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Amp up your collaboration skills and rock the modern workplace by harnessing the power of Microsoft 365 with this one-stop guide to the world's leading productivity platform
The Microsoft 365 productivity solution for the workplace is a cloud-based service with many features for effective and secure collaboration virtually or in person. Whether you start your day with meetings in Teams, respond to Outlook emails, create documents with Office apps, or even automate your work with artificial intelligence, Microsoft 365 has you covered. But first, you must unlock the potential of this powerful solution to showcase your ability to keep up with the modern workplace and make an impact in your organization. To do that, you need Microsoft 365 For Dummies!
This book walks you through the steps to get your work done anytime, anywhere, on any device, with Microsoft Teams as the central hub. Discover how to chat online in real time; conduct online meetings; co-author documents in the cloud; develop no-code applications; and even prioritize your well-being. The insights and step-by-step guidance in Microsoft 365 For Dummies will help you stay connected and engaged with your colleagues.
Whether you’re a Microsoft 365 newbie or a superuser looking for details on what's new, Microsoft 365 For Dummies is the friendly and authoritative how-to book you need. Discover the benefits of cloud technology today!
Jennifer Reed is Founder of Cloud61, a firm offering IT consulting products and services. She is the author of Office 365 For Dummies, Migrating to Office 365 For Dummies, Office 365 Backup For Dummies, and Office 365 for Higher Education. She recently launched a startup (www.hydrojennfarms.com) aimed at promoting locally grown food and regenerative farming practices using modern technologies like Microsoft 365.
Introduction 1
About This Book 1
Foolish Assumptions 2
Icons Used in This Book 2
Beyond the Book 3
Where to Go from Here 3
Part 1: Keeping up with Microsoft 365 5
Chapter 1: What’s in It for You: Overview of Features 7
Tasting the Flavors of Microsoft 365 8
Understanding the versions for home 9
Exploring the options for the workplace 9
Honing in on the Workplace Features 11
Reining in the apps and services 11
No, the robots have not taken over 12
Connecting the dots to get work done 13
Chapter 2: Work, Meet Life: The New World of Work 17
Going Native, Digitally 18
How to get your colleague’s attention 18
Turn back the hands of time with version history 20
Prioritizing Self-Care and Well-Being 21
Viva la vida loca! 21
Taming the “too-connected” beast 22
Calling it a day with Virtual Commute 24
Part 2: Reimagining Teamwork 25
Chapter 3: Unlocking Digital Collaboration 27
There’s a Purpose for That App 28
Office 365 versus Microsoft 365: What’s the diff? 28
Installing the Office 365 apps 29
The right tools for the right purpose 30
Connecting Experiences Across Apps 32
The lowdown on connected experiences 32
Look Ma, no hands! Using the Dictation feature 34
Chapter 4: Zooming In on Teams 37
Getting to Know Teams 38
Touring the Teams interface 38
Co-authoring documents in Teams 41
Don’t get ghosted — use Read Receipts 42
Reading instead of listening to voicemail 43
Creating a Humanistic Workplace 44
To hide or not to hide the kids (or pets) 45
The many ways to see each other 46
Eat chips without being annoying 48
Chapter 5: Rocking Your Meeting Like a Boss 51
The Things You Do Before 52
Get meeting insights from Outlook 52
Chat with attendees to prep 54
Preload agenda and documents 56
The Stuff You Do During 57
Present like a pro with one monitor 57
Reporting live from your home office! 58
Follow along with live captions or live transcriptions 60
The Actions to Take After 62
Play back the meeting 63
Track action items 63
Continue to engage via chat 64
Chapter 6: Facilitating Meetings and Breakout Sessions 67
The Basics of Teams Meetings 68
Scheduling a meeting 69
Calling for an impromptu meeting 70
Joining a meeting 71
Meeting within a Meeting with Breakout Rooms 72
Creating Breakout rooms 73
Starting the breakout session 75
Rejoining the main session 76
Chapter 7: All About Webinars and Live Events 79
Calling the Shots with a Webinar 80
Preparing for a webinar 80
Creating the webinar event 81
Delivering the webinar 85
So, You Want to be a Producer 86
Getting ready to produce a live event 86
Scheduling a live event 87
Producing the live event 88
Part 3: Modernizing the Workplace with Office Apps 91
Chapter 8: Getting the Most Out of Word 93
It’s Alive! Your Document, That Is 94
Jazz it up with pictures 94
Your screen is paper, draw on it 97
Immerse yourself in your reading 99
Becoming a Better Writer 100
Make your writing so much better 101
Support your facts with Researcher 103
That Time When Word Helped Your Career 104
Sprucing up your resume 104
Smashing the language barrier 105
Chapter 9: Stepping up Your Excel Chops 107
Excelling in Excel 108
Everyday Excel tasks 108
Get it all sorted out 110
Talk to your team from your workbook 111
Taking a Shortcut to Completing Tasks 114
Get to know Office Scripts 114
Stop the repetition; create a script 114
Run and share your script 116
So, You’re a Data Analyst Now? 118
Around the world with data types 119
Giving yourself permission to be curious 121
You’ve got questions, Excel has answers 123
Chapter 10: Wowing Your Audience with PowerPoint 125
More than Just the Basics of PowerPoint 126
Navigating the web and desktop apps 127
Have an interesting topic? There’s’ a deck for that! 128
The Art of Creating a Deck 131
Be artsy (even when you’re not) with Designer 131
Mastering the Slide Master 133
Reuse, recycle decks with templates 134
The Science of Presenting a Deck 135
Practice with AI makes perfect 135
Give a unique experience with Live Presentations 138
Experiencing Live Presentations as an audience 141
Chapter 11: Going Digital with OneNote 145
Exploring Basic Functions 146
Understanding the different versions 146
Getting around the user interface 149
Creating a new notebook 150
Moving a notebook to a new location 152
Stepping Up the Notetaking Game 153
Tagging content for later use 154
Viewing and restoring page versions 155
Sharing your notebook 156
Chapter 12: Staying Connected with Outlook 159
The Not-Just-Basic of Outlook 160
Just a few words will do 162
My thoughts exactly: When AI reads minds 164
Ask questions, naturally 167
Schedule Management with the Calendar 168
Click to meet from an email 168
Color your world with categories 169
Don’t get between your colleagues and their lunch 171
Outlook Out of the Ball Park 173
Sliding into a Teams chat from Outlook 173
Notes and Sticky Notes integration 174
Play my emails, please 175
Part 4: Storing Your Data in the Cloud 177
Chapter 13: Centralizing Data in SharePoint 179
Getting to Know SharePoint Online 180
No-code website in a flash? Yes you can! 181
Who let the dogs in? Setting permissions 184
The Wonders of Microsoft Lists 187
Creating and editing a List 187
A view for different points of view 189
Never miss an update with alerts 191
The Marvels of Document Libraries 192
Contributing to a document library 192
Help, I changed my mind! Versioning to the rescue 193
Chapter 14: Goodbye Hard Drive, Hello OneDrive 197
Storing and Syncing Files in OneDrive 198
Ready, get set, sync! Using the sync app 198
What’s in a name? Work or School versus Home 201
What’s the diff? OneDrive versus SharePoint 202
The Many Ways to Share Files 204
May I have a quick link, please? 204
Managing access before it gets out of hand 206
Part 5: Giving Power to the People Like You and Me 209
Chapter 15: Understanding the Power Platform 211
What Is the Power Platform? 212
Creating Workflows with Power Automate 213
Getting to Know Power Apps 214
Telling a Story with Data in Power BI 217
Advanced Concepts 218
Meet the AI Builder 219
About the Microsoft Dataverse 219
Chapter 16: Creating a Power-Automated Approval Process 221
Gathering What You need 222
Nailing the scenario 222
Building the library 223
Picking the template 224
All Systems Go, Let’s Flow! 226
Building the flow, making the connections 226
Testing the workflow 230
Checking for approvals in Teams 231
Turning off the flow 232
Chapter 17: Developing Your First App with Power Apps 233
Before Building the App 234
Creating the list to hold data 235
Managing access to the list 236
Fine-tuning the properties of the list 238
Specifying the survey questions 240
Building the App 243
Designing the app 244
Connecting the data source 244
Building the Survey screen 247
Adding buttons and labels to the form 250
Building the Welcome screen 253
Building the Thank You screen 255
Finalizing the Survey screen 255
Launching the App 256
Saving and sharing the app 257
Updating the app 257
Reviewing the data 258
Chapter 18: Dashboarding with Power BI 259
Understanding Power BI Concepts 260
What’s in it for you? 261
How Power BI is licensed 261
It’s the elements, dear Watson 262
Exploring a Sample Data Set 263
Navigating the Power BI Service 263
Loading the dataset 266
Interacting with the dashboard 267
Part 6: Being Your Own IT Department 271
Chapter 19: Getting Up Close and Personal 273
Let’s Get Personal 274
Paint a thousand words with your picture 274
Spice things up with a custom cover photo 276
Don’t be shy, toot your own horn 276
IT Tasks You’re Empowered to Do 277
Updating your security information 278
Changing your password 279
Self-service password reset 280
Chapter 20: Reining in Your Devices 283
Managing Your Devices 284
Securing your devices 284
Auditing and disabling devices 285
Checking for impossible travel 287
You Have Left the Building — Virtually 288
Signing out from devices all at once 288
Disconnecting a BYOD 289
Part 7: The Part of Tens 293
Chapter 21: Ten More Apps that Get the Work Done 295
People 296
MyAnalytics 296
Kaizala 297
Stream 298
Whiteboard 298
Lists 299
Forms 300
Yammer 301
Sway 302
Planner 302
Chapter 22: Ten Ways to Rock Delve 305
Know Thyself with MyAnalytics 306
Delve Away, Your Docs Are Safe 306
Delve Consumes OneDrive and SharePoint data 307
The Search Is On for People and Docs 308
Act On a Document 309
Favorite Documents for Later Use 309
Group Documents in a Board 310
Documents-at-a-Glance with Cards 311
Popularity Contest for Documents 311
Get to Know Your Colleagues 311
Chapter 23: Ten Microsoft 365 Remote Work Tips 313
Set Lunch Hours and Enjoy Your Meal 314
Chill and Decompress: Go Meditate 315
Start Your Zero-Carbon Commute 315
Keep Your Promises with Help from AI 316
Work Late but Let Others Not 316
Make Your Meeting Worth Their Time 317
Wrap It Up in Five Minutes 317
Say Thanks with Praise 318
Your Status Is Not Complicated 318
Give a Heads Up with Signatures 319
Index 321
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