Microsoft has been going all in on AI, whether it's pumping money into its own infrastructure or teaming up with companies like OpenAI. All of this effort is starting to pay off, as we now have Copilot, which runs on OpenAI's GPT-4. The AI model is baked into almost every Microsoft product, including integration with the Office suite and even keyboard integration (the Copilot Key) on some of its new laptops. Copilot fits right into platforms like Excel, Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, and Teams, and it’s not just for show. There are various tasks Copilot can take over for you in these Microsoft apps, which we'll discuss below.

6 Meeting management

Copilot makes it easy to keep track of your meetings. Ask it about your daily or weekly schedule, and it’ll check your Outlook Calendar to give you a rundown of your upcoming meetings, including the times and who’s attending. It also includes links to the meetings, so you can click straight to the details in your Calendar. You can also ask Copilot to find free slots for scheduling a meeting with your colleagues at the best times. It’ll hunt down available openings for you. Plus, the AI can help send out reminders and follow-up emails.

5 Monitor all conversations and activities on Teams

Teams is where most of the important discussions happen, especially when you’re working remotely or cross-functionally. However, keeping track of everything your team is discussing can be tough if you have a large team or happen to be on vacation. This is where Copilot steps in. You can ask the AI assistant to recap conversation topics with colleagues, and it can also answer specific questions about the conversation. You can use prompts like, “What did John say about the upcoming project deadline?”

Beyond text conversations, Copilot can also help recap verbal discussions in Teams meetings, by taking notes and keeping track of key topics and action items.

4 Email writing and organization

Composing an email can be time-consuming, and usually not fun at all, but it may be necessary to support the work you do. On top of that, email is arguably one of the most negatively perceived forms of communication, so you must ensure your message is communicated clearly. You can use Copilot to compose an email directly in Outlook and personalize it for tone and length. Make sure to double-check all responses, though, and edit the suggested text accordingly. Copilot is good, but there’s no substitute for human judgment. You’ll need to ensure the messaging is correct and that the AI model isn’t making up facts.

Additionally, you can use Copilot to summarize large blocks of text and even translate content.

3 Content creation and curation

Writing content is hard, whether you’re crafting a brief for a project, developing documentation, or creating social media posts and blog articles. Copilot can accelerate content creation in Microsoft Word by suggesting topics, drafting outlines, and generating catchy headlines.

It can even assist with curating relevant content from various sources, streamlining and speeding up content creation workflows across business lines. Plus, it can help you edit the content you’ve written by fixing grammatical mistakes, improving the flow, changing the tone, or adding extra context.

2 Automate Excel tasks

Microsoft Excel is the go-to app for a lot of corporate number crunching, but even regular users might not realize just how much the program can actually do. Copilot can make it much easier for you to use Excel. It can assist with building formulas, creating pivot tables, and applying conditional formatting to highlight important data. Instead of manually converting databases into tables and setting up pivot tables, you can now obtain insights and charts in Excel just by typing a simple prompt.

For instance, if you have a spreadsheet of sales data, you can ask Copilot, “How many units did Jim sell this year?” and it will automatically generate a pivot table with the answer. Or, you can ask for more detailed info, such as “Which month did Jim sell the most units?” and Copilot will deliver the relevant data.

Beyond just crunching numbers, Copilot can suggest formulas, letting you add them with a single click. You can also use Copilot to highlight data quickly or generate charts in real time by selecting the relevant columns and using the Copilot shortcut to skip the tedious steps.

1 Remove the hassle from PowerPoint

Microsoft has tightly integrated its Copilot and Designer AI tools into PowerPoint, making it super easy to speed up the presentation creation process. You can even build an entire presentation using just these tools. Copilot generates talking points, which you can tweak by deleting sections, rearranging via the six-dot menu, or giving feedback. Once you're good with the content, you can click to turn it into actual presentation slides.

Copilot also adds lively images and animations throughout the deck to keep things engaging. Plus, it includes speaker notes for each slide to help you during your presentation. If you want to make adjustments or add new images, you can use text prompts to create them.

Copilot can lighten your workload

Microsoft Office apps are a big part of any workspace, and most of us spend hours working with these tools, whether it's sending emails, attending meetings, or collaborating with teammates. Copilot can automate many of these tasks, saving you valuable time. The AI assistant is always evolving, and we hope you learn how to make the most of it.