Microsoft Dictate

NB: this article was originally posted in Summer/Autumn 2022.

Friday Finds are my attempt to bring cool discoveries to my readers. Most of them, I expect, will be online or tech-driven tools designed to help make our lives easier.

However, I might stray and go old school, from time-to-time 😊

It’s unlikely every Friday Find will be a new discovery for all my connections. I’m expecting a range of impact types from:

• Yes, yes Richard. I knew about xxxx already, to
• Ooh. Thank you Richard. I have come across xxx but had forgotten about it. Thank you for the reminder and
• Oh my word, Richard. I didn’t know xxx existed. I shall start using it all the time!

This week’s Friday Find is the Dictate function in Microsoft Office 365.

I’ve found this a very useful way to get thoughts down on screen.

Speak your ideas #

If you have a seed of an idea for an article or post, open up a blank email message in Outlook or Word, press the microphone icon (top right) in the application’s task bar and speak away.

OK, so the text you are left with will probably need heavily editing and adding to but; at least you’ll have a framework of a piece of text to work from.

Dictated text can be structured. Simply by saying “new sentence” or “new paragraph.” This helps enormously with the editing process.

There are subscription-based dictation services available. Rev is one where dictated speech notes are emailed to be converted into a document by a third party but there is always going to be a delay in turnaround time.

With the Office Dictate function, at least your idea is ready to be worked on right away.

The added bonus is Office Dictate is available free to subscribers to Office 365.

I hope my Finds are of benefit to you. More will be coming along in future weeks.

Thank you for reading.