Master Microsoft 365 Tips and Tricks

Microsoft 365 is the most dominant productivity application suite for businesses of all sizes. Truly, millions of people and businesses use Microsoft 365 apps ranging from? Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneDrive, and SharePoint to Outlook. But far too many organizations don’t take full advantage of new features that can massively boost productivity levels.?

This article has identified some Microsoft 365 tips and productivity tricks that will make your life easier. These tips guarantee saving time and effort in creating and completing all daily tasks.?

General Microsoft 365 tips and tricks.?

1. Install on your other devices

Installing Microsoft 365 on other devices is essential. You may have to work when you are not at the office. There are instances where you don't have your computer with you. However, with the help of the Microsoft Office 365 features, it is possible to install the applications to your portable devices, such as your tablet or Smartphone, and work on the necessary documents from there.?

There may be some limitations with these devices, for example, the Smartphone. However, you can still make corrections and check documents.

2. Activate the "ALERT ME" Function

You can activate the "ALERT ME" function when working with a team, instead of constantly checking to see when other team members have finished their end of the project work. This is a major time-saving feature for collaboration and teamwork. Regarding time management, this is one of the best Microsoft 365 tips and tricks you can use.

3. Use “Tell Me”

“Tell Me” allows you to enter words or phrases that direct you to a command performed instantly.? Click “Tell me” from the navigation bar and type in a command. A drop-down menu may appear to fine-tune your request. Click on the option you want and get your desired result.

4. Utilize Keyboard Shortcuts

Microsoft offers dozens of keyboard shortcuts in Windows to make your life easier. While you won’t be able to remember all of them, you can jot down a few that you can start utilizing immediately. Mastery of these keyboard shortcuts will help you give commands faster while working.

5.? Avoid the constant email ping

Turning on the “Do Not Disturb” feature in Microsoft Office will enable you to stop receiving email notifications for the scheduled time. This feature is best when you need optimum focused and untapped productivity levels. You can also use this feature during rest time at night.

6. Share Your Work

This feature allows collaboration between users. To share your work; right-click on file and select share from an open document, you can also select the file from the document menu and right-click or click the ellipses to select share.

Click Invite People and enter their email addresses. Clicking “SendWorkbook” will open an email window with the file attached but will not enable active collaboration.

7. Restore previous work

Microsoft Office365 enables you to restore your last saved copy (up to 25 previous copies), saving precious time and effort. View and restore files in SharePoint or OneDrive by clicking File> Info and selecting View. You can see previous versions and restore prior content as needed

MICROSOFT WORD TIPS AND TRICKS

These are Microsoft 365 Tips and Tricks that can help you easily navigate through Microsoft Word include:

1. Easy Copying, Cutting, and Pasting

This is one of the most basic tips in Microsoft Word. To copy, highlight the concerned text, hold down the “Ctrl” key, or the “command” key on your MAC and press "C". After this, you go to the area you want to paste the text. Hold down the "control key" (or command) and press "V"

To cut, use the key "X" instead of C. This completely removes a text or image from where it used to be so it can be pasted on a new area. The “Copy” feature also serves as a temporary backup, as whatever you copied will be stored in the system’s temporary memory.?

2. Ditch the unnecessary formatting

To remove the formatting from your document, highlight the section in question (or you can select all of it using the Ctrl and “A” keys) by holding down the Ctrl key and then pressing the Spacebar. This will remove all the formatting from the highlighted section.

3. Add a hyperlink

Adding an already saved hyperlink to a chunk of text is a required trick to drive leads to intended and necessary sites. To do this, highlight the word or phrase you want to add the link into, then press Ctrl, right-click the selected section again, and choose “Hyperlink.”).

4. Smart lookup

This is an easier way to search for additional insights or background information to text content. Smart lookup helps you get right to the links you want to share and copy them back onto the text (to add a hyperlink, right-click the selected section again and choose "Hyperlink").?

To use Smart Lookup, highlight a word or phrase, right-click the highlighted section, and choose “Smart Lookup.” This will automatically open up your browser and bring up a Google search for what you selected.?

5. Smart way to delete

It can be tiring to delete longer words (or groups of words) using the backspace key, and if you hold it down, you risk wiping out an entire line. To delete the smart way, use the Control button and then Backspace. This will delete the previous word. You can also double-click the mouse on the word, and it will automatically highlight that word, for which you can press Backspace.?

Also, if you want to remove an entire paragraph or block of text. Triple-click inside this block and the entire paragraph will be selected, then click on backspace.

MICROSOFT TEAMS TIPS AND TRICKS?

To navigate Microsoft Teams optimally, here are some tips and tricks:

1. Saying NO to emails

Instead of relying on emails or working within the office to receive Instant Messaging (IM), you can post and forward every group email into a Team access folder. By using the Teams application, you can select the “Get Email Address” option, then copy and paste the addresses of everyone you want to have access to the individual channel.?

In this case, everyone will receive messages in the same area and it works as a combination of IM and email service, all tied into one powerful productivity suite.

2. Take advantage of the command line

The command line is a blank bar with a pencil-on-paper icon next to it. In this line, you can type several commands that will instantly take you where you need to go. Sifting and searching for a particular bit of information can be time-consuming and tiresome.?

A better way to do this is to type in one of the accepted commands, and Microsoft Teams will take you there.

3. Locating a conversation

Using the “@Mention” feature, you can locate a conversation you are interested in, instead of scrolling through a list especially when many conversations are involved. To achieve this, type in the “@” symbol, followed by their name, into the search bar, and it will instantly bring up the conversation.

4. Group people together

An easy way to send messages to a group of people in Microsoft Office is to group individuals into a single tag.

To do this, you need to choose the “Create a new tag” option and give it a name. Once you’ve named it, you can then add people. Click the “Add People” option and type in the names of the people you want to include in the single tag. Now, instead of typing out all the individuals you want to send the message to, you can simply use the “@” and then add the name of the group.

5. Organize your teams

With Microsoft Teams, you can organize your teams in an order of priority, that is, the most important team is at the top of your list.?

To do this, click and hold down on the team name, then drag it to the location you want it to appear in. Whether it is at the top of the page or you find your eye wandering to the Calendar button, you can tweak and edit the configuration as much as you’d like.

6. Mark the message as unread

In Microsoft Teams, you can keep a message received that you are yet to respond to as unread to enable you to get back to it subsequently. This can be achieved when you click on the three dots on the right of the message. From the pull-down menu, select “Mark as Unread.” This way, it will be highlighted and ready for you to read whenever you have a chance to sit down and go back over your messages

MICROSOFT EXCEL TIPS AND TRICKS

Here are some Microsoft 365 tips and tricks for Excel that can help you become more productive.?

• ?Autocorrect

There is an AutoCorrect feature that will allow you to correct difficult entries without having to proofread immediately. To use this feature, you’ll want to select the “File” menu, then choose “Options,” followed by “Proofing,” and then “AutoCorrect Options.” You’ll then select an entry you know is spelt correctly and type in what you’d like to type while inputting the entries.

Whenever you input what you have typed in, Excel will automatically swap it out and put in the correct spelling.?

• ?Switch data from a row to a column

?You can now easily convert a row into a column without clearing and entering the cell content again.

To do this, you’ll want to copy the row in question, and then move your pointer to a blank section on the spreadsheet. From here, choose “Home,” then “Paste,” followed by “Transpose.” Just remember you need to copy the data before it works.

• Removal of blank cells

When you have blank cells around your spreadsheet, you’ll need to remove them without using the time-consuming random scrolling and deleting method. This can prove difficult especially if you have a huge number of blank cells you need to remove.?

All you need to do is choose the column with the blank cells, then select “Data,” followed by “Filter.” Once the down-facing button appears, you’ll choose “Undo Select All” and then choose the last option given, which is “Blanks.” You can then return to “Home” and then “Delete.” This will remove all those pesky blank cells scattered on your spreadsheet.

• Add a diagonal line

To input a diagonal line to the cell, you’ll want to choose the cells in question, then click “Home,” followed by “Font.” Once the new window appears, choose “Borders,” then click ‘"More Borders.” Here you will have the option of selecting a diagonal line. and “K.” keys. This will add the hyperlink to the selected text.?

Conclusion

Once you become a power user in Microsoft Office, you will notice that you don’t just navigate the applications more quickly, but you also stay focused with fewer distractions.?

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