Microsoft Office UI, to match Windows 11, now rolling out for everyone

Microsoft Office UI has started to roll out for its users this week. The visual update was originally announced earlier this year and went into testing over the summer. Now it's starting to roll out to all Office 365 and Office 2021 users, according to The Verge. This new Office UI is designed to match the visual changes in Windows 11, and it includes a more rounded look to the Office ribbon bar, with some subtle tweaks to the buttons throughout Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook.

It's a relatively simple refresh, and Office will now match the dark or light theme that you set inside Windows. The new-look can be toggled on or off using the Coming Soon megaphone icon in the top right-hand corner of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or OneNote.

It should be available for all Windows 11 users right now, and Microsoft says 50 per cent of current channel subscribers will have the visual update enabled automatically.

Most of the design changes are subtle, but Microsoft has teased more dramatic changes to its Office UI, which included moving toward more of a command bar instead of the traditional ribbon interface.

As per The Verge, it's still expected to see these changes appear in the web and mobile versions of Office first, and Microsoft did say last year that its bigger Office UI changes could take a year or two to roll out. 

Microsoft shareholders back proposal seeking report on harassment

(Reuters) - Microsoft Corp said on Tuesday its shareholders had approved a proposal by Arjuna Capital, which sought a report from the software firm on the effectiveness of its policies to battle sexual harassment in the workplace.

About 80% of the votes that were cast at the company's annual meeting were in favor of producing such a report, Microsoft said in a filing.

Arjuna Capital is a Boston-based investment adviser and frequent filer of shareholder resolutions pressing companies for changes like disclosing more data on pay equity.

Microsoft already internally shares annual data on the volume of sexual harassment concerns raised and the results of the investigations into them. It has now adopted plans to make that data public.

The vote comes as big mutual fund firms increasingly support investor challenges to companies on environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues and as employees of big tech firms stage walk outs protesting their tackling of sexual harassment claims.

Automaker Tesla Inc last month said that support for a shareholder resolution on how it handles arbitration to resolve workplace complaints of harassment and discrimination rose to 46% of votes cast at its annual meeting, up from 27% for a similar proposal in 2020.