Microsoft rolls out new Microsoft 365 Apps admin center capabilities

Posted on Monday February 28, 2022

The pandemic has expedited cloud migration timelines, and IT administrators have had to accomplish gargantuan tasks in record time, such as moving workflows to the cloud, securing company devices, and ensuring 24/7 data access. As the cloud becomes an increasingly pivotal part of business operations, Microsoft continues to improve the Microsoft 365 Apps admin center by adding new features that will make data management easier.

OneDrive sync health

With the OneDrive sync health feature, maintaining data integrity is easier than ever. IT admins can now readily check for sync statuses or errors by going to the OneDrive sync health dashboard and generating reports for specific administrative purposes. From the dashboard, admins can generate insights ranging from executive summaries to specific sync statuses of given devices, enabling them to filter the information they need so they can take action immediately in case they find sync issues.

Intelligent insights

Intelligent insights include features like Apps Inventory, Add-In Inventory, and Security Currency that allow IT administrators to strategically find and mitigate any issues. With these tools, they can gain an in-depth understanding of the organization’s Microsoft 365 environment and be privy to information such as:

• What devices are running Office apps and which versions they’re running;
• What Office add-ins are installed or running; and
• Which servicing channel each device belongs to.

Knowing all this information can help administrators identify and manage unsupported Office versions and add-ins to ensure security and compliance.

Servicing automation with controls

This feature streamlines and automates Microsoft 365 Apps servicing to eliminate manual deployment and accelerate the rollout of updates and security patches. With this new feature, IT admins only need to apply a specific servicing profile to a set of devices to automatically deliver monthly updates for users or groups.

Admins can also specify exclusion date periods, or when Office apps updates should not run, such as during holidays or company meetings. They can schedule these dates to happen only once or regularly, depending on their organization’s schedule.

Servicing profiles: Roll back to a previous version

For businesses that use a servicing profile, admins can now roll back devices to the previous version if users encounter issues with the most recent version of Monthly Enterprise Channel. For instance, if there’s an issue in Outlook’s latest update that hampers employee productivity, your IT team can revert Outlook to the previous stable version.

IT administrators can also view, pause, and resume updates on a per-device basis. If a user experiences issues during rollout, for instance, administrators can pause that user’s update and restore their software to a previous version while an IT personnel troubleshoots the issue.

Microsoft 365 Apps health

Microsoft 365 Apps health calculates an organization’s overall app health based on three criteria: app reliability, app performance, and supported versions. It also gives pertinent information such as Office app session crash rates and who reported such crashes, making it easier to identify issues and see how well Microsoft 365 apps are running during and in between deployments.

With these new features, administrators can better manage Microsoft 365 apps, and users can count on better experiences and fewer downtimes. If you want to learn more about how technology can increase your business’s operational efficiency, call us. Our IT experts are always ready to help.