Growing Clout of Microsoft Enterprise Services

If you are working in a modern enterprise, I guess you must be using several of Microsoft tools, like Microsoft Outlook (do you use Outlook on the Web?), Skype (did you migrate to Skype from Lync?) and SharePoint. At the same time, it is important to look at how some of the other enterprise tools from Microsoft are getting popular by the day. Following is a short list of some of such tools I prepared for you:

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams is an enterprise collaborative platform as part of Office 365. Teams integrates content and tools with people, making it most effective and at the same time keeping it secure and safe. Using Microsoft Teams, employees can create their own groups which will also have their existing mailbox, Calendar, OneNote, SharePoint sites and a document library. Microsoft plans to make Microsoft Teams collect most features of Skype for Business and then Skype for Business would be replaced by Teams.

Microsoft Stream

Microsoft Stream is an Enterprise Video service using which employees of a company can upload, view and share videos securely i.e. the company can restrict its sharing to only employees and not to outsiders. It is being used widely by companies to share recordings of townhalls, meetings, training sessions, demos, presentations etc with employees. It allows usual "social media like" features like tagging, comments, etc. so that employees can be engaged. A strong selling for Stream is how well it works with other Office 365 apps like Teams, SharePoint, OneNote and Yammer. Microsoft also has another service called Office 365 Video which is getting replaced in a phased manner by Microsoft Stream.

OneDrive for Business

OneDrive for Business is a cloud based enterprise storage space service which can be provided by a company to its employees. Using OneDrive for Business, employees can store their files and documents securely and safely controlling their accesses. They can share some files with other employees on which multiple members can collaborate, work upon and save data. Or else they can keep a file as private, thereby making it available only for themselves. OneDrive for Business can be accessed with ease across multiple devices and that comes as great help.

Yammer

Yammer is an enterprise social networking service used for private communication within organizations. Access to a Yammer network is validated a user's internet domain so that only employees can join these Yammer networks. Yammer allows employees to view, prioritize and manage important messages and announcements. It also has "groups" that allow them to connect with their communities e.g. skill based or competency based groups used for knowledge sharing and other activities. Yammer works like social networking site allowing attaching images, files and videos as well as user created polls. Yammer is also being used by organizations to share announcements as well as to gather ideas from employees. Yammer's mobile app is also being widely used.

OneNote

Microsoft OneNote is a "note taking" app which makes it easy to sync your notes, sketches and ideas across all your devices and share with colleagues. Its biggest advantage is ready integration with existing Office 365 account with OneDrive for Business enabled. It can also be used to record audio notes, insert online videos and add files.

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If you noticed, all of these services are cloud based and part of Microsoft's vision for the future. The shift is away from Microsoft's earlier model of one-time software licensing fees to a subscription based service provider which is the way forward.

With all these tools getting popular by the day, it seems Microsoft is strongly protecting its ground and even gaining it when it comes to competition from other vendors like Google. It you think about enterprise software, you must think about Microsoft first - that is the idea.

Strategy and market share aside, as a user what you should first be concerned about is how to use these tools most effectively in order to do your work better! Hope the snippets of these tools in this article has provided you with enough food for thought in order to motivate you to explore more!

© Rahul Tiwary