With AI infiltrating every facet of the tech space, Copilot is no longer a buzzword but a game-changer for businesses of all sizes. We sat down with Peter Graham, a Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro, to get his unfiltered take on this NextGen AI solution. From the incredible benefits to the most common challenges, he gives us a comprehensive look at the tool all while sharing top tips for any AI user.

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Reading Time: 7 minutes

Points of Discussion:

• Beyond Expectations: Delivering on the Promise
• Copilot’s Hidden Gems: Beyond the Basics
• Navigating Copilot Integration Challenges
• Copilot: The Future of Work, Today
• The AI Revolution is Here

Peter did not disappoint when we asked him for his honest opinion of Microsoft Copilot. We unpacked the good, the bad, and the mind-blowing to understand the full potential and limitations of this productivity powerhouse. In addition to being a seasoned user, Peter has a deep understanding of Copilot’s integration and adoption challenges – and more importantly, how to navigate them (spoiler alert: Copilot adoption training is heavily involved).

Beyond Expectations: Delivering on the Promise

Q: In your experience with Microsoft Copilot how has it lived up to its initial promise as a productivity tool?

Peter Graham (PG): Copilot has absolutely lived up to its promise and then some. Many people have asked Copilot to do a task that they’ve manually done for years and in some cases, it does the task even better than they did.

The biggest way Copilot has lived up to its promise is the speed at which it works. For example, the ordinary person would need to block out a morning in their calendar to create a PowerPoint presentation based on a meeting they’ve just had. Whereas Copilot can generate it in 60 seconds or less. This leaves you with a lot of extra time to customise it further and get some practice in.

In terms of integration, I’m yet to see customers integrating it into systems outside of Microsoft, but everyone – including Copilot Studio – is talking about it. So, I’d say we’re a few months away from seeing people integrate Copilot with Salesforce, on-premises file servers and the like.

Copilot’s Hidden Gems: Beyond the Basics

Q: Which Copilot features have made the biggest positive impact?

PG: Outlook is one of the most popular ones that people use because Word is not used as much as we think it is. Most people are creating and delivering presentations or working with data in Excel, but everyone uses email. Outlook is an integral part of IT services for businesses: it’s where you start and live in your day, as well as how businesses communicate – which is why that is typically where people are using Copilot the most.

I suspect that with those of us just coming out of summer in the UK, more people are using it because of the number of emails that you’ve received from having a bit of time off. People are saying, ‘Hey, Copilot, can you summarise the 300 emails I’ve got here? What do I need to do?’

Q: Do you personally use Copilot in Outlook?

PG: Yes, but it’s crucial to be intentional about how you speak to it

“Speak to Copilot like you’re speaking to a young child who is eager to help.” – Peter Graham, Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro

This is exactly how I interact with Copilot in Outlook: I’m very specific about what I want it to look for. There have been occasions where I’ve been a bit vague and it has not returned anything closely related to what I was looking for, and sometimes it’s been right on the money.

“You need to close Copilot down when you’re not using it, so that every time you open it up, it’s a brand-new memory and interaction.” – Peter Graham, Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro

On another note, I’ve noticed that a lot of people leave the Copilot sidebar open and never close it. When you leave the sidebar open all the time, Copilot never has a chance to refresh – this leads to AI fatigue.

If you continuously ask Copilot for help with multiple unrelated tasks without ever closing the sidebar, it will always think that the prompts you input are related and that you’re expanding on something that you’ve asked for earlier. This is sometimes why it cannot find things you’re looking for in Outlook.

Q: Have there been any surprising “wow” moments where Copilot’s capabilities impressed you?

PG: The first standout feature was when I was with Rhys Williams – Product Marketing Director at Babble – at a Microsoft consultancy session on Copilot adoption:

The trainer decided to record a call with him and I. Upon his request to ask him anything, I asked the trainer why Microsoft licencing is so complicated particularly due to changing the name of a product every month. This made a few people laugh. He stopped the recording and asked Copilot to summarise the meeting from the transcript. To our surprise, one of the meeting notes it generated was: Peter jokingly made a comment about how Microsoft changes its product names too often.

That was a “wow” moment for me because when it comes to using Copilot in Teams or in a call recording, it can understand the sentiment based on the tone or the interaction that the people are having in that call.

“Copilot was able to understand if there was a secondary or hidden meaning to the conversation. I thought that was incredible.” – Peter Graham, Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro

Navigating Copilot Integration Challenges

Q: How has the integration of Copilot with existing Microsoft 365 workflows been?

PG: The first thing that comes to mind is transcription. When recording a call, you need to turn transcription on so that Copilot can review what was said and generate meeting notes. The challenge arises when some companies don’t want all users to be able to transcribe calls. In these cases, more policies need to be created to segregate users and departments into what you want them to automatically do or request to do in a meeting.

“When recording calls, be aware that everyone in attendance from the organisation will have access to the recording and transcription.” – Peter Graham, Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro

If you’re a guest participating in a meeting that’s hosted by somebody from a different organisation, you cannot use your Copilot to reference after the meeting. As someone outside of the organisation, you can only use your Copilot during the meeting because it’s not in your tenant. As a Microsoft solutions provider, we’ve asked them if this is going to be permanent and we’re hoping that there will be future B2B collaboration features that will enable external users to still have access post-meeting.

Copilot: The Future of Work, Today

Q: Given your experience with Copilot, would you recommend it to other users? Why or why not?

PG: Absolutely. I would 100% recommend it only from the time-saving element. We all lose a lot of time procrastinating, doing chores in between meetings when working remotely, or catching up with a colleague who’s just come back from holiday. As we interact with more people, we work with more data and collaboration tools. Sometimes a lot of time is spent waiting for someone to get back to you. Now, you can leverage AI to shrink that feedback loop and get tasks done faster – while importantly maintaining efficiency.

“Every single role in a business has a use for Copilot, even though each department will use it differently. The best way to adopt Copilot would be to test it out in different departments before purchasing licenses for everyone in the organisation.” – Peter Graham, Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro

There’s one critical area that I think Microsoft doesn’t shout enough about: Copilot is a game-changer for people with dyslexia. It has a ‘coaching’ option that reviews what you’ve written and gives suggestions on how you can improve it, or it will give you the sentiment of how it understands it. For example, in addition to flagging spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, it will tell you if your email draft comes across as aggressive and will make suggestions on how you can soften your tone.

Q: Out of 5, what rating would you give Copilot?

PG: A solid 4 stars. The reason why I wouldn’t give it five is because we’re still in its infancy. There are still going to be teething issues in terms of user interaction and complete understanding. I’m still learning about Copilot myself.

“Generative AI is never going to be perfect, but Copilot has definitely wowed us in its delivery since its launch.” – Peter Graham, Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro

I appreciate the fact that Copilot references the sources it gets its information from, which is critical in preventing plagiarism and is very important for an organisation and content creators especially. Another unique GenAI offering when it comes to the search feature is its ability to search within your data. In some cases, people forget about the vast information that already sits within their organisation and go to Bing or Google unnecessarily.

“Copilot is not going to do your job for you. It’s going to get 80% of your task done immediately and the last 20% is you polishing it.” – Peter Graham, Partner Development Manager at Ingram Micro

The AI Revolution is Here

The future of work is here, and it’s AI-powered. Copilot offers a first step towards this future – promising increased efficiency, reduced workload and innovative solutions. But remember, the key to unlocking its full potential lies in understanding its limitations, navigating its integration challenges, and embracing the art of effective prompting.

Be sure to read the next blog to get your business Copilot ready. You can expect to get some top tips from Peter that will help you successfully mitigate the common Copilot adoption and implementation challenges.

Download our Copilot business case template to get the funding you need to revolutionise your workflow and embark on your AI-powered journey.