How to Avoid the Most Common M365 Mistakes
Did You Know an Average of 56% of a Business’s Microsoft Office 365 Licenses are Misaligned?
Cloud Migration is the process of moving an organization’s data, applications, resources, and workloads from hosted servers in data centers or on-premise, to a cloud-based infrastructure. Cloud technology saves your organization money by improving efficiency, security, scalability, and mobility.
Many of the apps and services we use in our daily lives are hosted in the cloud, like SharePoint, Microsoft 365, Gmail, and Slack. In addition, there are various cloud services available for businesses and public organizations today, including Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, and AWS.
How else does cloud migration affect business? Check out these stats:
- The average employee uses 36 cloud-based services during a workday.
- By 2025, there will be over 100 zettabytes of data stored in the cloud. To put that into perspective, a zettabyte is equal to one trillion gigabytes!
- 92% of enterprises are using a multi-cloud infrastructure.
Cloud services allow organizations to mitigate risk, keep down costs, leverage a sustainable future, improve productivity, and stay competitive in a fast-paced digital world.
1. Purchasing Licenses that Don’t Align with Employee Usage
One factor leading organizations to overspend is a lack of alignment between the type of license purchased and the needs of employees.
IT managers often buy Microsoft 365 licenses in bundles without first understanding the specific apps and addons users will take advantage of or not. In addition, Microsoft offers numerous tools and apps that may not be relevant to your business.
To ensure your M365 plan will meet employee needs, you will want to be sure your organization examines plan details so you’re not spending extra fees on tools that people aren’t using.
Examining plan details is challenging because it may seem tedious to explore the needs of each employee - that’s where our proven license provisioning process comes in. Our Cloud Innovators are trained to quickly assess and update your licensing so that every user has what they need, and not an app more.
2. Paying for Inactive Licenses Instead of Assigning Them to New Users
With the level of employee turnaround in many professional environments and the increasing number of external users in an organization, regular license checks can help you identify inactive Microsoft 365 licenses that could be used by others.
The best practice in most industries is quarterly reviews of your organization’s licensing plan and configuration based on applicable tier changes.
This way, your employees can take full advantage of the powerful apps and tools they need and ditch the unnecessary ones that surprise you with seemingly small subscription fees that add up quickly.
3. Not Training Employees on How to Use Microsoft Apps
When deploying Microsoft 365, employee training is essential and sets them up for success.
Employees should understand the capabilities of Microsoft’s available apps, tools, and integrations. Training sessions are a helpful way to get people up to speed, update them on changes, or if your organization is newly migrating to the cloud – explain the changes that will occur during and after migration to Microsoft 365.
Next steps for success
Thoroughly managing your M365 licensing tier will allow your organization to thrive and stay secure in today’s evolved and highly competitive business climate.
To make sure you are getting the most out of your plan, be sure to:
- Periodically review your current plan. A typical cadence is quarterly.
- Configure applicable tier changes.
- Collaborate with a certified MS Gold Partner to enhance and automate the process.
By partnering with Direct Technology as your trusted Cloud Innovator, you get 25 years of IT-driven business solutions experience on your side.
In addition, as a Microsoft Gold Azure Partner, we will ensure you never worry about workflow disruption with any of our cloud management services. Our cloud migration and license provisioning processes are time-tested, precise, and tailored to your specific business.
Want to learn more? Schedule a meeting today!
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