You can do this stuff for free -- or pay to do it right.
Pros
- Skype for Business is an excellent program for communicating not only in office, but with other Office 365 users across Windows, Mac and mobile platforms.
- Onedrive, included with a suite of products you are already buying, is a sufficient cloud-file storage program.
- Outlook is good for organization-wide mailing lists and ease of distribution. It organizes contacts well across a large company.
Cons
- Skype for business lacks the ability to EVER communicate with personal Skype accounts. Some of our vendors do not subscribe to Office 365 and therefore are shut out of this communication process.
- Outlook is a bit bare-bones on email coding and html and tries to be everything to everyone, integrating calendars, schedules, and many other functions instead of just being an outstanding email program.
- OneDrive is nothing special at the end of the day. Sharing of files across user groups is mildly less intuitive than Google Drive or Dropbox and lacks a good "backup" feature should files go missing.
Return on Investment
- Easy to schedule conversations; keep paper trails; and generally organize tasks and meetings.
- Can't communicate or share with vendors who do not subscribe to office 365.
- Easy to share files, make edits and communicate with other 365 users.
- There are free vendors out there -- but the larger the organization, the more difficult that becomes to implement consistently.
Alternatives Considered
Apple iCloud, Dropbox, Google Drive and Slack
Other Software Used
Adobe Illustrator CC, Google Drive, Apple iCloud, Kronos Workforce Central
