On Monday, January 15, 2024, Microsoft officially unveiled Copilot for Microsoft 365, extending its availability to all customers. Copilot for Microsoft 365 is a powerful set of tools that help to organize and connect your accounts, data, and online resources, but only for the data that users are allowed to see. For this reason, it is crucial to use permission settings in Microsoft 365 services to control who has access to what content in your organization. Additionally, the implementation of this powerful tool requires careful planning, and strategic deployment, differentiating it from other conventional Office applications.
The tech stack for Microsoft 365 Copilot includes several components that need to be understood and tuned for your specific business needs. The danger of not doing the preparation work could be user frustration and erroneous output.
Before deploying Microsoft 365 Copilot, ensure that your data is organized, secured, and ready for analysis. The tool will find relationships that may not always be timely, correct, or appropriate for the user to have access to.
Microsoft 365 Copilot will find and access data the user has permission to, whether they should or not. Therefore, it’s essential to review and set the correct permissions beforehand.
Microsoft 365 Copilot can also handle key data not stored in your Microsoft 365 tenant, such as SQL databases. However, you’ll need to ensure that these data sources are accessible and correctly configured for use with Copilot.
Microsoft 365 Copilot licensing is currently available on an annual subscription of $360 per user. The user must have a Microsoft 365 commercial plan, such as Microsoft 365 Business Premium or Microsoft 365 E3 or E5 plan. Copilot for Microsoft 365 is not yet available for nonprofit, academic, or government clients.
Before deploying Microsoft 365 Copilot, you’ll need to prepare your environment. This includes setting up the necessary permissions, ensuring that your data is ready, and configuring your tech stack. Systems Engineering can assist with auditing your SharePoint data for integrity and security.
Systems Engineering can help you connect to other data sources besides what's in your Microsoft 365 tenant as well as customize Copilot to be more specific to your business operations.
The introduction of Copilot for Microsoft 365 last week marked Systems Engineering's initial opportunity to engage with this new tool. Currently, we are thoroughly evaluating what is necessary to establish our Copilot practice to ensure our clients can maximize its benefits.
Concurrently, we are in the process of arranging in-person events for the first half of this year to cover broad AI adoption themes, followed by dedicated sessions for Copilot. Additionally, we are organizing webinars and exploring the possibility of Copilot workshops.
Here are some additional resources for you to reference:
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