Microsoft Office Certification

Microsoft Office Certification - Whatever your job role, if you use these applications your productivity and value can increase substantially with the right training.

Microsoft Office certification is one of the best investments anyone wanting to gain a foothold in the IT industry can make. There is a real need for skilled personnel in this area. Whether you’re on a helpdesk, a software trainer or just a user of these applications, an in depth knowledge of how they work can open several doors.

In my experience very few places I’ve worked at have tapped into the vast functionality of what this suite of applications can do. Having knowledge of the more advanced features, macros and compatibility with 3rd party applications will put you in a position where you can develop customised solutions specific for your working environment – and be recognised for it. Needless to say this is a very desirable skillset to develop.

Microsoft Office Certification – Roles and Qualifications

There are different types of qualification to suit different job roles. Let’s start with the Microsoft Office certification best suited to the helpdesk ‘problem fixer’ – the MCDST:

The MCDST (Microsoft Certified Desktop Support Technician) is an excellent certification for anyone looking to get into a helpdesk role. Combine this with a CompTIA A+ hardware/OS and maybe Network+ and you’ll be looking at a near perfect set of credentials for helpdesk support.

The MCDST covers installation, configuration and troubleshooting of Office applications as well as setting up some of the advanced features, language packs, security and document recovery (definitely need to know about that one!). It consists of two exams, 70-271 and 70-272, 271 covers the XP operating system whereas 272 covers applications.

As I mentioned this Microsoft Office certification is best suited to those looking for support roles or already in support roles wanting to develop and move on with a view to more advanced network admin in the future. If in-depth knowledge of how to use the applications (and not just use them but become a superuser) is what you’re looking for then you’ll want to look at the MOS.

Microsoft Office Certification – Microsoft Office Specialist.

The MOS certification is not nearly as common as some other Microsoft certs. This is a shame because the need for skilled professionals with extensive Office knowledge is huge.

There are 4 levels of MOS certification;- Specialist, Expert, Master, and Master Instructor. Depending on how far you want to take it, you can specialise and be the person in the office everyone comes to with questions on how to do this that and the other, or you can become a 10th dan black belt ‘Master Instructor’ and teach.

This Microsoft Office certification goes up in levels with two levels of difficulty for each exam – specialist and expert. To get the MOS title you only need to complete one of the specialist exams. But to become a master you need 3 core exams – 2 of them at expert level (Word and Excel) and 1 elective (specialist level) making 4 exams.

Microsoft Office Certification – Studying

Like any other certification getting a Microsoft Office certification is no walk in the park, what’s good about both the MCDST and MOS is that they can be split up into bite size chunks and done back to back.

I find what works for me is a combination of good reading material, video training (for early morning studying), audio training (to listen on the way to work and back) and practice exam questions (an absolute must).

There are varying levels of difficulty in practice questions I’ve found, some are easier than the exam, some or even harder! More and more exams are using simulations these days so I recommend you get some practice tests that include simulator questions like Preplogic who I use, I like their money back guarantee if you don’t pass the exam.

High quality training materials and practice exams are key to passing first time so it's worth investing in a company who are so confident about their products that they're prepared to put their money where their mouth is.

Microsoft Office Certification – Conclusion.

In today’s office life there is no escaping having to know your way around the finer points of Word templates, Excel formulas, impressive Powerpoint presentations and don’t get me started on Access! Outlook as we all know is probably the source of ¼ of helpdesk tickets worldwide and then there’s MS Project..

As technology moves on these apps will only get more sophisticated and thus require skilled, certified personnel to troubleshoot them and utilise their full potential.

If you want to get ahead in the modern workplace these days the smart money is on Microsoft Office certification.