Office and IT
In "Windows Error Reporting: Elementary, My Dear Watson" (August 2005, InstantDoc ID 46982) and "Windows Error Reporting: Hoping for Fixes" (October 2005, InstantDoc ID 47636), I wrote about Windows Error Reporting (WER) because readers were so confused about the data Microsoft receives and what the company does with the information. Readers wrote me they were glad to finally get some clarification about WER.
But today, because of Office 2007's launch, what's interesting is some of the data from the survey behind those articles. We asked IT pros about their main concerns with the Office desktop applications. Among the biggest problems respondents had was the lack of a consistent deployment tool that minimizes the resource burden and installs the standard configuration.
Microsoft's marketing information focuses on new end-user features; not much is being said about the IT pros who will be responsible for purchasing and deploying Office 2007. But those concerns are being addressed. According to Microsoft, new IT tools include "an Office Migration Planning Manager, a File Conversion Tool, a new Setup Architecture, an Office Customization Tool, greater Group Policy capabilities, and a new Multilingual Architecture. Microsoft also is providing customers with Desktop Deployment Planning Services, a Business Desktop Deployment Solution Accelerator, and an Office Resource Kit to help ensure trouble-free adoption of the latest release." You can learn more at http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/itpro/highlights.mspx.
On Top of IT
Once Microsoft figures out how to turn a negative (in this case, Microsoft's discovery that IT pro customer satisfaction was terrible) into a positive, the company can turn on a dime. I hear that IT customer satisfaction is growing impressively because of efforts to reach out to IT pros. It makes sense to me that the server teams, which depend on IT pros, have excelled at soliciting customer feedback and using it to improve products. It also makes sense that the traditionally end-user?oriented groups, such as Office, haven't been as successful with that challenge. Let me know what you think about Microsoft's efforts and whether you agree about Office.
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