Practical Project Management

MICROSOFT OFFICE 2000 PREMIUM from the Microsoft Corporation

Website: http://www.microsoft.com

{mosadsense4joomla ad_layout="A"ad_align=""}And now for something completely different! If you've begun to wonder if we're actually Monty Python's twins in disguise, you're not too far from the truth. For the past several months, we've presented you with some of the best tools currently on offer to you as project managers. Hopefully, we've helped alleviate your masses of tasks and mountains of former trees (or to be politically correct in many instances, recycled trees!).

Your projects have been Gantt charted and scheduled, PERT charted and split. Tasks have been colour-coded and customised, all in the name of making your working lives simpler. But wait just one minute! You've got your PM side covered, but how's the rest of your business doing?
Are you finding yourself going from pillar to post with your Internet and/or Intranet sites?
Do you sometimes struggle to manage all of your desktop information, as well as keep a close eye on your customer relationships?
Need multilingual support for your global staff and customers?

Always look on the bright side of life! Always look on the right side of life!

Take a closer look at Microsoft's new supreme office suite, Microsoft Office 2000 Premium Edition.
As we saw while investigating Project 98 and 2000, one of the best features of Microsoft Project is its ability to seam so effortlessly with Microsoft Office.
Why is this important? Well, anyone who manages projects from a computer will already know the answer to this. The ability to integrate your project management with the rest of the software that runs your business is vital for added efficiency. Some of you may be old Office hands, while others may never have used Office before. If you use or are thinking of using Microsoft Project, adopting Microsoft Office should also be a consideration.

Microsoft Office Premium is designed to be the Rolls Royce of current office suites. It comes loaded with every package you could ever possibly need to successfully run your organisation. The bundle includes 2000 versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Access, FrontPage, PhotoDraw, Publisher, and Small Business Tools. How good are these new versions? Well, when we opened the box, it was like all our Christmases had come at once.

As you might expect from Microsoft, installing Office could not be simpler. There is a range of installation options to choose from. You can choose to remove earlier versions of Office if you have them, but don't worry, none of your settings, templates, or documents will be erased. You can pick and choose what programs you want to install, install to your hard disk or a network, or even set it to only install certain programs when you need them for the first time.
The only downside is that the package comes as four CDs (the fourth is used while running PhotoDraw) and each of the first three has to be installed separately. This is just a minor pet peeve than a major problem. The package is also a resource guzzler, so you have to be sure your system is powerful enough to cope as well as have a reasonable amount of hard disk space at your disposal.

Most everyone will be familiar with programs like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, and Publisher. Most will be using them as a vital part of their business, and if you're not, you have probably seen these packages and at least had a go.
If not, where have you been hiding? To be honest, anyone who has used these packages before will be more than at home with these new versions because not a lot has changed beyond cosmetic updates and a few new whistles and bangs.

The main, across-the-board update in Office 2000 is the addition of many wizards, templates, and designs that let you quickly create customised and standardised documents like sales letters, invoices, newsletters, and brochures. All are a breeze to use by the most novice user.

If you get bored, check out the templates in Publisher that allow you to build your own air force of paper of paper airplanes!

The programs in Office are also highly customisable. You can add the toolbars you need, putting the features that you use most often right at your fingertips.

Another new feature of Office is its multilingual support. You can now work in your language of choice, as well as purchase add-ons for spell checking in whatever language you require. In addition to the more common Spanish, German, and Italian, there is support for East Asian languages of Japanese, Chinese, and Korean.

Office also features Web collaboration. The Explorer interface is integrated throughout the package, and allows for Web discussions and online meetings. HTML is supported in every program, so that you share documents across the Web, as well as import non-Office compatible files as HTML files.

Word is still the last word in word processing efficiency. If you don't already have a previous version on board, this will certainly become a strong member of your office arsenal.

Excel remains the business world's spreadsheet of choice. If you need to input, control, or otherwise control large amounts of data, this package can make your life a lot simpler. Link Excel with Microsoft Project and watch your projects sizzle!

If you need to present your ideas, projects, or business strategies to your colleagues or customers, then PowerPoint provides yet another excellent addition to your software armoury. Like the other Office members, PowerPoint now comes equipped with a wide range of wizards to use to make your presentations the envy of the world.

Access, like Excel, is another premium business tool and can be used to store all types of important business information. Use it to create lists of customers, inventories, or product lists.

Outlook 2000 isn't just for email anymore. It serves as an entire contact manager by managing all your emails, calendars, appointments, to-do lists, schedules, and meetings. It also integrates with other Office packages to allow you to email files created in the other programs as well as create mass mailings and office auto responses. It even allows you to write email in HTML.

Publisher is rapidly becoming a DTP program in its own right. It now comes furnished with a huge selection of wizards to create every conceivable type of business document and beyond. You can take advantage of the many stock designs and create brochures, catalogues, business cards, and web sites. There is also a new colour scheme feature in which you can add any one of the many predetermined colour schemes to your masterpieces.

FrontPage allows you to create Web pages in HTML. New to its features are its complete HTML preservation and personalised HTML formatting. Content and code can be imported without FrontPage altering the HTML code. The new formatting feature lets you apply your coding preferences to your newly created content.

PhotoDraw is a new addition that combines photo editing with drawing and painting tools. Images created in PhotoDraw can be used in the other Office programs as well as in email messages, direct print and professional print orders, and as web sites, report illustrations and covers.

Premium also features Small Business Tools, a range of tools to help start-up businesses as well as those already established. It includes a customer manager to help you gets to grips with your numerous clients as well as start-up tools to help new businesses get off the ground in areas like business plans and marketing.

Overall, Office provides everything any small business should need to effectively administer their business venture.

Microsoft Project 2000 links so effortlessly with Office that it could almost be part of the suite.

You can incorporate Excel for calculating your project costs and other project data, as well as Excel graphs and charts into Project to give your project management extra zing. Use Word to link Project's information and written reports with Project 2000 effortlessly.

Access has the ability to use queries to answer the many questions you're bound to have about your range of project data. Entire projects or sections of data can be imported or exported between the two programs quickly and easily. Several projects can even be stored within a single Access database.

Outlook, your information manager, is a vital addition to your project management. Schedule appointments, keep in contact with associates and clients, and keep on top of all your project tasks. Task data from Outlook can then be imported straight into Project 2000. You might be rushed off your feet, but things will never get on top of you.

If you need to present your projects to superiors, colleagues, or clients, PowerPoint can utilise your project information to easily create stylish and impressive presentations to really help sell your ideas.

FrontPage can be utilised should you need to create web pages to get your project data online. Publisher can also create easy web sites and professional quality documents. With so many templates in the program, your needs are met should you need mailings, letters, invoices, or even reports to add extra support to your project needs.

Microsoft Office doesn't come cheaply with the Premium package retailing for around £609.
If you consider that you won't need much more in the way of software to manage all your business needs, it could prove to be quite a wise investment. There is also a range of other versions at prices for those who don't believe they need all the features Premium offers. You can pick the bundle that best suits you, link this with your MS Project and you're really ready to rock.

So, if you're ready to look on the bright side of your business life, then Microsoft Office 2000 Premium could be just the brightly coloured parrot you're looking for!

The Microsoft Corporation
receives a PROJECTmagazine rating of 

5 bananas

2001 © Lee and James Appleyard

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