Unleash your productivity with Microsoft Copilot

What if you had a personal assistant who was always there for you? A work buddy who supports you in your daily tasks. That is exactly what Copilot is.

What is Microsoft Copilot?

Microsoft Copilot, introduced by Microsoft in 2023, is an AI-driven digital assistant designed to support users in accomplishing tasks and activities seamlessly across their devices. It integrates with popular Microsoft 365 applications such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams, providing real-time, smart assistance to boost creativity, productivity, and skill enhancement.

Powered by large language models (LLMs), Copilot employs advanced AI algorithms that leverage deep learning techniques and data sets to understand, summarize, predict, and generate content. This technology allows it to adapt continuously to users' specific needs and work habits, making it an ever-improving assistant. Within Microsoft 365 apps, Copilot delivers relevant content and insights tailored to users' tasks, such as drafting documents, creating summaries, and answering questions—all in the context of the work they’re doing.

Available as a subscription service, it ensures data privacy by keeping all user information securely within their digital environment, without sharing any data with external parties. By applying AI algorithms to internal data, it offers a personalized experience while safeguarding user information. This approach means that users can rely on Copilot’s real-time support to complete tasks more efficiently, with the added assurance that their data remains protected.

What are the versions of Microsoft Copilot?

There are three versions of Microsoft Copilot:

Copilot for Microsoft 365, which requires a subscription. This is designed to assist with work-focused tasks within 365 apps like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. It can also tap into your organisation’s data to answer questions about it conversationally.
Copilot Pro is another subscription version that provides priority access to GPT-4 and GPT-4 Turbo during high traffic times.
A general Microsoft Copilot, which is free and is primarily designed for home users as a tool to help make everyday computing tasks faster and easier.

“We believe Microsoft Copilot will fundamentally transform our relationship with technology and usher in the new era of personal computing”

Satya Nadella CEO, Microsoft

How can Copilot for Microsoft 365 help your organisation?

In the dynamic world of business, staying ahead of the curve is paramount. Microsoft Copilot is a cutting-edge AI assistant designed to enhance business productivity, amplify human creativity, and customize workflows to meet the unique needs of your company. With its integration into Microsoft 365, the AI tool is not just an add-on—it’s a transformative tool that seamlessly integrates with your existing applications to solve complex work tasks efficiently.

It's focused on assisting during the working day and is integrated with all of the core 365 apps: Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, Teams, and more.

Copilot for Microsoft 365 is accessible through a button in the app's ribbon. Click it to open a prompt window and use natural language to assign tasks. Here are some common tasks it can perform:

Writing an article draft in Word
Creating a draft presentation in PowerPoint
Reviewing and identifying trends within datasets in Excel
Summarising emails in Outlook
Taking virtual minutes of meetings in Teams
Taking notes automatically in OneNote

To start using Copilot for Microsoft 365, businesses will need to pay for an add-on license and they’ll also need an existing subscription for E3, E5, Standard, or Premium.

Copilot in Microsoft 365

Copilot is integrated into the Microsoft ecosystem. Across all kinds of apps, including the 365 suite; Word, Teams, OneNote, Excel, Outlook and more. But how does Copilot really help you increase productivity and job satisfaction?

Full Microsoft Copilot Ecosystem

Copilot in Excel

Imagine: you have to process a lot of invoices in Excel. This is a time-consuming and repetitive task that requires a lot of accuracy. With Copilot in Excel you save a lot of time.

How? By setting up an automated workflow.

You start by uploading the invoices to a shared folder. In Excel, Copilot can automatically retrieve the contents of each invoice, such as invoice number, amount, and due date, and place this data in the correct columns in your Excel file.

In addition, your AI assistant can also check whether the invoices match purchase orders, notice possible discrepancies and notify you immediately. This not only saves you time, but also minimizes the chance of errors.

Copilot in Teams

You have regular meetings and taking minutes, assigning tasks, and sending reminders takes up a lot of time. Copilot in Teams ensures that you can focus on your core tasks.

With Copilot in Microsoft Teams, your assistant takes notes in real time during meetings. Copilot listens to the conversations, summarizes the points discussed, and records action items and deadlines. After the meeting, Copilot in Teams automatically generates a summary of the minutes and sends it to all participants.

Copilot can also assign tasks in Microsoft Planner or To Do, and sets reminders so that everyone stays informed of their responsibilities and deadlines. This way, the team doesn't miss anything. Thanks to Copilot, an administrative burden is removed. Now you and your team can fully concentrate on the execution.

Copilot in PowerPoint

Imagine you’re working on a marketing campaign and you’re going to create a presentation for a new product launch. Creating original and visually appealing content takes a lot of time and requires a lot of creativity. Copilot in PowerPoint helps you get started.

How? Start by entering the key points and objectives of your presentation. Copilot will then generate suggestions for the layout, style, and design of your slides, including appropriate images and graphs.

Copilot in PowerPoint also gives you ideas for writing catchy texts and slogans. During the process, you can ask Copilot for inspiration for visuals or to show certain data in a creative way. This helps you discover fresh angles.

With Copilot in PowerPoint, you have a continuous brainstorming session. This helps you tap into your creativity without running into a wall of technical details.

Copilot in Microsoft Project

Imagine you’re a project manager working on a complex project. You want to track its progress, but you also want to learn how to work more efficiently and manage your team better. With Copilot in Microsoft Project and Teams, you can develop your skills in multiple areas.

Project planning: Copilot helps you create a detailed project plan. It supports you in setting up timelines and milestones. By examining your approach in real time, you get immediate feedback - and you learn from it.
Troubleshooting: When problems arise, Copilot suggests solutions based on historical data and analysis. This way, you can solve problems quickly and use difficult situations to sharpen your ability to tackle problems.
Communication: Copilot analyzes the communication within your team. Your AI assistant then makes recommendations for things like clearer task descriptions and more suitable meeting styles. This makes you a better leader.
Feedback: After the project, you will receive a detailed report from Copilot with feedback. What went well and what needs to be improved? You learn from the feedback.

Copilot in Dynamics 365

Microsoft Dynamics 365 Copilot is an innovative product that uses generative AI to automate time-intensive repetitive tasks and boost the creativity and effectiveness of employees across different business areas. It's the first world's copilot to support both CRM and ERP. Here are some of the features of Dynamics 365 Copilot.

Microsoft Copilot video series

Dynamics 365 Finance

Microsoft Copilot in Dynamics 365 Finance automates financial tasks, enhances forecasting, and improves cash flow visibility. It provides AI-driven insights for budgeting and expense management, helping organisations optimise spending and reduce risks. Copilot also streamlines compliance and regulatory reporting, enabling faster, data-informed decisions that strengthen financial health.

Copilot for Finance

Dynamics 365 Supply Chain

Microsoft Copilot in Dynamics 365 Supply Chain enhances demand forecasting, optimises inventory, and provides real-time supply chain visibility. It streamlines supplier management and automates logistics, helping businesses prevent disruptions and reduce costs. Copilot’s AI-driven insights empower proactive, data-driven decisions across the supply chain, boosting efficiency and sustainability.

Supply Chain Copilot On-demand Webinar

Dynamics 365 Field Service

Microsoft Copilot within Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service is designed to help service technicians perform their tasks more efficiently. Copilot for Field Service uses AI and machine learning to provide contextual information, recommendations, and guidance to service technicians while they are working in the field.

This can include displaying troubleshooting guides, providing diagrams, or suggesting spare parts. By integrating Copilot, service technicians can work more efficiently and achieve higher quality of service.

Copilot in Dynamics 365 Field Service

Dynamics 365 Customer Service

Microsoft Copilot for Customer Service is designed to improve customer service across organisations. Copilot uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to provide customer service agents with contextual information, recommendations, and guidance while they handle customer inquiries.

For instance, it can help quickly respond to customer inquiries by retrieving relevant information from customer databases or knowledge bases, to then suggest appropriate solutions.

By integrating Copilot with customer service platforms, customer service teams can work more efficiently while increasing customer satisfaction.

Copilot in Customer Service

Dynamics 365 Sales

Microsoft Copilot for Sales helps sales reps streamline their workflows and increase their sales quotas. Copilot provides contextual information and recommendations throughout the sales process. As well as, seamless integration with platforms such as Microsoft 365, Outlook, and Teams enabling sales teams to work more effectively and achieve better results.

Benefits of Microsoft Copilot

1
Increased Productivity
Microsoft Copilot automates repetitive tasks. This allows you to focus on strategic and creative work. It saves time by having faster access to relevant information. The result? A more efficient work process and faster decision-making.
2
Higher quality of work
It runs on the most advanced AI models and therefore ensures accurate output. By implementing it, human errors are minimized and you can count on consistent quality, which increases the reliability of your end results.
3
User-friendly Integration
Copilot integrates seamlessly with existing Microsoft products. The familiar interface means that the learning curve for new users is low. This allows you to quickly use the functionalities without extensive training.
4
Data-driven Insights
It provides insights based on data analysis and trends, which helps you make informed decisions and determine your strategy. You can immediately apply these insights to improve processes within the company.
5
Better Collaboration
By using Copilot effectively, teams work together more smoothly. Real-time updates of tasks and meetings and the ease of sharing relevant documentation create streamlined communication. This leads to better communication and more job satisfaction.
6
Scalability
The Microsoft tool is scalable and can be adapted to the growing needs of your organization. It always remains relevant and grows with your organisation.

Why use Microsoft Copilot?

Microsoft is widely acknowledged by industry analysts and investors as a leading entity in the AI revolution.

With Microsoft's Copilots and the Azure AI platform, businesses are enabled to automate processes, analyze data, and make informed, data-driven decisions to enhance operational efficiency and profitability.

Microsoft Copilot follows strict security and privacy practices. It includes two-factor authentication and privacy protections, similar to other Microsoft products. Copilot for Security has also earned HITRUST Certification, confirming its high standards of security and compliance. This standard provides customers with confidence in knowing their data and confidential information are secure.

Why choose HSO as your partner?

Our unique combination of technological expertise, 30+ years of experience delivering ERP and CRM enterprise solutions worldwide, and deep industry knowledge allows us to help businesses leverage Copilot to achieve meaningful business outcomes. We help our clients realize the benefits of Copilot and AI, leveraging the latest Microsoft technology. Our team of trusted advisors will guide you to help you navigate your Copilot and AI journey so that you can benefit from increased productivity, better decision-making, and gain a path to competitive success. Find out more about our methodology and how we can help onboard your company.

Why HSO

Next Steps

HSO's Copilot for Microsoft 365 Foundations Programme offers a step-by-step guide to help you fully leverage it, through the four levels of engagement: discover, explore, assess, and deploy.

Our experts will collaborate with you and your workforce, to understand the impact on your business, to identify quick wins and growth opportunities, and to drive AI-driven productivity and maximum results. Start your journey with HSO today.

Microsoft 365 Copilot Foundations Program

Get in touch

First name

Last name

E-mail

Phone optional

Company name optional

Company location

Message

By using this form you agree to the storage and processing of the data you provide, as indicated in our privacy policy. You can unsubscribe from sent messages at any time. Please review our privacy policy for more information on how to unsubscribe, our privacy practices and how we are committed to protecting and respecting your privacy.

This website uses cookies

We, and third parties, use cookies on our website. We use cookies to keep statistics, to save your preferences, but also for marketing purposes (for example, tailoring advertisements). By clicking on 'Settings' you can read more about our cookies and adjust your preferences. By clicking 'Accept all', you agree to the use of all cookies as described in our privacy and cookie policy.