A collaboration services suite is adapted to support a plurality of
integrated telecommunications services accessed by geographically
dispersed team members using a virtual team environment (VTE) client that
generates a graphical user interface (GUI) for each of the respective
team members. Communications sessions are automatically set up by the
collaboration services suite in response to request messages generated by
the VTE client when a team member initiates a communications session
request using the GUI. Team members require no knowledge of another team
member's communications device address in order to initiate a
communications session. The collaboration services suite includes a VTE
server that communicates with the VTE clients, a presence engine that
collects and maintains a status of communications devices specified in a
current profile of the team member; and, a call server for handling setup
and control of a voice component of each communications session
completed.