There are some good reasons to keep your entire company on the same version of Office, but file compatibility generally shouldn’t be one of them. It’s true that Office 2007 has a new file format. Office 2007 files are now XML-based, which means that they are more open, more accessible, and smaller that the older binary-based files. In fact, Office 2007 files can be as mush as 50% smaller than Office 2003 files, which makes them easier to store, backup and transfer between machines than the older Office files were. But Microsoft makes available free file converters that you can install on your Office 2003 machines, which enable them to seamlessly read and write the new format. That way, you can create documents with Office 2007 and still read and edit them with Office 2003 if you need to.

That said, there are some other things to be aware of before your move to Office 2007. First is that it has an entirely new user interface, which may cause your users some pause if they haven’t seen it before. The old commands you’re used to are not in the same places. The look and feel of the programs is different and that may require some training to help your users get comfortable.

Also, while it’s a misconception that Office 2007 requires Vista, it does require at least Windows XP with Service Pack 2 and also a machine with at least one gigabyte of free hard drive space. I still see Windows 2000 (and sometimes older) machines in production, so I know that many of you have machines that aren’t going to be capable of running Office 2007. So you may have to incur some additional costs to upgrade your machines to even being running Office 2007.

However, like I mentioned, the Office 2007 File Converters are available via free download from Microsoft by visiting Microsoft.com and searching for “Office 2007 File Converters.”

So while there may be several prohibitive reasons – support, training, cost, machines that aren’t ready to support it – for not upgrading to Microsoft Office 2007, don’t be scared off from it due to file formats. Office 2007 is a pretty big advance over previous versions and it’s definitely worth a look.