Office 365 Reviews

• Microsoft Office
• Skype for Business
• Office 2016
• Data loss prevention

• Provided us with better capability to trace emails, and provide security over those emails.
• Provided the ability to encrypt email.
• Gave us a professional video conferencing system.
• Easily manageable.

The default reporting is not very helpful; extendable mostly through PowerShell; must have knowledge of PowerShell to fully utilize.

I have used it for a little over one year.

I have not had an issue with anything going down. On Google Apps for Business, it was frequent.

No issues with scalability; easy to work with and extend.

Honestly have not had to deal with technical support; most problems have been resolvable through the community and online research.

We previously used Google Apps for Business. Solution was incomplete, a headache to manage and extend. Email filtering was essentially useless.

Initial setup was very straightforward; was able to set up and migrate with little assistance.

We use a parallel licensing structure through Dell. Originally, there were some limitations; however, those limitations are now rare.

We looked into an onsite email server, as well as staying with Google Apps for Business.

Know PowerShell. This is where the true power of Office 365 lies.

I love this tool. I like the release planning feature and their notifications about upgrades; it makes me feel like an inside partner rather than just a customer.
Some valuable features are

• SharePoint
• Yammer
• Microsoft Planner
• Office 365 (Excel, Access)

Yammer and SharePoint’s social collaboration features have transformed our work style and the way we collaborate with the clients. There’s less of emails tracking and more moving the conversations forward, with greater context in terms of supporting the documents or issues being discussed.

Furthermore, the way that Excel has grown into a data analytics tool/engine with monthly updates is a pleasant surprise.

Task management needs to improve. There still doesn’t seem to be a unified view of my tasks that follows me around from SharePoint to Groups to Yammer to Planner.

Planner seems the best model in terms of functionality, but tracking my personal responsibilities still seems the tiniest bit soiled.

I have been using this solution since 2013.

I have not encountered any stability issues. On some occasions, the service health status reports have indicated issues and resolution timelines, but I don't seem to recall ever feeling, that my services as experienced were either degraded or underperforming.

There were no scalbility issues so far. However, ours is not a large scale enterprise.

The ticketing process is simple and they are responsive. Sometimes they have to get back to me with findings (at times i’ve been surprised having not to expect it to be as complicated enough in order to warrant research) and then the phone tag can begin. Unless the problem is mission-critical or urgent, I let it slide. They might want to consider adding an asynchronous Yammer-like channel for customer support. I know I need a problem fixed, but commandeering time from my day instead of going back and forth about it. It would be really helpful to move the discussion forward without having to have my undivided attention on the support rep and that might be worth investigating into.

I had used Office Professional Pro without the cloud backbone. So, it doesn’t really seem comparable to this product. I have also used and still use the G Suite which is fine, but frankly it doesn’t seem as robust or exciting as the Office 365. I maintain both because some clients are Google people or otherwise have an aversion to MSFT while there are others who know and seem to love the Office 365 solution.

The non-changeable primary tenant DOMAIN.onmicrosoft.com was not explained clearly to me back then. I wound up opening a few instances, instead of adding multiple domains to a tenant. But what still has not been resolved are the branding issues, i.e., if your brand-expressing domains are not intuitively related to each other. For example, there is no mbamoralist.com yammer network b/c my primary domain is succelleratorsaas. If one legitimately owns the domains, one should not be locked into decisions about brand primacy that may have applied at that time but don’t today.

The number of SKUs and the varied configuration that MSFT offers is evidence, that they are segmenting the offers meticulously well.

Google Apps for Work/G Suite that I have used and like as well. I just think that MSFT Office 365 is appreciably a more powerful, detailed and granular tool.

First of all, I was an enthusiastic and an early adopter of this product. Microsoft has made the onboarding process impressively robust and my learning pains back then, would not be those experienced by someone arriving new/fresh today. Still, the primary domain is something that one should give some consideration to, as it’s a lock-in decision.

People tend to keep their mistakes hidden. With version control, you only have access to what you need. Managing assignments of tasks can make a team effort be more transparent. The solution keeps people honest.

Team members can work together and make them more accountable.

I would like to see improvements in connections to external content types and their connectors.

While consulting at a client’s office, I found it very difficult to connect SharePoint designer external content types to the IBM AS400 iSeries connector. I was also trying to connect to the JDE connector.

We have used this solution for six years.

At first there were some stability issues. However, Microsoft got much better with it over time.

I did not encounter any issues with scalability.

I would rate technical support with an 8/10.

It was easier to set up in the earlier versions. Now it has many more bells to ring.

Cost to value is much better than on premise SharePoint.

We evaluated Amazon Web Services.

Do your homework first, plan governance, and then pull the trigger. Use a migration tool to add metadata to file share documents.

I like that mail and calendar are available anywhere. It is easy to share with colleagues.

I can make changes in seconds. It is easy to share the mailbox and the calendar. It is easy set the 'out of office' status.

Microsoft Excel for Mac (version 15.30) is very slow with a large Excel document. Microsoft Excel for Windows is much faster on the same Mac with Windows (Boot Camp). I’d like to see an improvement in the speed of Excel for Mac in relation to Windows.

We have used this solution for one and a half years.

Microsoft Excel on Mac OS can be very slow.

I did not encounter any issues with scalability.

I would give technical support a rating of 8/10.

In our case, the installation was fairly easily, after good preparation and a plan of action. The migration of all old mailboxes to Microsoft Office 365 takes a long time. We completed this with no problems.

This is not the cheapest option, but the product can scale to the needs of the company.

We evaluated CommuniGate Pro Server and Kerio Connect Mail.

Have a good plan with shared mail and calendars.

You know that there a lot of features are available. SharePoint and Yammer are the most valuable.

Any user can get updates from this portal easily.

• Yammer
• RMS
• Delve

I have used it for the last three years.

We have not encountered any deployment issues.

We have not encountered any stability issues.

We have not encountered any issues like that.

Customer Service:

Customer service is very good.

Technical Support:

Technical support is very good.

We used only Google, but we have Microsoft AD, Exchange, SharePoint, System Center, Lync/Skype for Business, so that Office 365 Enterprise is the most important for us.

Initial setup was not complex.

We implemented it with our team.

We got a lot of ROI from the business site.

You need to compromise regarding the licensing and pricing.

I would recommend using products from the same vendor (i.e., Microsoft).

It is excellent for any organization's business productivity.

• Exchange Online
• SharePoint
• Skype for Business
• OneDrive

• Removed support and infrastructure of legacy technologies.

Be sure you understand ADFS and, if you decide to go with it, what you get and don't get with it. Your users will want it.

ADFS was sold to overcome the issues with entering passwords in all your clients (Outlook, Skype for Business, OneDrive) but, if your password changes, you do have to manually update passwords in all of these clients.

Also, this does not get you direct access to the 365 portal or SharePoint without modifying links to use Federated Services.

This becomes an issue if you use generic accounts for the shop. It will work if each of your users are required to use their own ID. Also, note there is a cost for the Azure instance of ADFS (servers, compute, network, VPN).

I have used it for nine years.

Deployment went very smoothly even in its infancy. My most recent deployment went off without issue.

Others report stability issues and there are often warnings in the console but the service has been flawless for us.

We have not encountered any scalability issues. We have probably increased our user base 20% since inception.

Customer Service:

For general support, it is offshored and you open a ticket in the console. It works pretty well. For how-to's or best practices, you will need to have a good partner.

Technical Support:

Generally, the technician has a good idea what you are trying to do. There is often a handoff to a group that can actually DO the work.

Our vendor assisted with setup using the Jump Start program. There are complexities with certificates, hybrid, etc., but overall, it went well.

A vendor team implemented it. I would rate them 10 of 10 at the time. Since then, our resource has moved on but they still have a pretty good skillset.

I don't have my spreadsheet handy but the ROI was there. Microsoft also provided significant incentives to make the move.

If it is an in-person query or reference, I do let them know the deal I got, as well as the approach that got me there.

Because of the significant investment we already had in Microsoft, this made the most sense; thus, I did not evaluate competitors.

You may need ADFS; you may need a hybrid environment. Not everything necessarily goes away. Also, user management continues; it just moves to a new place (hosted/the cloud).

I mostly use Office 365 for project management and reporting. I utilize tools like Excel, Jira, Confluence, Microsoft Suites, and others primarily for collaboration, documentation, and compliance reporting.

Office 365 is particularly valuable for collaboration, reporting, and documentation related to compliance. The tools are utilized for project management as well, with Excel, Jira, Confluence, and the Microsoft Suite playing significant roles.

When buying an external product, I believe the security is lower. Therefore, there is room for improvement or development internally for better security.

I have been using Office 365 for more than ten years.

From time to time, I face minor issues, but nothing really major has occurred.

I mostly rely on the community for support and have not had any direct contact with Microsoft's technical support.

Neutral

I was not involved in the deployment of the tools.

I do not have a clear understanding of the cost, as I use the tools provided by the customer. I know they are quite expensive.

I rate Office 365 six out of ten. It does the job without much excitement and fits the needs of people due to a lack of alternatives. However, it is known to be quite expensive.

Hybrid Cloud

Other

I have been working with the full Office 365 suite, including Excel and PowerPoint. We also have it integrated with Copilot, which I use extensively for various tasks.

The design feature of PowerPoint is really effective. The email functionalities are convenient, and the entire suite serves our needs well. I also use automation in Excel and benefit from SharePoint workflows. Additionally, Copilot is integrated with Office 365, which saves me time by allowing quick access to instructions and facilitating the creation of presentations.

The search feature in email just doesn't work effectively. If it could be fixed, it would be excellent.

I have been using Office 365 for five, six, seven, eight, or nine years.

Microsoft's customer service is really good.

Neutral

The initial setup was really easy.

I have been a BDR manager and wish to remain fully anonymous regarding this review. I rate Office 365 ten out of ten.