Microsoft Office AI’s tool, known as Copilot, is an advanced, generative AI tool designed to streamline business processes. From creating emails to summarizing team meetings or analyzing data, Copilot can be used within Microsoft Office applications. Users can automate repetitive tasks, make data-driven decisions, and improve the customer experience all with one tool.
Following best practices will ensure that company data and compliance remain safe in all processes. Though the basic features of Copilot are set in stone, the details are consistently evolving. Upgrades to Copilot Pro will cater to businesses’ different needs, providing a flexible solution that enhances productivity and efficiency.
Continue reading to learn about Copilot and how your business can easily integrate it to simplify workflows.
What is Copilot?
Microsoft Copilot is a generative AI tool that can assist with tasks like generating text, drafting emails, summarizing meetings, creating images, and more when given a prompt from a user. The tool then creates answers to your query, offering comprehensive results and explanations. As with any AI tool, there are best practices to ensure you get accurate results.
AI best practices
AI tools, like Copilot, have proven to enhance efficiency, help businesses make informed decisions, and improve the customer experience. Take these steps to ensure your organization is using AI in a safe, trustworthy, and ethical manner.
Review site permissions
Copilot is only able to use information that the user has access to. The trouble comes when users have access to information they shouldn’t or may not even know they have access to.
Before integrating Copilot into your daily operations, be sure to review each user’s permissions to limit Copilot’s access to sensitive information and data. Labeling information can also be useful to keep track of the data that Copilot can and cannot use and what permissions are currently in place.
These labels will show up when Copilot generates responses so the user can track if the information in the response uses data that the tool should be able to access. Without the permissions in place, Copilot may use sensitive data to generate responses, potentially revealing insights into that data or information.
Clean up data
Copilot generates responses with data and information found on the user’s system. Now, it can create answers using file uploads, images, diagrams, and more. That being said, cleaning out the data on your system is essential to ensure the tool can give updated and accurate responses. If the data is outdated or no longer relevant, Copilot may generate responses that are also outdated and irrelevant.
Start by cleaning out old files, removing duplicates, archiving information, and updating restrictions. Once all the data is updated, Copilot can use it to generate suitable responses.
Enable transcription capabilities
Copilot can be used during video meetings and voice calls to help take notes and summarize what was said. This helpful tool tracks important points during a meeting or call and allows users to see who said what, where people agreed or disagreed, recommend follow-up tasks based on the conversation, and more in real-time.
Be sure to enable transcription for video meetings and voice calls to allow Copilot to generate these notes.
Disable Copilot extensibility
Disabling Copilot extensibility or blocking apps that use plugins can prevent data from leaving the organization’s M365 service boundary.
Data can exit the service boundary if:
- You use plugins for M365
- You use web content plugins
Web content plugins are a first-party solution that uses Bing’s Search API. Copilot can determine if the web content will help generate a more accurate answer to the user’s prompt. It does this by sending a new search query to the Bing Search API that is completely disassociated with the user ID and tenant ID. Once it has more information on the query, it can generate an answer to the user’s original question with information gathered from the Bing Search API.
If web content plugins are blocked it may negatively affect the answers that Copilot is able to generate. That being said, it’s important to assess if your organization is comfortable with the transaction between Copilot and Bing Search API. Once determined, you can choose to block or allow web content plugins.
Audit interactions
Many companies fear that Copilot can be used with malicious intent. However, there are ways to prevent this. First, check the security, compliance, privacy, and responsibility controls in Copilot. Organizing and enabling these controls will help prevent most attempts at malicious activity.
Copilot communication compliance allows you to create a policy that detects Copilot interactions like keywords, sensitive information types, content safety classifiers, and more. When a prompt or search is entered into an app that uses Copilot to match a compliance policy, it will be flagged as a match.
This will show details like who the message’s sender is, what app this match is coming from, the recipients of the message, and the text that caused the policy match.
To investigate interactions on Copilot, you are required to have one of the following titles:
- Communication compliance
- Communication compliance investigator
- Communication compliance analyst
Taking these measures to audit and monitor interactions will reduce the chance of malicious activity. If a user is violating compliance policies, you will be able to quickly track who the user is and what they are doing to create a match.
Create effective prompts to enhance results
Once all the security measures are in place, it’s time to start using Copilot to generate effective responses. This can only be done if the AI tool understands the intent and context of each prompt. The quality of the input will directly affect the quality of the output. Taking time to give Copilot details of what you are looking for will lead to accurate, relevant, and useful results.
When making a prompt, include the following details:
- Goals
- Context
- Expectations
- Data sources
If the result of your query is still not what you expected or needed from Copilot, try following up with another prompt. Treat this as a conversation, giving more detail or clarification when needed to allow the tool to provide helpful results.
Validate information
With any AI tool, it’s imperative to fact-check the information it gives you. AI tools, though helpful, are not always 100% accurate the first time they generate an answer. Checking the results will help you avoid mistakes or misinformation. You can check the accuracy in a couple of ways. If the response includes citations, click on each and read through the information to ensure it is true and accurate.
You can also prompt Copilot to “validate further” to give it a chance to tell you where it got the information. As we said above, interacting with Copilot as if it is a conversation and asking questions about where the answer came from will help streamline the process and give you correct and reliable information.
Copilot download explained
Copilot is simple to download and use within applications that your team is already familiar with. It integrates directly into other Microsoft Office programs such as Excel, Word, and PowerPoint. To access Copilot, it must be downloaded from each respective application.
Follow these steps to implement Copilot.
- Check that you have a valid Microsoft 365 subscription with the most recent versions of the Microsoft Office suite installed on your device.
- Launch the specific application you would like to use (Word, Excel, PowerPoint).
- Find the Copilot icon in the application’s ribbon menu. This location may change depending on the app’s version and interface.
- Click the icon to activate the Copilot assistance.
After completing these steps, you should be able to use all of Copilot’s capabilities.
Copilot Pro costs and features
Although Copilot offers a free version, Copilot Pro has been shown to generate faster results with advanced features for a small monthly cost. In total, there are five versions of Copilot Pro available, each one offering different services tailored to your needs.
- Individual and small businesses: For $20 per month, with the first month free, you will get fast results and full integration into all Office 365 applications.
- Business and Enterprise: This upgrade allows businesses and enterprise users to get results and suggestions based on their company data. For $30 per month, Copilot will write and summarize text based on the team information and create visual branding for your company. It also keeps interactions private and does not use the input information to train versions of Copilot.
- Copilot for Sales: Copilot will generate sales meeting briefs and emails to clients and integrate into your working CRM data.
- Copilot for Service: This version focuses on improving customer service and efficiency by using company and customer data.
- Copilot Studio: At $200 a month, you can program versions of Copilot that use custom data to generate predictable responses within a conversation.
Depending on the business’s priorities, Copilot has a version that will meet your needs. This tool will improve efficiency, enhance the customer experience, and keep your team organized.
Copilot technical support services
Implementing Microsoft Copilot into your business can substantially improve productivity, efficiency, and customer satisfaction. Following best practices like cleaning out data, auditing interactions, and managing permissions will uphold security or compliance standards.
Successful integration and continuous support are essential for optimizing the benefits of a tool like Copilot. Applied Tech can assist with seamless implementation, offering IT support and handling any issues that may arise. From the initial set-up process to regular maintenance, Applied Tech will make sure Copilot is working within your systems so your team can continue to focus on reaching business goals.
About Applied Tech
Applied Tech is a leading IT and cybersecurity services provider dedicated to helping businesses protect their digital assets. Our proactive and strategic services include cloud management, security, productivity, and IT growth strategy. With a team of experienced professionals, we provide unique solutions tailored to your IT needs.
Protect your business with Applied Tech’s fully managed IT services, co-managed support, and security assistance. With IT services focused on your business goals, keep your team productive and your data secure.
