Microsoft has announced a handful of new collaboration tools for Teams ahead of Microsoft Inspire, its partner-focused event taking place this week. In addition to new Teams features, Microsoft also introduced Windows 365 Government, bringing cloud PCs to government customers in the United States.

The bulk of the announcements is focused on Teams, though, and that starts with the new Excel Live feature, which is built on top of Live Share, a feature introduced earlier this year at Build. Live Share lets you collaborate on certain content within the Teams meeting window, and Excel Live leverages that so you can edit Excel workbooks simultaneously with other people on a call. The Teams SDK has also been updated so developers can build collaborative experiences for Live Share.

In a similar vein, Microsoft is adding collaborative annotations to Teams, so users can draw or type on top of content shared in a meeting using the suite of tools provided by Microsoft Whiteboard.  This feature is now generally available. Finally, Teams is getting the ability to record and send videos directly within the app, so you can easily send a video message to someone.

Something else that's new is the brand-new Viva Engage app for Teams. Microsoft is continuing to expand the Viva brand, and Viva Engage is meant to be like a consumer social network (such as Facebook) but for the workplace. As the name suggests, the goal is to increase engagement between people in the workplace, and it includes features like Stories to give users more ways to express themselves. You also have a "Storyline", which is pretty much the equivalent of a Facebook profile where others can see all your posts over time. If that sounds familiar to Microsoft's own Yammer, it is, but it seems that Viva Engage is more focused on sharing more of a personal perspective about your work, rather than just a place to get work done.

On the topic of Viva, Microsoft also announced that Viva Goals - first announced at Build back in May - will be generally available on August 1st. This is a platform for setting goals and managing employees to drive results based on your organization's priorities. For the most part, Microsoft didn't mention availability for the other collaboration tools in Teams.