Microsoft Office Solution Accelerator for Recruiting Launched Today At the HR Technology Conference & Exposition

EDITORS’ UPDATE, Dec. 3, 2004
— Microsoft is evolving the Office Solution Accelerators program with the Solution Showcase for the Microsoft Office System. For additional information, see
Microsoft Showcases More Solutions Developed On the Microsoft Office System
or the
Microsoft Office System Solutions Web site
.

PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 8, 2003 — Today at the HR Technology Conference & Exposition at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia, Microsoft Corp. introduced the Microsoft® Office Solution Accelerator for Recruiting software, designed to empower human resources (HR) departments to increase enterprise productivity. The Accelerator for Recruiting was created in response to feedback from customers who want to use Office System technologies, such as the Outlook®
messaging and collaboration client and Word, to achieve highly efficient recruiting.

“Office Solution Accelerators help our partners readily build great solutions that give enterprises more value out of the software they already own by solving real-world business problems,” said Peter Rinearson, corporate vice president of the Information Worker Business Unit at Microsoft. “Our customers tell us that up to 50 percent of the time they dedicate to recruiting is spent on administrative duties such as scheduling. With the Accelerator for Recruiting, these tasks can be automated to maximize productivity. For example, a recruiter can schedule a whole set of interviews with just a few mouse clicks.”

Investing in Customers

The Accelerator for Recruiting includes a set of tools that address specific challenges customers face in managing the interview process. These interview management tools are designed to increase the return on investment on technology spending and improve the efficiency and productivity of enterprise hiring processes by accomplishing several main goals: standardization and automation of recruiting documentation and processes, integration between Microsoft Office and other recruiting technologies, and helping people involved in recruiting and hiring stay informed and coordinated throughout the recruiting cycle. Using the Accelerator for Recruiting, customers can seamlessly share information among people involved in the recruiting process, reduce the administrative tasks required to schedule interviews, more easily plan interviews to help optimize the time spent by interviewers, and quickly capture and view feedback from each interview. With the Accelerator, customers will be able to reduce recruiting-related costs and lower their administrative burden while improving service levels and optimizing recruiting processes. Additional HR Accelerator versions are being developed to help customers in areas where they are using Microsoft Office System technologies to get their work done.

Partner Opportunities

Industry partners will play a critical role in delivering complete, end-to-end solutions to customers by integrating, configuring and customizing Office Solution Accelerators.

Microsoft has compiled a broad and diverse set of early solution partners that includes Hire.com, iCIMS, Unicru Inc., Development Dimensions International Inc., Resume Mirror Inc., Immedient and Quilogy Inc. These partners will have the opportunity to bring new value to their customers and quickly expand their businesses into new areas with minimal investment.

Adding Value to the Investment in Office

The Microsoft Office Solution Accelerator’s benefit will be made available to all Microsoft licensing customers that have purchased Office applications with Software Assurance. To make use of any given Accelerator offered through this benefit licensing, customers need to have Software Assurance on the specific Office applications listed as technical requirements to run or use the version of the Accelerator in question. Interested customers can visit http://www.microsoft.com/office/solutionaccelerators/ or speak with a Microsoft representative or partner to learn more.

About Microsoft Office Solution Accelerators

Built for the Office System, a Microsoft Office Solution Accelerator is an integrated set of software components, templates and Microsoft-authored architectural guidance designed to solve specific customer business problems across common organizational areas. Microsoft Office Solution Accelerators are focused on helping customers quickly realize more value from their Microsoft Office System software investments and to assist industry partners in continuing to grow their businesses into new areas. The Office Solution Accelerators will become available in October and will continue their rollout into 2004. Initial packages are designed to accelerate the development of solutions in common organizational areas such as finance, operations, sales and human resources. Many more are expected as the Office Solution Accelerator program grows.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software — any time, any place and on any device.

Microsoft and Outlook are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries. The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft’s corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but may since have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/contactpr.asp .

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