Office 365 Online: Why is the user experience so shitty?
I went from a company that uses Google to another one that uses the Microsoft stack. Every day I lose my patience with Office 365 online. The user experience is absolutely terrible, making stupid things complicated or broken. Why is that? Is it a Product Design problem, Product Management problem, or what? PowerPoint online is worse than Google Slides to create animations such as fade-in/out. Aligning elements doesn't work as well. Even to start the presentation from a specific slide, they put the function is a tiny, almost hidden icon in the bottom right of your screen. Excel online is also worse than Google Sheets. Some basic functions are not available. Freezing rows requires more clicks. If you add a hyperlink to a cell and need to edit it, it will open the link every time you click the cell. Word online (but also applicable to others) - The way that you share links and permissions is so stupid and more complicated than how Google does it. With Microsoft, you have specific URLs to specific access groups and you can accidentally remove one of them. With Google, it's one single URL for everyone. Even Microsoft Teams can be annoying sometimes. If you duplicate a meeting, it doesn't create a new meeting url, it keeps the same. I know I sound nitpicky, because those are small things but they happen all the time.
Think about the bias you have. You expect a google slides and sheet for msft and you dont see it. You are frustrated
Think about the logic. You expect a usable product and don’t get it. You are frustrated.
We're talking about big tech companies. Is it too much to expect a product that is simple to use and fully functional? A lot of people from Microsoft are saying they don't recommend the web apps. Why expose the user to a terrible experience, then?
Sounds like the typical Microsoft experience.
I've used both. Prefer msft. But I'm old so I have what I need to do figured out. Rtfm.
I was at LinkedIn when Microsoft acquired it. We were heavily using gsuite so it was an opportunity to improve 365 from the feedback we were generating. Email and calendar was moved relatively quickly and for the most part was OK. I tried hard to eat that dogfood for sheets and docs but like you said the experience was crappy compared to gsuite. Microsoft had a dedicated support channel for us that was responsive and took our feedback to improve the product but for me I had a job to do so I eventually just gave up on it and so did most of the people around me. In the LinkedIn/Microsoft blind group there were occasionally interactions where microsofties would have this attitude that gsuite is some toy thing and serious business uses Microsoft. With that attitude I'm not surprised at how some customers aren't well served by 365.
Yeah everytime I commented saying our products are frustrating, I always had people say, you don’t know how to use them correctly. Our products are top class and stuff like that. I said fuck it, I’ll just go to a company which strives on quality. And not use teams, outlook and the whole 365 crap.
You just reminded me of another issue. I have the URL for my Outlook mailbox bookmarked. It's something like outlook.office365.com/mail Almost every time that I open it, it triggers a reload loop and then it throws a 500 error - Too many redirects. When I click the refresh button, then it loads. Could be my browser or VPN, but it doesn't happen with Gmail on the same PC. I'm not a big fan of the calendar app, either.
365 products were outsourced and decentralized when I was with the group. It’s a leadership problem
I also feel like dogfooding has a hand in this
If I were a product design lead, I'd be very frustrated working at Microsoft if the leadership doesn't care about UX. I'd work only for the salary without an ounce of enthusiasm.
Why are you using the online version. Can’t afford the desktop apps? The experience is 100x better than google workspace that is all dependent on online connectivity.
I have the desktop apps, but the experience of using a desktop app for async collaboration feels completely dated to me. I also prefer to manage files directly in the cloud instead of using the app. And yes, I know I can save to the cloud, but I don't like the workflow. But I think the question you should be asking is: Why can't I admit that my company is notorious for delivering poor user experiences?
This is the equivalent of switching from iOS to Android. For the most part, all the functionality is there. You’re complaining because how you get to that functionality has changed. Maybe invest in yourself by taking some training courses on the Office client suite.
Create a presentation with 5 slides using Google Slides and another one using PowerPoint online. You need start presenting at slide 3. Compare how both work. Who needs some training is your product design team, your PMs, and your leadership. Very embarrassing.
@microsoft, sorry but I have to agree with timetorant. He’s got a point. And like in his original post. He was quite specific of problems, so it was clear that he had pet peeves rather than not knowing how to use the product
I've always used the installed apps [word, ppt, excel] to interact with docs and even docs shared online. I'd say the desktop apps are a significantly better experience. I would not use the webapp.
So many people are saying to use the desktop apps that I'll give them a try. How would you rate the usability of the apps vs web version?
It's typical MS problem. Most microsoft product I have seen is full of bloated features that nobody wants. (Looking at you Azure Devops WI team).
G suite is WAY better, hands down.