Banks pay a lot for enterprise licencing, and office applications are one of those.  So one Bank I am familiar with, has an Enterprise licence with Microsoft, that cost 10’s of millions.  A large part of that is the use of MS Office on 35K +/- desktops.  I would consider myself a relatively power user in Bank terms, using Powerpoint, Word, and Excel daily, and Visio if someone sends me a file.

So why are we seeing simple office applications being developed that function in the browser and do 90% of what is required, and, and built from the ground up to collaborate.

Gliffy, the online Visio killer | News.blog | CNET News.com

Like other online applications, it has inherent advantages over traditional software. Collaboration is easier, for one. Although Gliffy doesn’t offer real-time group editing like Writely, Google Spreadsheets, or SynchroEdit, it makes it easy for multiple users to work on a diagram in turns. Gliffy does track all changes made to a document. It’s kind of like a wiki in that way.

Gliffy also makes it easy to publish a diagram you create to the Web. Gliffy keeps a live JPG of each file on its servers, so if a site or blog links to that image, it will always show the most current version.

These new applications are on to something.  They are better matched to how people actually work, and collaborate.  They are simple and focussed on the right capabilities, and  are beginning to form a compelling argument to re-consider Microsoft Office.  Office is predicated on the notion that features have a compelling value, and people will pay.  However the majority if those features are formatting.  Formatting is free, and expected, and these new browser based applications have all those.

The real value lies features that promote productivity, and those are things like, simplicity, ease of access, and collaboration.

I recently started to use MyInfo, an Outliner tool that sits in my toolbar, uses almost no memory, and loads instantly – not fast, instantly.  I will never go back.  I do all my early thinking in MyInfo, and if required, can simply export into Powerpoint when ready to go to full presentation.  So MyInfo does things that Office never can.

This significantly reduces my time for each project, issue, new development, strategy outline, etc.  It has highlighted for me that I only use 10% of MS Office capabilities except when am ready to go to full deck.  It also highlights that MS Office does a terrible job at helping me do things like:

• prepare outlines
• organise my work
• plan my work
• plan and organise my department

Comments on MyInfo from Jeremy at WSJ.

Relevance to Bankwatch
Microsoft Office has not fulfilled its promise to promote office workers productivity.  It has functions that claim to do so, (eg, Outlook tasks) but the reality is that its too complicated for non power users, and too inadequate for power users.  In short, there are better products out there, that are more applicable to office productivity.

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