Businesses from small to large are always looking for ways to get ahead and set themselves apart from competition.
It’s the basic formula for success: in order to outlast the competition, businesses must continually work towards methods of increasing their productivity while keeping costs down.
Adopting technology is one way that businesses can accomplish this, and Microsoft Office 365 is an example of current technology that can be useful in helping businesses, both small and large.
What is Office 365?
There isn’t a businessperson out there that isn’t familiar with what Microsoft Office has to offer. From Excel to PowerPoint, Word to OneNote, Microsoft Office has been providing businesses with essential tools to complete tasks for over two decades. So what makes Office 365 different?
The biggest thing that separates Office 365 from past incarnations of the software is that it is a subscription-based online version of the popular applications backed by cloud computing. In other words, Office 365 offers businesses the opportunity to access Office tools from any connected device.
So instead of Office being installed on individual devices as was traditional with the program, Office 365 is web-based, thus increasing the flexibility of use in a variety of ways that are beneficial for business users.
Benefits of Office 365
Targeted to businesses, Office 365 offers some beneficial features and capabilities that are unique to this web-based version. Some of these significant benefits are discussed below:
Accessibility – As touched upon previously, the fact that Office 365 is web-based with cloud capabilities greatly enhances its accessibility options. No longer is a user tethered to a particular device or even a particular type of device: office programs can be accessed on a computer at work or any mobile device on the go.
That means that the spreadsheet you begin on Office 365 can easily be pulled up and continued from home, or anywhere else for that matter. The ability to work on multiple devices and across locations is one of the great advantages of Office 365.
Collaboration – Another benefit of Office 365 is the collaboration that is built into its function. Because of the accessibility of the productivity suite, Office 365 allows not only individual users access anytime, anywhere, but also for teamwork to occur without geographical barriers.
Because employees can stay in contact regardless of place and time and because work done within Office 365 is accessible to all parties in real time, it is obviously easier to work collaboratively and to complete projects as a team. This ability to easily share information and keep this information current certainly demonstrates the teamwork capabilities that Office 365 has to offer.
IT Maintenance – One final beneficial feature inherent in the web-based Office 365 is that maintenance on the software is not a concern for your business. Unlike the desktop version of Office software where all updates, upgrades, and patches must be installed by your IT department, Office 365 automatically completes these tasks for you.
While Office 365 stills allows businesses the ability to customize the services and manage users, the time-consuming and/or costly IT tasks associated with running the software are no longer your responsibility. In this way, businesses get all the benefits of utilizing the software without any of the negative IT concerns.
Office 365 is undoubtedly a technology that can improve how businesses operate by improving accessibility, collaboration, and maintenance concerns, among other things. It is worthwhile to look into Office 365 education for your business so that you can be sure you are utilizing all the features to increase productivity, and in doing so putting your business ahead of the competition.
About the Author
This is a post by Dan McCarthy. Dan is a freelance writer and an occasional guest blogger interested in business, marketing and education related topics.
