Introducing Microsoft Lists – Unleash your business’ potential with Microsoft 365

“Organise workflows, store information and keep your Team on-track with Microsoft Lists”

Microsoft Lists is the eagerly awaited ‘evolution’ of a popular existing feature found within SharePoint – SharePoint lists. ‘Microsoft Lists’ promises to bring new features, capabilities and updated user experience to the popular ‘Lists’ feature that has existed within SharePoint for many years.

The main difference between existing SharePoint lists and the new ‘Lists’ experience will be how it’s accessed. At the moment the lists feature is only accessible through SharePoint. Microsoft Lists will take this feature and bring it front and centre with a dedicated app, as well as the option to launch lists through channels in Teams.

Hang on, I’m not familiar with SharePoint lists

‘Lists’ act as a gathering space for data pertaining to a particular topic that you can set up within a SharePoint site. ‘Lists’ display data in columns and rows similar to excel spreadsheets only in a cleaner, slimmed-down and more user-friendly interface. The Lists experience also lets users set up ‘views’; customisable panes that display only selected data from a list in a predetermined way for ease of analysis.

What might I use a ‘list’ for?

The highly customisable nature of lists means they are ideal for gathering a wide variety of data – the choice is yours. However, some of the more common applications are for storing contact information, storing links or employee records.

SharePoint lists can be exported to Excel for more detailed examination. Excel can extrapolate lists data into graphs, tables, pie charts etc for review and analysis purposes.

Ah, I see, so what will Microsoft Lists bring to the table?

As we’ve mentioned the fundamental difference to the Lists experience will be the ability to launch Lists as a standalone application, this essentially upgrades Lists from a mere feature, to a platform. In addition to this fundamental change, there are likely to be several experiential changes. It’s impossible to explore these changes in forensic detail until the platform is launched but let’s look at some of the main changes that Microsoft users are expecting with Lists.

Templates

Lists will introduce pre-formatted Templates which will speed-up the list building process and make it easier to create lists with the same data fields and properties consistently every time. Microsoft Lists will also see a return of the ability to create lists form an excel spreadsheet – a feature absent in SharePoint lists. You’ll also be able to establish a new list based on the format of an existing one, however, this feature is available in SharePoint already. It’s not yet known how many pre-made templates there will be, but early indications suggest there may be eight with templates for asset tracking, issue tracking, team evaluations, among others.

Views

The evolution will extend to Lists’ trademark ‘Views’ feature.

• The Grid. This will be a refresh of the existing ‘quick edit’ view which allows you to perform mass updates to a list. Details of this refresh are not fully known yet.

The ‘card view’ will also be subject to a refresh.

• Calendar view. This popular view will return allowing individual list items to be displayed in a calendar format. Great for event planning or task management.

Rules

There will be the addition of a ‘rules’ feature so that you can trigger actions when changes are made to a list. For example, you could trigger email notifications to group members whenever an item is added so that all concerned are updated to any relevant changes as they happen.

Teams Integration

The ability to access Lists through channels in teams will help bring group conversation and data together in ways not possible before. For example, you’ll be able to centre a conversation around a List item – now you can only start a chat around a document, not an item of data stored in a list.

While it is likely to prove evolutionary rather than revolutionary, Microsoft Lists will level-up the SharePoint lists experience with the addition of new access portals as well as useful new features such as templates. With its launch imminent, it may be worth considering how you could incorporate Lists into your business’ productivity toolkit.

Release your business’s potential with empowering tech choices.

Here at Cloud Nexus, we draw on over 20 years of experience in the IT sector to help the hundreds of businesses we work with unlock their true potential using technology.  We help small and medium-sized enterprises increase their productivity, improve efficiency, and safeguard their digital assets often by helping them get the most of the technology they already have at their disposal.

We know Microsoft 365 inside-out, but we’re often dismayed by how few businesses utilise its full potential.  Why not get in touch and let us guide you through the options that may already be sitting on your PC waiting to be opened.