Office 365 is an app built in with the features that are specifically useful and designed for business enterprises those extensively need access to apps like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. It significantly meets the various and continuous requirements of business documents, data and presentations.
Server availability is not a concern as these apps store the data on cloud. Monthly updates secure the app, and loads with latest features. Most appropriate example of digital transformation is Microsoft Dynamics CRM to the Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM.
What is Digital Transformation and why do you need it?
Simplest explanation is traditional to modern approach, manual to automation and intranet to internet is the similar experience that digital transformation creates for an organization. Innovation in simplifying the business processes is business transformation while innovating the way we do business is digital transformation. We often change our mobile handsets with change of technology e.g. From 3G to 4G and now waiting for 5G, do we ever realize that with every technological development, our personal and professional life is becoming easy.
Role of Office 365 in your Digital Transformation Journey of Business:
- Value Addition: Business Enterprises using Office 365 could add value in engaging with customers, improve operational efficiency, employee productivity, increase customer acquisition, ultimately resulting in rising revenues.
- Jet Speed: Routine work is uninterrupted and you can check the schedules, manage meetings, check agreements, orders, invoices, approvals, and much more that otherwise can get stuck with your absence in office. Customers expect immediate response, better experience, and quality work. Maintaining quality with promptness to great extent creates better experience.
- Flexibility: Office 365 works successfully works on operating systems such as Android, Windows, macOS, and iOS. Data storage online is of one terabyte making it easy to manage business smoothly with no location constraint. The Office 365 once installed on your PC, Tablets or Smartphones, allows access of MS Word, MS Excel, MS PowerPoint, and MS Outlook even when you are offline because of one drive. You can easily upgrade from the Office 365 Business Plan to Enterprise Plan. Few web apps such as Skype for Business, SharePoint add to the agility and comfort.
- Communication: Internal and external communication is a strong base of business transformation and digital strategies. If digital strategies are rightly implemented it can empower the employees and management to play as a team. Continue to rate the effect and efficiency that get created using the digital platforms.
- Workflow: Each organization has a work procedure that passes through the flow of resources. This human channel either speeds or delays the process that affects the performance. Office 365 evens out the workflow due to the clarity the connectivity brings to business.
- Measurable Performance: With access to technology that works high speed the expectations from employees rise as it becomes measurable. The use of mobiles, access of documents and response to customers, employee’s availability and customer satisfaction some of the criteria’s for measuring the performance and ensuring productivity.
- Diverse Savings: Positive impact is the declining expenses over server, its maintenance, licenses of software and frequent upgrades. To great extent, it reduces the burden on IT support staff. Selecting monthly or annual payments can save time and get you discounts.
- Digital Identity: Create unique identity with digitalization; make appropriate use of technology such as instant messaging, voice messages and notifications. You can transmit information in minimal time and keep customers updated. Convey the latest developments about your products or services, order in process, payment receipts, discounts, schemes etc.
- Accessibility: Organization’s accessibility is an issue for customers; your digital presence can solve this to the extent that your image built over a period remains trustworthy. The availability of concerned people, their response time, easy access to the reports/ documents etc. make the companies more reliable than ever.
Preparedness for Implementation of Office 365:
- Network Ability: The use of internet is likely to rise thus the organization needs to be prepared for its bandwidth and operating expenses. The data will now be on cloud thus the LAN based traffic will move to WAN which may require redesigning of your organization’s network. To support Office 365, application IT support, network, risk mitigation and security teams should be involved to create architecture build for unique solutions.
- Help from Microsoft: For setup and deployment of Office 365, you can expect help for it and invite Microsoft to develop custom solutions for your business.
- Various Licensed Solutions: Organizations insisting on Data migration, data security, and confidentiality can opt for higher versions of Office 365, actually created for the high level business safety.
- Apps Selection: The nature of business invites us to select the applications and software’s that bring value to the business. It should spread customer satisfaction after implementation of these apps. Select from Office 365 plans to transform the areas of the organization such as marketing, sales or other areas. You need not select what is popular unless that meets your requirement.
Usability of Office 365 in Digital Transformation:
- Domain based e-mail ids makes business communication look highly professional creating good impression.
- Conversion of the trial versions to paid subscriptions within 30 days of expiry of trial relieves you from the fear of losing the data attached to this account. If you do not convert it to the paid version the account information is lost can cannot be retrieved once erased.
- Nearly 300 users can be part of the plan.
- OneDrive in Office 365 provides 1 TB of file storage to sync your files from your device in online and offline mode. To make changes and to overwrite across the devices you reconnect to internet.
- Authorized access enhances the customer data security.
- Add-ons like Advance Protection, Audio Conferencing etc can add to the experience of Office 365.
- Customization of automated forms and business processes can improve the business performance.
Limitations of Office 365 in Digital Transformation:
- 300 users can be a limited capacity for bigger organizations.
- Cancelling subscriptions can induce penalties for annual commitment subscriptions paid on monthly basis, if paid in full are not refundable.
- The data and documents are downloadable from your account within the period of 90 days from closure.
- Deploying internal applications on cloud can be time consuming.
- Data Migration is not easy when it comes to change in platform, the accuracy of data transfer completely depends on your Development, and IT teams expertise.
- Existing data transfer can be a challenge e.g. E-mail data lying in inbox, if being transferred on cloud. Choosing right licenses is most crucial decision limiting it to the decision makers understanding.
- Users will need some amount of training for adapting this new technology, in a way consumes the business time.
Thousands of cloud based business solutions will not be required for your type of business. Selecting the apt is important and not the ones that are renowned. Office 365 built for all sizes of business enterprises is top rated for digital transformation. It can bring unique solutions to the organization by being an indivisible component of digital strategy.
Digital Transformation and the role of Office 365 is genuinely unconditional if the planning, and implementation is concise irrespective of the size of your organization.
