It is too time consuming and sometimes extremely difficult to search
exclusively for contact names when emailing multiple people or creating a
distribution list. After selecting 5 or 6 contacts in your contact list, you
should get the option when you right click to "send email" or "create new
distribution list".

That option is in all versions of Outlook. Choose either Actions | New Message to Contacts or Tools | Mail Merge.

Either that or make it possible to search for contacts by company name or
even last name. I find that by putting a suffix such as P.E. or M.D. at the
end of a peron's name, I have to search for them by placing the suffix before
their first name! Crazy.

Search where?

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.turtleflock.com/olconfig/index.htm
and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers
http://www.outlookcode.com/jumpstart.aspx