteboard, and
  • 08:22 we can work on it and edit it in this Whiteboard app.

Lesson notes are only available for subscribers.

Gift this course