Microsoft Office Award

Our Essential Microsoft Office Award is a mini-Diploma that teaches you the most popular and up-to-date Microsoft Office programs to a good working standard.

It’s ideal for people with entry-level IT skills – with the support of our Course Advisors and by working through the courses, you’ll soon be confident in your new-found IT skills.

The course is also highly practical in nature – not only will you have the knowledge you need, but through a range of practical exercises based on real-life scenarios, you will have the skills and confidence to apply your knowledge in the world of work.

This is a key reason why this course is different to others and why employers respect Pitman Training courses.

On successful completion of the Award, there is also the opportunity to further enhance your learning, progressing to a range of accreditations including City and Guilds and ECDL Advanced, as well as more advanced Microsoft and Excel training.

The course takes around 80 hours – you can start when you like and our flexible learning system means you can fit your studying around your existing work and home commitments.

There will also be a course advisor on hand to help, should you need additional support.

Core subject areas covered include:

• Microsoft Word

• Microsoft Excel

• Microsoft PowerPoint or Microsoft Outlook

On completing the course, you will have earned a highly regarded Pitman Training Award – a ‘mini-diploma’, which will help your CV stand out from the rest. This is because Pitman Training is highly regarded by employers; yet again top business professionals in the UK have voted Pitman Training to be the UK’s top independent training brand, through achieving Business Superbrand status.

This Award can take a little as 4 weeks to complete, although you do have up to 6 months to finish.

Workbooks, course materials and exams are included in the cost.
Tutor support is available to students.

Microsoft Word*

Being confident in Microsoft Word is essential for anyone who either works or aspires to work in an office environment.

Our Word course is designed to provide you with the essentials skills you need to be proficient in Word, in a work environment, in as short a time as possible. You don't need any prior experience of Microsoft Word, but you will need to be familiar with using a computer and the Windows environment. Our training will also assist you in taking the Microsoft Office Specialist test (MOS) exam.

Yours studies will cover the basics - from starting Word, to inputting text, saving documents, page breaks, auto-correct, cut and paste, indenting and bullets, page numbers, the use of tables, WordArt and text boxes, clipart, the use of columns through to applying, creating and modifying styles.

Microsoft Excel*

Microsoft Excel is the world's most popular spreadsheet programme; learning how to use the software with Pitman Training shows that you've taken one of the best Excel courses available.

You don't need any prior experience of Excel but you will need to be familiar with the Windows environment and have some basic keyboard experience.

Our Microsoft Excel course is very flexible - as is the case with all our courses, you will have the freedom to take the Excel lessons at your own pace, based at one of our handy town or city centre locations, with support on hand should you need it.

This Excel course comprises several lessons, which provide a detailed but managable study programme, so you can be confident about your new skills in the workplace. Just some of the areas covered include creating worksheet, formatting text, simple and complex formulas; handling rows and columns, autocomplete, using styles, headers and footers, average, max and min functions and using charts.

*Depending on skill level it may be possible to study the Expert course as an alternative core course.

Microsoft PowerPoint

There are two advantages to our Microsoft PowerPoint training. One is that it’s broken down into twelve easily handled lessons. And the other is that it puts the powerful Pitman Training name on your CV – and that’s something other Microsoft PowerPoint courses just can’t compete with.

The course is wide-ranging covering: running slide shows, planning and designing presentations, applying themes, inserting slides from Word, drawing and resizing shapes, charts and spreadsheets, using flowcharts, viewing and editing comments, transition effects and hyperlinks.

On completion, you will feel confident in using Microsoft PowerPoint and be able to create interesting and creative presentations.

or Microsoft Outlook

Condensing a Microsoft Outlook course into twelve hours is the optimum balance of time taken and information given and that’s just how we deliver our Microsoft Outlook training.

Of all the Microsoft Outlook courses, we’re convinced that this one is the best. In six lessons, we’ll take you through everything you need to go to use Outlook as a work tool, from navigation and views through contacts and appointments to tasks and folders. This is MS Outlook training on a self-study basis, so learning is flexible to suit you.