Copilot for Microsoft 365 is Microsoft’s much-anticipated AI assistant for work. Designed to transform work processes and boost efficiency in Microsoft 365, our blog lifts the lid on Copilot’s capabilities. You’ll gain insights into how it can assist teams within small and medium-sized businesses with complex tasks, offering intelligent suggestions and adapting to your unique work style.
If you’d like to discuss how your business can harness the potential of Copilot for Microsoft 365, contact us for a free discussion with one of our certified technical consultants.
What is Copilot for M365?
Copilot for M365 is an AI assistant integrated with Microsoft 365 apps such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams. Acting as a helpful companion, this innovative tool understands the documents and messages in your Microsoft 365 tenant, giving assistance in various tasks:
- In Outlook, Copilot can summarise email threads and draft emails for you.
- In Teams, it can provide summaries of chats, meetings, and calls, including phone calls, enabling you to stay informed and ask questions about ongoing discussions.
- In Word, Copilot can assist in drafting content, providing ideas, summarising documents, and executing commands like changing fonts or creating tables.
- In Excel, it can help with data analysis. You can use human language instead of writing formulas yourself.
- In PowerPoint, Copilot can help you create presentations based on prompts or existing documents.
How does Copilot for M365 work?
At the heart of Copilot for M365 lies a sophisticated blend of AI Large Language Models (LMM), Microsoft Graph, Semantic Index and the Copilot Orchestrator.
Copilot works by leveraging Microsoft Graph and Semantic Index to gather relevant information from your tenant, including messages, chats, emails, Teams chats, and documents.
Far more than just a keyword search, the Semantic Index has enhanced search capabilities by identifying related information. This gathered information is then sent to a large language model running in Azure, such as GPT-4, for processing and generating a coherent response to your user’s query.
The large language model operates in a stateless way. Crucially for your business, this means that it doesn’t retain or store information after providing an answer. Further, Copilot ensures your data privacy by only returning information that your users are entitled to access based on configured security settings in Microsoft 365. The Microsoft 365 Copilot orchestrator controls the entire process – from receiving user prompts to sending back the generated answers to the respective Microsoft 365 app where the query originated – as illustrated below:
Licensing
Microsoft Copilot licensing allows users to start with as little as just one licence, with no minimum licence count required.
- Each licence is an annual commit-only option, meaning there is no monthly commit option for Microsoft 365 licences.
- The administrator of the tenant does not need a licence for Microsoft Copilot.
- Users must have a base licence of at least Microsoft 365 Business Standard or higher to be eligible for Microsoft Copilot licensing.
- When a licence is assigned to a user, they gain access to the wealth of Microsoft Copilot’s capabilities
- Licences can be reassigned to different users just like any other 365 licence
Admin considerations
Copilot respects security settings such as security groups in SharePoint, sensitivity labels, and data loss prevention, ensuring that users only have access to information based on their permissions. This means that Copilot makes it easier for users to discover information but does not grant access to content they do not already have permission to view.
The Semantic Index, part of Microsoft search, is automatically included in Business Standard and above licenses. You can configure settings for the Microsoft Copilot business chat function in Bing Edge and Teams, including access to web content and tenant content. Once you assign a user a license, they receive an automated email welcoming them to Microsoft Copilot, and start using it.
Microsoft Copilot Studio
Microsoft Copilot Studio means that your business can create its own, customised, no-code chat bots – from providing simple answers to common questions to resolving issues requiring complex conversations.
Enhancing Microsoft’s Power Virtual Agents, you can build chatbots in a similar way. However, it has the advantage of being able to use generative AI to search and get answers from your chosen sources, whether that’s other public websites or your own SharePoint libraries. What’s more, no developer knowledge is required, empowering organisations of all sizes to quickly build their own Copilots and GPTs.
Enhanced functionality and integration possibilities
You can expand the capabilities of Microsoft Copilot by integrating it with various applications such as Loop, Whiteboard, and OneNote. Additionally, there are plug-ins available to seamlessly connect Copilot with third-party apps, enabling enhanced functionality and integration possibilities.
For instance, a plug-in for Dynamics CRM allows you to instruct Copilot to update records within your CRM system. Moreover, graph connectors enable Copilot to connect to external data sources and index the information, expanding its knowledge base beyond your organisation’s data. These features can be customised using Copilot Studio, creating standalone Copilots for specific tasks or workflows.
To conclude
With seamless integration of large language models with Microsoft applications, Copilot for Microsoft 365 can transform the way your teams work in Microsoft 365. By boosting productivity, enhancing skills, unleashing creativity, and enabling informed decision making, Copilot is fast becoming an indispensable tool in the workplace.
With nineteen enhancements in development as we speak, the Copilot for Microsoft 365 roadmap is dynamic and evolving all the time. If you’re interested in Copilot, we recommend that you buy at least one licence and experiment with it amongst your teams.
What Next?
If you have a potential use case that you’d like to discuss, please contact us for a free discussion with one of our certified technical consultants. We’re a trusted Microsoft Solutions Partner for Data & AI and we’ll be happy to help.
Contact our Microsoft specialists
Phone or email us to find out more – or book a free, no-obligation call with our technical consultants using the contact form.
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