User Certifications for Office, Vista

To coincide with the launch of Office 2007, Microsoft is restructuring its certifications for desktop application expertise. The new desktop certification levels for users will resemble those already in place for developers and other IT professionals. As it has done with its IT-oriented certifications, Microsoft will move beyond certifying people for specific applications, such as Excel, to certifying skills in broader business roles, such as managing budgets. The change may also spark more interest in these skills among business desktop users and hiring managers.

Current Office Certifications

Today, people who want to get an Office user certification—Microsoft Office Specialist—can take a basic Core or a more advanced Expert exam for any of the five major components of the Office suite: Access, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, or Word. Someone who successfully completes Expert exams for four of the five applications is qualified to call herself a Microsoft Office Specialist Master.

Microsoft says that more than 2 million Office Specialist certificates have been issued, including certificates for more than 8,000 Office Specialist Masters.