
5 underused Microsoft apps to save you time and money
Microsoft Office 365 is the centre to countless modern workplaces. From daily spreadsheets, internal and external presentations, to a standard Word document, it’s hard to imagine a world where Microsoft Office isn’t at the centre.
However, did you know that the Microsoft package also includes countless applications to save you time and money? Microsoft Office boosts productivity and makes collaboration and remote working easier for employees and management alike.
If you’re ready to start saving money and time using your Microsoft 365 package, keep reading…
Underused Microsoft Apps –
To Do/ Planner
These are technically two separate apps, but their seamless integration with each other makes it easy to forget they are! Beyond the regular pen and paper to do list, To Do allows you to create separate and shared lists with your team. From keeping track of your work, to ensuring smooth workflows for reoccurring tasks, it could not be easier to plan your campaigns, product launches, and more using Microsoft ToDo.
Microsoft Planner is arguably one of the most underused Microsoft Apps in the digital workplace. Whilst ToDo allows you to add tasks to your day, Planner goes one step further and allows you to categorise tasks as ‘not started’, ‘in progress’ and ‘completed’, with a simple drag and drop feature to add your work to your calendar. To keep on top of tasks, and optimise your working week with detailed plans, ToDo and Planner are valuable assets to your digital workplace.
Microsoft Power Automate
Do you feel wasted on repetitive tasks? Whilst Microsoft ToDo can help you plan your workflows, menial tasks that follow specific workflows can drain you have energy and reduce your productivity. Power Automate (previously Microsoft Flow) can automate notifications, alerts, data gathering and communications.
Microsoft Power Apps
This low code / no code application platform allows you to develop and deploy business applications. These are custom built to tackle your business specific, frequently experienced business problems.
Examples include employee onboarding apps, expense approval apps, service request apps.
If you’ve created a series of MS lists (another bonus there for you) then you can automate email reminders that tasks need to be completed to send out to your employees when a due date is approaching.
For all the HR and People managers – Power BI
Imagine if you could seamlessly pull data into one place – no data entry or hours wasted looking at insights from across the Office 365 suite. See what’s going on where and make use of interactive data visualisation software, all as part of the Power Platform. An easy look at insights to help you improve your business processes in a fraction of the time.
Collectively, these 3 Power solutions make up the Microsoft Power Platform and using them will help your business take the first steps into the future, a process known as digital transformation. The team at id are experts in using Microsoft Power Platform so get in touch with them here to book a chat.
Microsoft Teams:
Bear with us on this one – we know what you’re thinking. Over 500,000 businesses use Teams daily, how has this made it to the most underused apps list?
Whilst Teams is being used for company chats and video calls, its features are not being optimised by most of its users!
- Teams Whiteboard – illustrate ideas and concepts visually. To use: start meeting – click share content icon in the upper right and select share content icon and then whiteboard
- Notify When available – Locate the team member in question in the chat section, click on the 3-dot menu, then ‘notify when available’
No more tedious Teams meetings, make Teams work for you and your business.
That’s a first look at the top underused Microsoft apps you should be making the most of in your business.
Do you want even more advice on which Microsoft apps to save you time and money – we’ve put together an extended list along with actionable tips! Simply sign up here and receive Microsoft and Hybrid working advice straight to your inbox!