Often Microsoft Office suffers from a lack of credit (and support) despite the fact that it’s at the core of many business processes. It’s easy to brush it off as being Office.

It’s important to consider that Microsoft Office as an application suite continues to grow from its humble beginnings as bundled desktop applications to a business front end for knowledge workers.

One of the must humbling projects in my career was at a major federal government agency that was upgrading to a new version of Microsoft Office. I got to see firsthand how Microsoft Office impacts the day to day jobs of workers at all levels of the agency. I saw even a simple change in the product could stop some users cold in their tracks. After that contract, I’ve had to tackle Microsoft Office adoption and user issues on other contracts. I still wonder if Microsoft Office needs its own evangelist

Here are five reasons why Microsoft Office needs an evangelist:

1. Promote the use of sharing and collaboration tools. The Outlook inbox has been the primary tool for sharing and collaboration in many organizations. Now sharing documents through SharePoint or OneDrive, means many users need guidance for new workflows.
2. Promote the use of new features in the applications. With each new release of Offices comes productivity enhancements. When a new Microsoft Office release hits corporate desktops, there needs to be someone to work with the users to adopt new features.
3. Evangelize OneNote and its potential uses in the enterprise. OneNote has a lot of uses inside an organization such as collaborative note-taking. You can even use OneNote for publishing team policies and procedures. While OneNote as part of the Office suite speaks to a bright future for the application, users may still ignore it because of they’. Before, you had to buy OneNote separately meaning it was a rare occasion to see it on corporate PCs.
4. Standardize templates and macros. The term “template” can get thrown around pretty liberally when it comes to Microsoft Office document. An internal champion for Microsoft Office can assist with template creation. They can also help with template management. An Office evangelist can be a big big help to Office users locked in a vicious cycle of cut and paste corrupt document hell.
5. Guide mobile users to Microsoft Office. Being able to access Office documents from Android and iOS devices is bound to be a productivity tool for some users. A Microsoft Office evangelist can help lead the move of Microsoft Office users to the mobile apps. They can become a trainer and an advocate for taking Office apps off the desktop.
6. Ensure Microsoft Office document security. If your organization sends documents to external parties, it makes sense to secure the document data. Somebody needs to educate document writers and publishers about document security.

Do you have a Microsoft Office Evangelist inside your enterprise?

Hi! My name is Will Kelly. I’m a technical writer and analyst based in the Washington, DC area. I’ve worked with clients like NetApp, Dell, and Neustar to develop technical, training, and thought leadership content. My articles have been published by IBM Mobile Business Insights, TechBeacon, CNET TechRepublic, Network World, Toolbox.com, ZDNet.com, and others. Follow me on Twitter:@willkelly.