Washington Works Blog

We have all used spreadsheets to track ongoing projects, daily to-do lists, or department inventory. That said, manually typing "Yes," "No," or highlighting cells in green to mark that a task is finished gets cluttered fast.

Adding interactive checkboxes to your sheets instead gives you an instant, visual way to keep your workload organized.

Microsoft is officially pulling the plug on Publisher on October 13, 2026. This “End of Life” event officially marks the end of support for the long-running desktop publisher.

If your team relies on Microsoft Publisher to create flyers, brochures, or newsletters, this retirement will impact your business. Understanding what this change means—and taking a few proactive steps today—will keep your network secure and prevent your design files from becoming inaccessible.

There is one critical phrase every business should always have on its radar: End-of-Life (EOL). A prime example of this lifecycle transition is currently underway: Microsoft Publisher is reaching its official End-of-Life in October 2026.

If your team uses Publisher to draft flyers, internal newsletters, or promotional templates, October 2026 might feel like a distant milestone. However, letting an EOL deadline sneak up on you is a fast track to unexpected operational downtime, lost data, and costly last-minute scrambles.

Microsoft Excel is a powerful tool that businesses leverage every day to store, track, and report on data, but it can be tedious to work in the document without knowing all of its little tricks. Today, we want to share with you one that could save you valuable clicks and time spent copying and pasting values. You’ll learn how to enter the same data into multiple cells at once.

How effectively can you multitask in the office? Are you known to have multiple windows and tabs open at any given time? With so many windows, applications, and tabs cluttering your brain, it helps to have tricks to keep them all in line. Using Smart windows (or Snap windows), you can place two or more side-by-side to clear things up a bit and make working in multiple apps or windows easier than ever.

The end of Windows 10 support is closer than you think. On October 14, 2025, Microsoft will officially stop providing free security updates, non-security updates, and assisted support for Windows 10. For businesses, this isn't just a minor inconvenience—it's a critical security and operational risk that demands immediate attention.

After the major flop that was Windows 8 and the 8.1 Update, Microsoft hit a home run with Windows 10 in both the personal and professional contexts. However, Windows 11 is now in a position to succeed Windows 10, and Microsoft is making plans to end support for Windows 10. Here’s what you’ll need to know.

Microsoft is constantly innovating to maintain its status as one of the world's largest and most well-respected technology companies. One of its prize projects is Copilot, an operating system-integrated artificial intelligence. In today’s blog, we’ll discuss some of the major changes coming to Copilot and how they can improve people’s lives at work and at home. 

All things considered, Windows 11 has received favorable reviews, although it can also be considered a somewhat unnecessary upgrade from Windows 10. Upgrading has significant benefits, provided you have the hardware to handle it. Microsoft wants users to have accounts to install the operating system, but there is a way to install Windows 11 without it.

Both Microsoft and Google offer work profile solutions that are designed to separate personal and professional use on mobile devices. These profiles are commonly used in enterprise settings to enhance security and manageability while allowing employees to use their personal devices for work-related tasks. Here's an overview of work profiles from Microsoft and Google.

The end of support for Windows 10 is scheduled for October 14, 2025. While that is a couple of years away, it's crucial to start strategizing for the future now. After this date, Microsoft will cease providing technical assistance, security updates, and bug fixes for the operating system. This means that continuing to use Windows 10 beyond that point could expose users to security risks and performance issues.

Microsoft’s operating systems have been around for a long time, and since Windows 95, Microsoft has published free utilities that can help users make slight adjustments to their operating systems to suit their needs. Microsoft PowerToys are even available now, and we want to explore what they can do for your business, as well as how you can acquire them.

The holidays are fast approaching and that means people are going to miss work for one reason or another. If you can get away from the office for a little bit, you’ll want to set up an out-of-office message to ensure that others know you will get back to them when you get back to the office. Here’s how you can set up an autoresponder for an out-of-office message in Microsoft Outlook.

Goodbyes are always painful, but we suspect that this one for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer will be more on the bittersweet side of things. Long a staple in the web browsing world, Internet Explorer has largely been removed from devices running Windows 10 and Windows 11. Let’s take a moment to discuss the approach Microsoft is using to slowly phase Internet Explorer out of the web browsing space.

Microsoft Teams is a video communication and collaboration platform that your organization can use to great success, but it helps to have a couple of pointers so you can make the most out of the software. Here are five ways you can maximize the value you get out of your Microsoft Teams software.

Typing on your keyboard is something that you do every day, but sometimes you just don’t want to do it. You can give your hands a break and use Microsoft Word’s dictation feature; this lets you use your voice to write in the software. Let’s go over how you might use the feature on a desktop, web browser, or mobile device.

Have your opinions of remote work changed at all over the past year and a half, or do you still want your employees to return to the office in full force? Many major companies, despite initially advocating for remote work, are sending mixed signals on the topic, including Microsoft. What can we learn from the experiences of these companies?

With Microsoft announcing that the Windows 11 release is right around the corner, most users will be looking to upgrade to hardware that supports it. This is a topic for another day. As we approach the Windows 11 launch, Microsoft is gearing up to retire one of its most controversial (and ultimately innovative) operating systems to date, Windows 8.1. Today, we thought we’d talk a little bit about the mixed bag Windows 8.1 is and how it will be important to move off of the software by January 2023.

Microsoft has officially unveiled Windows 11, the latest in its line of PC operating systems, as well as detailed its system requirements. Will your business be upgrading to Windows 11 when the time comes? We think a lot of it will depend on its current IT infrastructure and whether or not you meet the minimum requirements right out the gate. Let’s dive into the details and what you need to know about Windows 11.

Back in 2015, Microsoft confirmed that Windows 10 would be the last version of Windows, meaning that we should not expect Windows 11 anytime soon. Still, a major update to the Windows 10 operating system has been confirmed to be on its way. What’s coming with this next update to Windows 10, and what does it mean for your business?