TODAY’S business environment is highly competitive and the need to gain a larger market share of clients and customers cannot be overstated.

       For that reason, most businesses need the edge or advantage that helps them to not only keep up, but excel in what they do.

       For that, efficiency is the lubricant that helps the business function at its optimum, with workers being able to create, collaborate and communicate seamlessly and efficiently.

       Assisting them in this effort are productivity suites that essentially function like a Swiss Army knife – offering a collection of software that aims to increase the productivity of its users.

       The concept took off in the early 1980s with the emergence of Starburst, which combined a word processor (WordStar), a spreadsheet editor (CalcStar) and a database manager (DataStar).

       Eventually as computers progressed along with the operating system running them, newer players joined the race.

       By the 1990s, the scene became dominated by Microsoft Office, which bundled a word processor as well (Word), a spreadsheet editor (Excel), a database manager (Access) and a presentation software (PowerPoint).

       Although there are several productivity suites available today – such as OpenOffice, Google Docs and Apple’s iWork – Microsoft still holds the top honour of being the most used suite since the 1990s.

       Winning combo

       Microsoft has since added more applications to its initial offering of just MS Word, Excel, Access and PowerPoint.

       Today it has over 40 applications – Word, Exchange, Excel, SharePoint, Teams and more – under its productivity suite called Microsoft 365 (M365), all of which integrate and complement each other seamlessly.

       These tools function as a software-as-a-service (SaaS), allowing users to access their work and data any time of the day, from virtually anywhere as long as they're online.

       It combines all the efficiency and versatility of the Microsoft Office suite and augmenting those with productivity tools and artificial intelligence features that will prove to be invaluable to users in and out of the office setting.

       These include functions such as a hosted Exchange Server, Skype for Business Server, and SharePoint, among all its over-40 applications.

       Business users can streamline management operations, monitor the suite’s environment for critical behaviours and irregularities, as well as to generate various types of reports that will provide crucial in decision making.

       M365 also represents a future where operations continually shift to become decentralised, with many organisations realising that cloud services help them stay agile and competitive within their playing field.

       This is even more so when the Covid-19 pandemic began spreading globally, crippling economies and affecting large swathes of industries around the world.

       The most basic M365 suite is packaged for home users, for personal use or the whole family.

       Businesses would have access to a suite designed specially for small- or medium-size businesses and one that is planned for larger companies and enterprises.

       There is also one with apps that will aid educators, such as universities, schools, teachers and even students.

       Upgraded services

       Working in tandem with M365 is Celcom Business InSuite Manage Services, which secures M365 availability and performance with additional proactive monitoring and issue management.

       These added productivity tools can streamline and simplify your daily business operational needs and processes, from creating new Teams channels, to providing a shared Exchange mailbox or assigning users to a SharePoint site.

       It is easy enough for managers and administrators to set up and running, without the need to engage or hire specialists.

       InSuite Manage services offers employee trainings to use the productivity tools and to also empower them for quick decisions

       The result is a reliable, agile M365 environment that enables employees and teams to collaborate effectively and improve productivity.

       And at the end of the day these collaborations can be measured through report generation and measured analytics.

       It is customised to suit different business needs and is available across all devices.

       InSuite Manage Service adds value to the productivity apps and streamlines employee attendance, annual leave and claims submissions.

       Together, these tools empower the human resource department to generate paperless reports with ease for management visibility.

       InSuite also proactively monitors the company’s business data for security reasons, which reduces the need for emergency troubleshooting.

       It also provides useful data for the company, detects and mitigates potential risks and problems before those affect the entire organisation.

       inSuite helps to deter costly breakdowns and ransomware attacks by solving problems before those get out of control and become too expensive to fix.

       Suite deal

       As a business owner, complementing your M365 subscriptions with the Celcom Business inSuite’s intelligent processes will free you from the repetitious task of having to monitor the overall setup yourself as experienced IT engineers at Celcom Business will oversee your M365 platform, ensuring your apps and storage are accessible and secure.

       But most of all, it eases what could potentially be a tedious, expensive yet necessary exercise to digitally transform your business, leaving you with the clarity to concentrate on building and upscaling your business and generating more revenue.

       Get serious about digitally transforming your business. Sign up for Celcom Business InSuite Lite subscription and enjoy three months free, terms and conditions apply. This promotion ends in June.

       Call Celcom at 019-601 1111, visit https://business.celcom.com.my/digital-solutions/productivity-suite or simply scan the QR code below to find out more.