Artificial intelligence is no longer just a trend. It is already built into the Microsoft 365 tools your team uses every day. If your business has Microsoft 365 Business Premium or an enterprise subscription, you may already have access to Microsoft Copilot.
Microsoft Copilot is an AI assistant that helps employees write faster, summarize conversations, analyze data, and generate content across Outlook, Word, Excel, Teams, and other Microsoft 365 apps. It works securely within your Microsoft environment, keeping your company’s data private and compliant.
For small and mid-sized businesses, Copilot is one of the easiest ways to save time without introducing new systems or complexity. In fact, many organizations are already seeing over five hours of time saved per employee each month, simply by letting Copilot handle repetitive or time-consuming tasks.
In this blog, we will explain what Copilot is, how it works, and how your business can use it to improve efficiency and reduce unnecessary admin work.
Microsoft Copilot is an artificial intelligence tool built directly into Microsoft 365 apps like Outlook, Teams, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. It allows users to ask questions, summarize information, create content, and get suggestions using natural language.
Because Copilot is part of the Microsoft ecosystem, it works with the files, messages, and data your team already uses. This makes it more useful in real business workflows compared to public AI tools like ChatGPT.
Just as importantly, Copilot runs securely inside your Microsoft 365 environment. It respects the same compliance rules, identity permissions, and data residency protections already in place for your organization.
To learn more about how Microsoft ensures AI tools stay secure for business, read A Guide to Prepare for Secure AI Adoption with Microsoft Copilot.
Employees are already experimenting with AI on their own, often using tools like ChatGPT or Google Gemini. A recent study found that about 11 percent of all content pasted into public AI tools contains sensitive business data. This includes customer information, financial details, contracts, or internal documentation.
This creates risks around:
Confidential data leakage
Intellectual property loss
Compliance violations
Regulatory or legal exposure
Microsoft Copilot avoids these risks. It gives your team the same productivity boost as public AI tools, but with data privacy and enterprise-grade security. All content stays within your Microsoft 365 tenant, and Copilot only accesses data that each user is already allowed to see.
To understand how AI is shaping cybersecurity for SMBs, see How AI Is Changing the Cybersecurity Landscape.
When used effectively, Copilot helps employees cut down on routine work and focus on more valuable tasks. Here are some of the most common ways businesses are using it today.
Copilot can summarize long conversations in Teams or generate a recap of meetings, even if you were not present. This is helpful for reviewing decisions, catching up quickly, or assigning follow-ups.
Examples:
Summarize the last client meeting and list next steps
Recap a conversation between two coworkers to understand status updates
Extract deadlines and action items from a project discussion
This feature can help reduce meeting fatigue and improve accountability.
Writing and responding to emails can take up a significant part of the workday. Copilot helps by generating drafts, suggesting replies, summarizing long threads, or rewording content more clearly.
Examples:
Draft a follow-up email to a client based on a previous message
Summarize a lengthy email chain into a few key points
Rewrite an email to sound more professional or concise
This can be especially useful for client-facing employees and busy executives.
Instead of starting from scratch, Copilot can help generate a first draft of reports, internal updates, proposals, or PowerPoint decks. It can even pull content from existing files or meeting notes.
Examples:
Create a one-pager introducing your services
Build a five-slide client proposal based on an existing document
Summarize a project plan and turn it into a presentation
This helps standardize messaging and reduces manual formatting work.
In Excel, Copilot makes it easier to interpret and visualize data. Employees can ask simple questions and receive summaries, charts, or calculations in return.
Examples:
What were our best-performing services last quarter
Show a trendline of monthly revenue
Highlight any months where expenses exceeded budget
This allows non-technical users to make data-driven decisions without needing advanced Excel skills.
Copilot helps transform unstructured information into usable formats. If you have a document with rough notes, a meeting transcript, or a brainstorm session, Copilot can turn it into a task list or project outline.
Examples:
Extract a list of follow-up items from meeting notes
Turn a rough idea into a draft proposal
Create a task list from a project discussion
This helps move work forward without wasting time on reformatting.
Copilot can also adjust the tone of a message or translate content into another language. This can improve communication with clients or international partners and ensure the message fits the audience.
Examples:
Rewrite this message to sound more polite
Translate this email into French for our Quebec client
Simplify this paragraph for a non-technical reader
This helps your team communicate more clearly, respectfully, and effectively across different audiences and languages.
To use Microsoft Copilot, your organization needs Microsoft 365 Business Standard, Business Premium, or an eligible enterprise plan with Copilot add-on licenses.
Here’s how to get started:
If you are not sure which Microsoft 365 plan your business is using, contact your IT provider. Copilot Chat is included in all 365 plans but the paid license which embeds CoPilot in your Office software like Outlook, Teams and Word requires additional licensing.
For more information, see Why You Should Upgrade to Microsoft 365 Business Premium.
Start small by assigning Copilot licenses to a group of employees who rely heavily on communication, documentation, or reporting. Monitor how they use it and gather feedback before rolling it out company-wide.
Even though Copilot is easy to use, it helps to show your team how to use prompts, where it works best, and what to expect. Always Beyond can help with customized training for your staff.
Make sure your team knows how to use Copilot responsibly. Encourage them to double-check content, avoid pasting highly sensitive information, and understand where Copilot’s suggestions come from.
If you want to ensure long-term productivity with Copilot and other Microsoft tools, read How to Work Effectively with Your IT Service Provider and Get the Best ROI from Your IT Spend.
Microsoft Copilot offers a secure and user-friendly way for your business to start using AI inside the tools you already rely on. It helps save time, reduce manual work, and support faster decision-making across your organization.
By using Copilot effectively, many businesses are already seeing more than five hours saved per employee per month. This adds up quickly and can lead to better productivity, happier staff, and less reliance on manual processes.
If your business is ready to get started with Copilot or wants help training your team, contact Always Beyond. We will help you unlock the full potential of your Microsoft 365 environment.