Office 365 Groups: Quick tour of new user and admin experiences
Today we take a tour of all the recent updates to Office 365 Groups – spanning user, IT and developer experiences. Groups are pervasive in Office 365, providing self-service capabilities to accelerate collaboration – from conversations, calendar, files, to notes and planning. From an admin's perspective, this also means there is a need to create, modify and audit all activities; Groups in Azure AD provides these capabilities as well.
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Give Your Data The Chart It Deserves
As written on nhlearninggroup.com
Definitely for the arithmophobic. Thanks to the Live Charts feature in Excel, you can give them an instant makeover with colorful charts. In older versions of Excel, charting was one of the more difficult tasks. It wasn’t only about the time it took, but also about the right chart type that fit the data. Excel 2013 makes it easy as a click with Live Charts. Excel uses a special algorithms to show the chart types you can use based on the data.
Select the data to chart and click Insert — Recommended Chart to see options such as line, bar, and pie charts that Excel feels is right for your data. Click each chart to preview what your data will look like. Pick the right chart and Excel inserts the chart with some page elements to work with styles, colors, and the chart data. Do note: Not every chart type is recommended. Specialized chart types are available from the Insert Chart button on the Ribbon..
From PDF to editable Word documents
One of the best features of PDFs are that they are not editable as a default. It’s also an irksome feature if you want to take information out of it. A whole industry of tools exist that help you be more productive with PDF files. Don’t disregard the new PDF Reflow feature in MS Word 2013. Making it uncomplicated – open a PDF with Word 2013 and it will behave like a normal Word document. You can reuse the content without too much effort. Now, all that rich data locked in PDF files is ripe for picking.
Word creates a copy and opens it as a normal document as you would any other from File – Open. Make any changes - the original PDF is left intact. The conversions are not always perfect, but this is a very handy feature.
Use Share Link As A Quick Presentation Tool
Microsoft Office 2013 brings new collaborative features for Word and PowerPoint which piggyback on a Microsoft Account. With the Office Presentation Service your collaborators do not even need the Office suite at their end. A web browser does the job with the help of the Office web app. Work on your document and begin sharing from File — Share — Present Online. From here, select Office Presentation Service and click Present Online. A share link is created. Send it via Skype, email, or any other online medium. Start your presentation and the recipients get to view it on their browsers when they click on the shared link. Share notes and your team members can follow you through the document. They can also watch the presentation independently. The presenter controls the presentation from this special menu bar.
Refer Wikipedia Within Word
The official Wikipedia app is a quick resource for general research. With the Wikipedia app inside Word. Go to Insert – Apps for Office– Wikipedia. You might have to search for it among the featured apps. The app also allows you to insert a section of a text or an image. Select the text or hover over the image. Click on the insert symbol to insert it into the body of your Word document. The source link is automatically included with the insert. The Wikipedia app can also be used to research something on the side-pane by simply selecting something in your document. Nice.
Use Your Ears with Assistive Technologies
With the Office suite, you can take advantage of the built-in screen reader (Narrator) to read and create Word documents, PowerPoint slides, Excel spreadsheets, OneNote notebooks, and Outlook email. Microsoft Support recommends that you become familiar with shortcut keys as well. For example, you can use voice to record your comments on PowerPoint slides or a Word document. If you are short on time, use the Narrator to have it read aloud Outlook emails or a Word doc. Microsoft Office 2013 also comes with an audio-enabled Mini Translator that can take a selected foreign phrase and read aloud its pronunciation. Select a foreign word. Click onReview – Translate – Mini Translator. Hit the Play button.
Go Easy on the Eyes with Read Mode
If you have a touch enabled computer, Office 2013 was designed for productivity with fingers. The Ribbon menu was restyled and made more functional. I will ask you to do one thing if you are still deciding to come aboard (c’mon, it’s been a year now!). Go to View – Read Mode. That’s a bonus point for a distraction free reading experience.
It auto-resizes the document to the full screen and is completely uncluttered. Click on View to see options for tweaking this mode. For instance, the color modes that make it easier on the eyes. You can get rid of the toolbar for a full-screen experience.
Save Time With a Copy
Don’t go hunting for the document to copy. The shortcut for creating a copy of an Office document is not very apparent but it is a huge time saver if you want to work on a copy while keeping the original intact. Click on File – Open – Recent Documents. If the document was opened recently, the filename will be displayed. Right-click on the filename and select Open a copy. Any changes that you make are saved to the copy. You can then save it at any location. This tiny step is a time saver because you are spared from browsing to its location and manually creating a copy to work on.
Work Anywhere With Documents Online
Save your Office documents online via the Microsoft account. Microsoft has the sister suite ofweb apps for Word, Excel, OneNote, and PowerPoint. Word, Excel, and PowerPoint save the last location where you left off work before saving– to the letter, cell, or slide. Pick up where you left off working on a different device while away from your main computer. You can also continue your work on Mobile apps for Office.
Don't Cut and Paste Anymore
There’s this quicker way that uses lesser key presses. Using Cut-Paste (Ctrl-x Ctrl-v) to move text from one place on the page to another within a Word document is fine. But try this. Select any block of text. Press F2. You will notice that the status bar (at the bottom of your screen) says Move to where. Place the cursor at the location where you wish to move the block of text. Press Enter and the selection will be moved.
Searching for Data in Excel
When you search for data, you can use ? to represent any single character or * to represent a series of characters. Example if your data has all the states, you could type “*Dakota” and it will pull up both North and South Dakota data.
Auto Filter in Excel
Too much data to go through? Use AutoFilter to find values, show or hide values, in one or more columns of data. You can filter based on choices you make from a list, search to find the data that you want to see. When you filter data, entire rows are hidden if values in one or more columns don't meet the filtering criteria. Click the Data Tab- Filter to activate.
Save and Auto Recover in Word 2013
It will happen! A computer crash, power goes out or you just close without saving. To avoid losing all your work when this happens, make sure AutoRecover and AutoSave are turned on. Simply click on the File Tab- Options- Save and make sure the SAVE AUTORECOVER INFORMATION IS SELECTED and you can select the number of minutes from 0-120.
Calendar Views in Outlook 2013
Managing and Viewing multiple calendars? By default, calendar groups appear side by side. To make the calendars overlap, click the View in Overlay Mode arrow on the tab of each calendar you want to overlap. In Microsoft 2013 there is a world of cool new things to discover. However, a favorite new feature in Outlook 2013 is located below the Navigation pane where you can have mail, calendar, contacts, tasks and notes.
Extended Clipboard in Microsoft Work 2013
Microsoft Word has a useful "Spike" feature that allows you to cut text and images from multiple locations in a document and paste them all at once to a different location. To use this feature, select the text, images or other objects in your document that would like to move and press "CTRL +F3" to move that selection to the Spike. You can to that same spike using the same key combo shortcut.
Adding Video to Microsoft PowerPoint 2013
Ask any teacher, and they'll tell you nothing captures your audience more than a movie. To add a movie to your PowerPoint Presentation, click "Insert" on the Ribbon. You will see a button for "Video" on the right side of the ribbon. Using the drop-down menu, you can insert a video from YouTube, Facebook or your OneDrive account, or any other video embedding website.
Refreshing the Same Query in Access 2013
You may use a report or query with the help of parameters as a filter tool. With this one report of query you filter different departments or dates you need to print multiple reports for different purposes. You may only need your mouse click to click the refresh button to prompt for a new parameter window. You can work much faster by staying on the keyboard and creating a smoother workflow. After running your first query or report stay in the same view (don't switch back to design). Press "SHIFT + F9" to run the report again with a new parameter.
Copy and Paste Tricks in Word 2013
When you copy a passage of text from the web to Word, styles and formatting are retained. However, there's an easy way to remove this styling from any block fo text in Word - just select the text you copied and press "Ctrl+Space Bar". The rich text will be transformed to plain text. Additionally, you can move text in Word without the traditional "Ctrl+X, Ctrl+V" shortcut. Highlight any block of text, press "F2", and place the cursor at the spot where you wish to move that text. Press "Enter" and the selection will be moved! Test it out with this paragraph!
PowerPoint Presentation Tricks
While you are conducting a PowerPoint presentation, if something comes up that you don't want to be seen at that point without having to stop the slideshow, hit the letter 'B' on your keyboard. This will blackout the screen without losing your place. Hit 'B' again, and you'll be back in business. Another cool trick... while in presentation mode, hold 'Ctrl+P' and you will change your pointer into a pen that can write or draw. Hit the 'Esc' key and you will change back to your pointer!
Custom Views in Outlook 2013
In Microsoft 2013 there is a world of cool new things to discover. However, a favorite new feature in Outlook 2013 is located below the Navigation pane where you can have mail, calendar, contacts, tasks and notes.
While working in your inbox, to view your calendar without leaving your inbox, right-click on the calendar and select open new window. You will now be able to stay in your inbox and open your calendar at the same time. You can now actively work in your calendar and read your emails. Tada!
Visually Represent Your Data in Excel
Here is a great Excel trick for all of us out there that like visual representations of our data. You can use this trick with Excel 97-2013. Whenever you have a table of data and want to create a chart, here is what you do. Click in a cell within the table you want to chart. Press the Key on the top row of your keyboard, and say "WOW"! Now you have a new chart of your data on a new worksheet named "Chart 1". Your original table is still on the original worksheet!
Navigate Excel Workbooks Easily
Here's a little-known trick that will allow you to quickly and easily navigate to a specific worksheet in Excel workbooks that contain more than one (Sheet1, Sheet2, etc.). You can display a pop-up list of all worksheet names in your workbook by right-clicking one of the navigation arrows to the left of the worksheet tabs that are located at the bottom of the screen. Simply select a sheet from the list, and you're there in a flash![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
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Anyone, at any level, who aims to make an impact, buck the status quo, and define his or her industry can take a page from Fast Company cofounder Bill Taylor’s book. He addressed top-level IT professionals in his recent Microsoft Virtual North America CIO Summit keynote speech, but his advice is relevant to professionals across sectors. Like a true sage, Taylor asked attendees to consider a variety of questions and seek the answers within themselves to reach greatness. These three questions offer a roadmap for those looking to raise their game to the next level.
Instead of focusing on being the best player, how can you redefine the game you’re playing?
Changing the nature of the competition is a great way to get ahead. By “embracing one-of-a-kind ideas in a world filled with me-too copycat thinking,” innovators come out on top. “The job today is not to be the best at what lots of other people already do. It’s to be the only one who does what you do,” asserted Taylor. One example is Umpqua Bank, a regional institution that was smaller than small—just six branches—until Ray Davis took the helm in 1994. Now boasting nearly 400 locations, Umpqua is Oregon’s largest bank, and this change was driven in large part by a focus on culture: the tellers also act as baristas, each transaction concludes with a piece of chocolate, and the branches become community centers after business hours. Umpqua is winning because it dares to redefine a bank as a regional resource.
Changing the nature of the competition is a great way to get ahead. By "embracing one-of-a-kind ideas in a world filled with me-too copycat thinking."
What single sentence will describe you?
Taylor stressed the importance of simplification for both individuals and corporate entities. Inspired by the story of Clare Boothe Luce—who told President Kennedy that “a great man is one sentence” before she asked him what sentence would describe his presidency—Taylor stressed the importance of this kind of simplification for both individuals and corporate entities. This reductionist method forces leaders, companies, or job seekers to zero in on their goals, minus buzzwords and jargon. Once you know how you want to be described, you can make changes to bring that fantasy into reality.
It doesn’t matter what keeps you up at night. What gets you up in the morning?
Taylor was emphatic that success is rooted in caring more than anyone else, whether it’s about your customers, your colleagues, or the way your organization conducts itself in the marketplace. It’s up to companies to provide their employees and their leaders with this motivation.
One exemplar is USAA, the financial services company for active and retired military. Taylor said new employees are immersed in the world of their customers on day one, engaging in a deployment simulation (to develop empathy while learning about the financial issues service people face), eating MREs at training instead of a catered lunch, even volunteering to go through the brutal first day of basic training. USAA takes work that might seem passionless (such as selling renter’s insurance) and gives staff a reason to believe this work is valuable and necessary and important. This directly translates to better customer service and, of course, more revenue.
Taylor summarized his thesis with contributions from two unusual thought leaders: cognitive-psychology pioneer Jerome Bruner and acerbic comedian George Carlin. Bruner once wrote that learning (or as Taylor extrapolated, innovation) “is, most often, figuring out how to use what you already know in order to go beyond what you currently think.” Carlin famously cracked wise about “vuja de”—“the strange feeling that somehow none of this has ever happened before.” Taylor believes fostering this feeling is a way to inspire Bruner-style breakthroughs.
The questions Taylor poses are a few ways to intentionally make the familiar feel unfamiliar, to look at your profession or your career or your industry as you’ve never seen it before. The answers may be surprising.
At Pandora, our goal is to design and sell signature jewelry that delights the women who wear it. Our pieces are sold in more than 9,500 stores in over 90 countries; sometimes our end customers shop at our corporate-owned stores or franchises, while others seek out Pandora jewelry at other retailers. As a company, Pandora is growing—by leaps and bounds, which is a testament to the beauty and quality of the products we make. To smooth the way, we’ve taken a fresh look at how we operate. It isn’t enough anymore for our different offices to use whatever supplies, processes and technologies they have at hand. Instead, we need to grow as a single cohesive organization, putting the right support in place for our workforce so that employees worldwide stay efficient and effective in their daily work lives.
Our efforts to help employees design and market our jewelry include providing the latest technology solutions companywide. We’re using some of our new solutions to help us make sweeping changes to the way we interact with our franchisees and to transform the shopping experience for our customers. Other technology upgrades are all about incremental efficiencies.
We adopted Microsoft Office 365 a while back and find ourselves constantly benefitting from the continuing innovations that Microsoft adds. For example, we recently gave Microsoft Office 2016 a try so we could take advantage of lots of time-savers. Our geographically dispersed employees have already become enthusiastic users of the new Office Groups features, which give them an easy, organized way to share conversations, calendars and notebooks. Office Groups are easy for anyone to create, and they’re particularly effective when used in conjunction with Microsoft Outlook, because everything related to a team project shows up right within Outlook, which is where I spend most of my day.
It’s even more powerful when we add in Microsoft OneNote, which may be the best app ever developed. Having a single place to put anything you think of (notes, images, jewelry design sketches, production schedules, logistical information), making it searchable, and being able to access it from any device and share access with others is pretty amazing. In fact, one of our executives used to be a strictly paper guy. He had special notebooks that he carried around everywhere. When we showed him OneNote, he immediately switched over completely, and now he uses it for everything, making his notes available to the executive team, who comment on them electronically.
It’s not just our executives who’re making faster decisions and moving the company forward. Pandora employees everywhere now use Skype for Business for instant messaging, telephony, presence and video calls. Our ability to interact visually during conference calls makes a huge difference to our communication—it’s important to be able to see facial expressions and reactions so we know if we’re connecting and understanding one another, which is especially critical because it helps bring together our teams around the world. We share desktops during these calls, which improves the teamwork because we can share our work, whether it’s a design for a new bracelet, a marketing campaign or an IT schematic. Plus, we’re saving on long-distance costs and reducing travel expenses. I’m convinced that we wouldn’t be as successful operating as a unified global company if our distributed teams couldn’t collaborate using capabilities like Office Groups and Skype for Business Online.
Employees use simplified sharing features to help keep track of document versions and work faster. For example, when I want to send out a document for review, I use cloud-based attachments, which means that my colleagues receive a link to the document in Microsoft OneDrive for Business. They don’t have copies of project plans or spreadsheets cluttering up their Inboxes. And when they click on the link, it takes them to the latest version of my document, so I can keep modifying the document even after I send the email.
I also appreciate the cross-platform functionality, touch capabilities and digital ink, because I can stay productive even when I don’t have a mouse and keyboard. I use a Microsoft Surface Pro 3, a MacBook Pro and an iPad. Office 2016 provides a seamless experience as I edit, save and share documents on any device.
We’re getting so much value from Office 365 and the new Office 2016 suite, but I feel like we’ve only scratched the surface of what it can do for us. Already, we’re connecting teams, streamlining processes for increased productivity, and working more efficiently from everywhere across a range of devices. But I’m looking forward to exploring Sway for more polished reports and presentations and Outlook Clutter to help keep me focused and prioritize my email. With so many ways to save time and gain insight, we’re better able to keep pace with the demands of our growing business. That’s good news for jewelry lovers everywhere!
Read customer success stories to learn how Managed Solution helps businesses implement technology productivity solutions.
The line that separates Microsoft’s cloud collaboration suite, Office 365, from its corporate communications services, marketed under Skype for Business, is getting blurrier.
On Dec. 1 the tech giant will officially unleash new conferencing, meeting, and cloud telephony options for Office 365 that are meant to consolidate and replace the separate services many businesses use to host audio and/or video conferences.
“Most of our customers have more than one of these [services], they’re putting a lot of money into them, but aren’t satisfied,” said John Case, corporate vice president for Microsoft Office. “This turns Office 365 into a modern communications platform.”
For example, the new capabilities will allow companies to set up and initiate all-hands meetings for up to 10,000 attendees—that can be attended via Web browser or mobile device—in a matter of minutes, Case told Fortune. Additionally, any questions that arise during the large broadcast can be submitted via the company’s Yammer messaging application.
The new services aren’t exclusionary: Teams can also create conferences that connect with traditional phones using the public switched telephone network (PSTN). “You can dial in from pretty much anywhere,” Case said. Meanwhile, Microsoft MSFT 0.81% is also pushing Skype for Business as nothing less than a replacement for existing corporate private branch exchange (PBX) systems—and it’s offering “Fast Track” funding to help businesses make the switch. The Office 365 pricing plan, which includes all of the above features, costs $35 per user per month, plus another $24 per user for international and domestic calling plans, according to a Microsoft pricing sheet.
Competitors Facebook FB 0.87% and Google GOOG -0.61% have also busy adding video-calling features to their platforms in recent years—to compete with both Skype and Apple’s FaceTime app—but Microsoft has been far more aggressive about embedding these options into its existing business applications. Over the coming months, you can expect Microsoft to forge relationships that embed conferencing and calling features into applications from other software companies.
For example, in the future, customer service agents using software from call-center company Genesys may be able to initiate support or telemarketing conversations by simply clicking on contact information within a customer’s record. Right now, that same person might be forced to jump back and forth between several systems to track the conversation and make changes, Case said.
The consumer-grade Skype service boasts almost 300 million registered users. Microsoft bought the company in May 2011 for $8.5 billion, and promptly began merging the cloud-delivered communications service with its existing Lync communications products.
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