AI, or artificial intelligence, is the ability of machines to perform tasks that normally require a person to do. You could think of AI as a friendly and helpful assistant that can make your life, both work and personal, easier. AI is all around us and it has been for quite some time. From the simplest things such as analysing viewing patterns in your favourite streaming service to tracking movement in grocery stores to optimising product placement and sales. AI can help you find the best deals online, book your travels, order food, listen to music and much more.
Copilot is Microsoft’s response to the AI demand. It’s a suite of different Copilots aimed at different tasks, all powered by Large Language Models (LLMs) and immense compute power that is transforming the way that we work, communicate and create content. It can help us solve complex problems, automate repetitive tasks and increase our output. Copilot can help developers write code more efficiently to reduce errors and explore new possibilities they never thought of.
Copilot can help users increase their productivity across a multitude of services in Microsoft 365. It can create reports in Word based on your input, draft emails, generate presentations in PowerPoint and correlate data in spreadsheets in Excel. It can analyse attack vectors in Defender and assist with handling issues in Dynamics 365. It can help you recap meetings and take down action points in Microsoft Teams and generate images for marketing materials and presentations. The possibilities are endless as it is, more or less, your imagination that sets the limits.
If you want your organisation to make the most of Copilot, you need to prepare for the changes and challenges it brings. I’ve jotted down a few things to consider to get ready:
– Assess
Take the time to identify your needs, strengths, and weaknesses. How can Copilot help you achieve your objectives? How can it address your pain points, leverage your assets and overcome your limitations? What kind of data do we have? Where is it stored? Who has access to it?
– Learn
Educate yourself and your team about the basics of Copilot, how it works, what it can and can’t do. What are the best practices and what should you avoid.
– Prepare
Make sure your data and organisation is prepared for Copilot. Ensure that your users have just enough access to your data and that sensitive information is protected with sensitivity labels. Implement retention policies and retention labels to ensure that Copilot only interacts with relevant and up-to-date information to make sure you get reliable results.
– Experiment!
Go nuts! Play around with Copilot to see how it can help you with your projects. Copilot is your own “co-pilot”, it performs what you ask it to do. Nothing more, nothing less. It’s there to help you with your tasks, not pilot the ship. Practice by slightly changing the prompts to achieve different results. Join communities, read through forums to get new ideas and to learn more. Head over to Microsoft Copilot labs and Microsoft’s adoption to grow your knowledge on prompting.
Implement
Once you have a clear idea of how Copilot works and how it can benefit you and your organisation you can start integrating it into your daily workflow to increase your productivity.
Evaluate
Measure the results of using Copilot and compare it with your expectations. Find what works well and what needs improvement. Adjust your strategies accordingly.
When you are done evaluating Copilot in your organisation, you can decide on how to roll it out and make it available to more users. Start small and then scale out. Not everyone in an organisation has a need for Copilot, but the ones that do will increase their productivity significantly and leave room for growth and new skills that will benefit your business, if you let them. There is a lot of talk about the cost of Copilot, and sure, it is quite a lump of money to add on top of your existing Microsoft 365 licenses but try to look at it this way: ”Can Copilot save you 15-30 minutes a month? ” If so, then it has already paid for itself. Everything on top of that is a win. AI is not the enemy, it’s an assistant and enabler that should be embraced rather than feared.
Me and my colleagues are always eager to get you up and running with the preparations you need to be aware of before implementing Copilot in your organisation. Feel free to reach out.
PATRIK WENNBERG
Senior Microsoft 365 Strategist
patrik.wennberg@nexergroup.com
