Home / Non-Accredited / Microsoft Office & Computer Skills / Microsoft Office Essentials: Word, Excel and PowerPoint Beginners (3 days)
Quick Look Course Summary:Microsoft Office Essentials: Word, Excel and PowerPoint Beginners (3 days)
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Next Public Course Date:
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Length: 3 day(s)
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Price (at your venue): 1 Person R 14,997 EX VAT 3 Person R 11,205 EX VAT 10 Person R 8,120 EX VAT
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Certification Type:Non-Accredited
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Locations & Venues: Off-site or in-house. We train in all major city centres throughout South Africa.
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Microsoft Office Essentials: Word, Excel and PowerPoint Beginners (3 days)
Three days, three applications: delegates leave able to produce a properly formatted Word document, a calculated and charted Excel workbook and a clean PowerPoint deck without asking for help.
New staff are expected to produce a letter, a budget and a slide deck in their first week, yet most have never been shown how Word, Excel or PowerPoint actually work. They copy old files, format by hand and avoid anything they do not understand. This three-day Microsoft Office essentials course fixes that with one beginner day on each application, taught hands-on at a computer with South African workplace examples.
Day one is Word: creating and laying out documents, formatting text and paragraphs with styles, tables and lists, references such as footnotes and a table of contents, and pictures and SmartArt. Day two is Excel: workbooks and worksheets, entering and formatting data, Excel tables, the core functions from SUM and AVERAGE to IF and COUNTIF, charts and printing. Day three is PowerPoint: building a presentation from a theme, designing consistent slides with the Slide Master, adding pictures, tables, charts, video and animation, and presenting and sharing the result.
Each day stands alone, so a delegate who already knows Word can join for Excel and PowerPoint only. The three days together give a new employee the full everyday Office toolkit in a single week, with a BOTI workbook for each application to keep.
Why this course
For your organisation
- New and junior staff productive in Word, Excel and PowerPoint within a week
- Documents, spreadsheets and presentations that look professional and are built the right way
- Fewer avoidable errors: formulas instead of typed totals, styles instead of hand formatting
- One course to onboard a whole intake of interns, learners or new administrators
- Three applications in one booking, with the option to send different people on different days
For your delegates
- The foundations of all three applications, explained from the start
- Hands-on practice on realistic workplace files, with the facilitator on hand
- Confidence to open a blank document, workbook or presentation and know where to begin
- A workbook and quick-reference guide for each application
What delegates will be able to do
- Create, save, navigate and print Word documents, and check them for hidden information and accessibility
- Format text, paragraphs, pages and sections in Word, using styles rather than manual formatting
- Build tables, bulleted and numbered lists, footnotes and a table of contents in Word
- Insert and format pictures, shapes, screenshots and SmartArt in a document
- Set up Excel workbooks and worksheets and enter, edit, format and fill data efficiently
- Use Excel tables, sorting, filtering and conditional formatting to manage a list
- Write formulas with SUM, AVERAGE, MIN, MAX, COUNT, IF, SUMIF, COUNTIF and basic text functions
- Create and format charts in Excel and set a worksheet up to print properly
- Build a PowerPoint presentation with consistent design, text, images, tables, charts and media
- Rehearse, present, record and share a presentation
Who should attend
New employees, interns and learners, administrators, receptionists, clerks and frontline staff moving into office roles, and anyone who has picked up Office by trial and error and wants to learn it properly. Delegates should be comfortable using a computer – mouse, keyboard, files and folders. Complete beginners to computers should start with Introduction to Computers and Microsoft Office Basics (2 days).
Course outline
Day 1 – Microsoft Word for beginners
Creating and managing documents
- Starting a blank document or one from a template; opening a PDF for editing
- Inserting text from another file; moving around a document with search, Go To and bookmarks
- Views, zoom, the Quick Access Toolbar, a split window and formatting marks
- Document properties; saving as PDF and other formats
- Print settings and printing part of a document
- Checking a document for hidden information, accessibility and compatibility before it goes out
Formatting text and paragraphs
- Selecting, cutting, copying and pasting; find and replace; AutoCorrect and special characters
- Fonts, highlighting and the Format Painter
- Line spacing, paragraph spacing and indents
- Built-in styles for headings and body text, and clearing unwanted formatting
- Columns, and page, section and column breaks
- Different page setup for one section of a document
Page layout for a professional document
- Margins, orientation and paper size
- Themes and style sets for a consistent company look
- Headers, footers and page numbers
- Page colour, borders and a DRAFT or CONFIDENTIAL watermark
- A cover page for a proposal or report
Tables and lists
- Inserting a table, converting text to a table and back
- Table styles, sorting rows and resizing columns
- Merging and splitting cells, cell margins and splitting a table
- A header row that repeats on every page
- Bulleted and numbered lists; custom bullets and number formats
- List levels, restarting and continuing numbering, starting values
References
- Footnotes and endnotes
- Citation sources and a bibliography
- Captions for figures and tables
- A table of contents built from headings, and keeping it up to date
Pictures, shapes and SmartArt
- Inserting shapes, pictures, screenshots and text boxes
- Picture styles, effects and removing a background
- Wrapping text around objects and positioning them on the page
- Alternative text for accessibility
- Creating, formatting and editing a SmartArt graphic such as an organogram or a process
Day 2 – Microsoft Excel for beginners
Workbooks and worksheets
- Creating a workbook and bringing in a comma-separated export from another system
- Adding, copying, moving, renaming, colouring and hiding worksheets
- Moving around a workbook: search, Go To and hyperlinks
- Inserting and deleting rows and columns; row height and column width
- Freezing and splitting the window, zoom and workbook views
- Showing formulas; the Quick Access Toolbar and document properties
Entering, editing and formatting data
- Entering and replacing data; cut, copy, paste and Paste Special
- AutoFill for dates, months and series
- Inserting and deleting cells; merging cells; alignment, indent and wrapped text
- Number formats for rands, percentages and dates; cell styles and the Format Painter
- Conditional formatting to flag overdue or over-budget items
- Sparklines, grouping and subtotals for a quick summary
Excel tables and lists
- Turning a range into an Excel table, and back again
- Adding rows and columns; table styles and options; a total row
- Filtering a list to the records you need
- Sorting by one column and by several
- Removing duplicate records from a list
Formulas and functions
- How a formula is built, and cell references
- SUM, MIN, MAX, COUNT and AVERAGE
- IF for a yes or no decision in a cell
- SUMIF, AVERAGEIF and COUNTIF to total or count by category – sales per branch, staff per department
- Text functions – LEFT, RIGHT, MID, UPPER, LOWER, PROPER and CONCATENATE – to tidy names and codes from an HR or ERP export
Charts and objects
- Creating a chart and adding a second data series
- Switching rows and columns; the Quick Analysis tool
- Chart titles, labels, legends, layouts and styles; resizing and moving a chart to its own sheet
- Text boxes, shapes and images on a worksheet
- Alternative text for accessibility
Printing and sharing a workbook
- Print area, print titles and scaling to fit a page
- Headers and footers; page setup
- Saving as PDF and other formats
- Checking a workbook for hidden information, accessibility and compatibility
Day 3 – Microsoft PowerPoint for beginners
Getting started with PowerPoint
- The interface, the start screen and recent files
- A new presentation from a theme or template; themes and slide layouts
- Saving presentations, including AutoSave to OneDrive
- Adding, duplicating, reordering and deleting slides
- Sections, Outline view and Slide Sorter view for a long deck
Designing consistent slides
- Changing styles, colours, fonts and effects
- Aligning objects with grids and guides
- The Slide Master: set the logo, colours and fonts once
- Keeping the company brand consistent across every slide
Text that reads well on a screen
- Text boxes, fonts, size, alignment and spacing
- Bulleted and numbered lists that do not overcrowd the slide
- SmartArt for a process, a team structure or a timeline
- Text effects, used sparingly
Pictures, shapes, tables and charts
- Pictures and stock images; cropping, transparency and filters
- Shapes, icons and the drawing tools
- Inserting and formatting a table
- Creating a chart, and linking a chart to Excel so it updates
- The chart design and layout tools; choosing the right chart type
Video, audio, animation and transitions
- Inserting video and audio, and adding captions to a video
- Animations and the Animation Pane
- Slide transitions, and the Morph transition for movement between slides
- Keeping media and movement purposeful
Presenting and sharing
- Rehearsed timings, narration and a custom show for a particular audience
- Presenter View, laser pointer and ink annotations during the talk
- Recording the presentation with voice and video; kiosk mode for a self-running display
- Co-authoring, comments and mentions; sharing through OneDrive
- Exporting to video or PDF, and protecting the file
- The Accessibility Checker and keyboard shortcuts
How it is delivered
Three days, 08:30-16:00, usually consecutive but can be split across weeks. In person at your offices anywhere in South Africa, at a BOTI venue, or live online. One delegate or a group of up to 20, each at their own computer with Microsoft 365 (Word, Excel and PowerPoint). Laptops with the software can be supplied on request. Workbook, practice files and a quick-reference guide for each application included. We deliver it at your offices in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban, Cape Town and anywhere else in South Africa, at a BOTI venue in Johannesburg, or live online for teams in different places.
What our clients say
“The facilitator effectively encouraged participation and used practical examples, discussions and interactive activities to ensure that the concepts were understood and could be applied in the workplace.”
“Business Optimization Training Institute facilitated Microsoft Excel Training for our company. The course was efficiently scheduled and planned around our timetable. We were impressed by the quality of training.”
“The training was very informative and practical, leaving our employees feeling confident in their ability to leverage Excel more effectively.”
Frequently asked questions
Do delegates need any Office experience?
No. They should be comfortable using a computer – mouse, keyboard, files and folders. Anyone newer than that should start with Introduction to Computers and Microsoft Office Basics (2 days).
Can delegates attend only one or two of the days?
Yes. Each day is also sold on its own as Microsoft Word Beginners (1 day), Microsoft Excel Beginners (1 day) and Microsoft PowerPoint Beginners (1 day), so you can send different people on different days. Ask us for a quote for the mix you need.
How is this different from the five-day All-in-One course?
The All-in-One adds a day each of Outlook and OneNote, and pitches its Word and Excel days at intermediate level for people who already use those programs. This three-day course is the beginner route.
Can you run this course at our offices?
Yes. Most groups are trained at the client's premises anywhere in South Africa; we can also host it at a BOTI venue or deliver it live online. Laptops with the software can be supplied on request.
Which version of Office do you teach?
Microsoft 365 (Office 2024). Almost everything also applies to Office 2019 and 2021; tell us what your organisation uses and the facilitator will point out the differences.
Is it accredited?
No – it is a non-accredited short course and delegates receive a BOTI certificate of attendance. If you need an accredited route, ask us about BOTI's End User Computing skills programmes (QCTO accreditation pending).