Almost everyone who’s worked in an office in the last decade has encountered Microsoft 365. Encompassing massively popular applications ranging from word processing to instant messaging to email and more, Microsoft 365’s software family covers a vast range of tasks people might need to do at work.
But is it useful and necessary for organisations in the voluntary sector? Here, we’ll look at some Microsoft 365 pros and cons from a charity’s perspective.
Pro: Applications work together
In a modern charity’s office, there are many different types of tasks to do. In the space of a few minutes, a worker might calculate figures in a spreadsheet, send a note to a colleague, and upload a file to a drive so that everyone can see it.
With Microsoft 365, all of the software meshes together, making it easy to work with the same file in different applications without uploading and downloading it again. You can work on a document in Word and save it directly to SharePoint without exiting Word, for example. That saves employees time that they might use in switching from window to window or downloading and uploading again.
Pro: Just one login
A huge plus for Microsoft 365 is that there’s just one login needed for everything. This can really help with security since it means there’s less incentive to write passwords down, which can lead to a security breach. Plus, if the employee has to use different applications for each task, they could end up losing time trying to remember passwords or trying to retrieve lost passwords. Having just one login makes a workflow far simpler.
Pro: Easy collaboration among teams
We live in an age of hybrid working, and that’s great for many charities, since it means they don’t have to pay so much for office space. But hybrid or home working can also feel like an obstacle to communication.
Microsoft Teams, which is part of Microsoft 365, helps to keep everyone connected. It’s super easy to start a voice or video call with one or several people, and you can schedule video conferences just as easily. Moreover, you can upload files on Teams or SharePoint and work on them collaboratively.
Con: It doesn’t mesh well with Google apps
Among our Microsoft 365 pros and cons, there’s one particular negative point worth mentioning.
Typically, offices choose whether they’ll be working with primarily Google applications or Microsoft ones. If an organisation is already very accustomed to using Gmail for business and Google Meet, it can be difficult to switch the organisation over to using Microsoft applications instead.
Offices can also encounter issues if they try to use applications from both software families at once. In the worst-case scenario, team members can end up saving files on both SharePoint or OneDrive and Google Drive, which can lead to confusion.
Get Microsoft 365 through VS Group
After considering Microsoft 365’s pros and cons for your charity, you might have decided you’re ready to join the many non-profit organisations relying on this famous software. But what’s even better than the software alone is Microsoft 365 plus secure email hosting from VS Group. If that sounds good to you, why not give us a call on 0330 094 0170 to learn more? Alternatively, you can email us at customerservice@vsgcomms.com.
