Office 365 email is here! These are few things you need to know.

Hello everyone. The Office 365 launch date is here.

Passwords

For 95% of you, your initial password will be composed of your first and last initials (uppercase with periods) and the last 4 digits of your Social Security Number. For example: Walter White's last 4 of his SSN are 2210. His new password is W.W.2210 it's very important to include the two periods after the first and last initial.

The first time you log into Office 365, you will be prompted to change your initial password. Office 365 requires strong, secure passwords. All passwords must be at least 8 characters in length, must contain at least 1 number AND 1 uppercase letter. We are unable to modify the password policy. Microsoft requires complex passwords since they are hosting the email for us.

About 150 of you already had your password reset to that new format on the current system and you will use that password one final time when you log in to Office 365.

New hires that were hired since the Office 365 announcement in mid-November will use the password you were originally assigned.

My password isn't working? What should I do?

We anticipate having a few who are unable to log in for various reasons. I tried to spot check all 300+ passwords to make sure they looked like they were in the correct format and didn't have any sort of corruption from the script that generated the password based on your first and last initials.

If your password isn't working, don't worry. We've created a tool to quickly reset your password in just a few seconds. Simply call IT at our IT Help Desk number. Everyone has that number memorized, right? For those that don't the IT Help Desk number is 631-2210. If you call from a normal desk phone, just dial 2210. We'll reset your password to a super easy to remember temporary password. Once again, you will be prompted to change your password the first time you log in.

Thunderbird

We have quite a few staff that are currently using Thunderbird to access their email accounts because Thunderbird allows staff to check several different email accounts at once. I'm sad to report that we will not be supporting the use of Thunderbird from this point on. Thunderbird unfortunately does not work properly with Exchange accounts without the use of third-party extensions. Even with third-party extensions, Thunderbird cannot access the Global Address List, so you would have to manually keep your contacts list up to date with new hires and people who sadly decided to leave this great place to work. The good news is you are now able to check your other accounts without having to log out of your current account using the Outlook Web App, which I'll refer to the official Microsoft abbreviation, OWA from this point on. It's uncertain when we will come and uninstall Thunderbird from your computers, but it will eventually need to be done. It's not necessary to keep Thunderbird as an "archive" like we did with Calypso. Everything that is currently in your Thunderbird inbox and folders will be in your new Office 365 account. The folder structure will still be the same as you have now.

Non-Staff email accounts

We have a large number of non-staff email accounts. For example: [email protected], [email protected], and [email protected]. On Office 365, we will use a new feature called Shared Mailboxes for these accounts. These accounts are fully functional email accounts, but are not accessed by logging in to the sign-in page like you do for your normal staff account. These accounts have to have permissions delegated to staff accounts that are allowed to access them. This is good because it prevents someone who should not have access the account from figuring out the password and logging in, and it also keeps us from having to change the password when staff that had access to the account leave the company. I've done my best to make sure all shared accounts are correctly delegated to the people who will be checking the accounts. If you find that you are unable to access a shared account that you should be able to access, send an email to me ([email protected]) and I can quickly get you fixed up as soon as I can get to a computer. Please don't call the main IT Help Desk to have this particular problem fixed; the Help Desk Specialists do not have the ability to delegate permissions to shared mailboxes. For the time being, I will need to set that up for you.

Personal Address Books

I sent out an email last week with instructions to export your contacts from Convergence and Thunderbird. If you have not yet done that, please do so before we switch over. You will not be able to login to Convergence after we switch over. You will be able to access your Thunderbird address book for a short period after the switch until we are able to get around to uninstalling Thunderbird.

Mobile Devices

Non-Overtime Exempt Staff
Since we a organization full of bright, intelligent employees, we anticipate that many of you will quickly discover how to access your email from your mobile devices such as tablets, phones, etc. There are official Microsoft Apps for iOS, Android, and Windows phone that are readily available for users to download. The bad news is, non-exempt staff will not have the ability to connect using their mobile devices. Unfortunately, accessing email outside normal business hours, on any type of device, is in violation of guideline #7 in our company email Guidelines in our Policy and Procedures manual. I highly recommend all staff read the email guidelines and be familiar with them.

Overtime Exempt Staff
Exempt staff will be able to access their email from mobile devices. The first time any user tries to access the email from a mobile device, they are automatically put in a "quarantine status" awaiting an email administrators approval to access the email from their device. An email will automatically be generated and sent to the email administrator who will then verify the user is authorized to access email from a mobile device. Once the account has been authorized, your email will start showing up on your device. Any time you add a new device, this process will need to be completed.

If you have any questions about Office 365, please post a comment on the Office 365 Q & A page.