Find anyone with a full email inbox and more notifications than they have time to action, and you’ll be familiar with the common problem of digital debt. Digital debt is the constant hum of work data and admin that consumes our lives but isn’t always necessary for the jobs we have to do. It’s damaging because it makes us less productive and less profitable.
Taking it a step further, digital debt is problematic because it preoccupies us with routine everyday tasks, leaving us with very little time to think, breathe or innovate. And if you bear in mind that these three activities are vital ingredients for personal growth and business performance, you’ll realise why we need to do everything we can to accommodate them.
Business leaders are increasingly hearing about the benefits of AI and its potential to boost productivity, but they are hesitant to roll it out straight away. They’re tentative because they don’t know which of the many tools to use, and they don’t know how to deploy it while maintaining strict security and data privacy standards. It can be a catch 22 situation because if they do shy away from using AI, their competitors that are clued up will surpass them in both efficiency and innovation. The answer, then, lies in deploying AI purposefully, with eyes wide open to its potential pitfalls and choosing solutions that garner trust and safety.
Bringing focus back into your day
Microsoft has launched Copilot for Microsoft 365 as a powerful AI assistant that can address digital debt and help to change the way we work – for the better. It is proof that technology in its most intelligent forms can inspire productive, meaningful work, increase efficiency, deliver cost savings and generate new business value.
Copilot integrates generative AI across Microsoft’s suite of productivity applications – weaving it effectively into the employee experience through tools like Teams, Word, Outlook, Excel, and PowerPoint. It goes far beyond simple questions and answers – we’ve seen solutions that have been doing that for years. With Copilot, the technology is smart enough to answer, create or take action. Think of it as a new colleague that amplifies your own capabilities and makes your workday more enjoyable and focused.
For example, Copilot can combine powerful large language models with your work content and context to take on any task. It can help you get more out of meetings by summarising the ones you attend and catching you up on the ones you miss. Meetings become more productive with Copilot’s ability to tell you what outstanding actions there are and if there are any disagreements that need resolving.
It’s not just in meetings where Copilot can lend a helping hand. It can boil down lengthy email chains into short outlines that bring you up to speed quickly – particularly useful if you’ve been added to an ongoing email conversation and you need the background information fast. It can even draft suggested replies to emails too. Add to that the capability to strengthen your writing by drafting, editing and summarising your copy, and you have a well-rounded tool that can help you achieve more.
Context is key
“Words are never good or bad on their own, context makes them so,” says neuroscientist and author Abhijit Naskar. Context is the difference maker in everything we do, which is why having the ability to understand context is a vital part of the success of AI. The more you work with Copilot, the more it understands you, your job, your priorities and your organisation. As such, it can give a personalised response and unique outputs that reflect your needs and those of your business. It removes the step of having to give specific prompts because it already knows who you are.
Being aware of context is also a benefit when it comes to security. If some businesses are reluctant to deploy AI because they are worried about the risk it could introduce, Copilot offers reassurance. Copilot is fully integrated into the Microsoft 365 apps that many businesses already use. Consequently, it inherits the security, compliance and privacy policies you already have set up in Microsoft 365.
AI in action
Keen to see the real-world results from people using Copilot, Microsoft spoke to early users of the technology. It found they were 29 per cent faster overall when completing three tasks (searching, writing and summarising), and 27 per cent faster when pulling together information from multiple sources. Once they’d tried it, 77 per cent of users didn’t want to give up access – showing they were able to quickly incorporate it into their workflow and find it a fundamental part of their work.
People are already seeing the value of transforming their work with AI, and the numbers will only grow as more companies use Copilot. Now that it’s available to businesses of all sizes, as well as individuals, we’ll continue to see more use cases and examples of how people have become more productive, creative and focused with Copilot.
The rise of AI presents a transformative opportunity for businesses grappling with the burdensome digital debt that undermines productivity and innovation. Microsoft’s Copilot for Microsoft 365 stands as a testament to the potential of AI to revolutionise work practices, offering a powerful assistant capable of alleviating routine tasks, enhancing efficiency and preserving security.
With its ability to understand context and integrate seamlessly into existing workflows, Copilot has already demonstrated significant time savings and user satisfaction. As more companies embrace AI tools like Copilot, we can anticipate a widespread shift towards more productive work environments, paving the way for a new era of work driven by intelligent technology.
Learn how Copilot for Microsoft 365 can support you, every day.
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