Microsoft offers a variety of official certifications for individuals to demonstrate their expertise within a program.
You aren’t likely to see many jobs that specify an official Microsoft certification as a requirement, however it might be beneficial in certain cases.
If you are planning on training others on how to use Office applications, or your technical Office skills are highly weighted in your role, then you might consider taking this path.
Those with certifications earn up to an average of 15 percent more than their uncertified coworkers.
There are three certification levels to choose from, ranging from training in specific applications to mastery of the full suite.
Microsoft Office Certification
Microsoft Office Specialist (MOS)
This training enables you to demonstrate your abilities with: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, Outlook, SharePoint and OneNote.
According to Microsoft, those with a MOS certification can earn up to $16,000 more in annual salary than those without the certification.
Microsoft Office Specialist Expert
These trainings include advanced skill work in Microsoft Word and Excel. We’re not just talkin’ bold and italics here. You’re tested on the ability to use advanced features, like creating new mail merges inside Word, and adding bookmarks and watermarks to documents.
In Excel, you’ll also need to create advanced PivotTables and perform data analysis with its extensive functions.