April 16, 2025 • 8 mins
Take control of your workday—summarize long emails instantly, turn meeting transcripts into actionable plans, and build strategic documents in seconds using your own data with Microsoft 365 Copilot. Instead of chasing down context, ask natural prompts and get clear, detailed results complete with tone-matched writing, visual recaps, and real-time collaboration.
Get up to speed on complex email threads, transform insights from missed meetings into next steps, and pull relevant content from across your calendar, inbox, and docs—all without switching tools or losing momentum. Mary Pasch, Microsoft 365 Principal PM, shows how whether you're refining a plan in Word, responding in Outlook, or catching up in Teams, Copilot works behind the scenes to help you move faster and focus on what matters.
► QUICK LINKS:
00:00 - How to put Copilot to work for you
01:09 - Use Copilot in Outlook to summarize email threads
01:57 - Use chain-of-thought reasoning with Researcher
03:55 - Reference your content & meeting recap
05:29 - Use Copilot in Word to build on existing content
06:56 - Use Copilot in Microsoft Teams when late to a meeting
07:52 - Wrap up
► Link References
Check out the free Copilot Academy at https://aka.ms/copilotacademy
► Unfamiliar with Microsoft Mechanics?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
If you have Microsoft 365
Copilot in your organization today,
I'm going to walk you
through the top five power user tips,
and the lesser known waysin which you can really
put Copilot to work foryou, saving you time.
We'll go beyond the richMicrosoft 365 Copilot
chat experience that's available
to every Microsoft 365 user,
where you might be uploading information
(00:23):
to inform generated responses.
And I'll focus on what you can do
with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license,
which lights up experienceswithin your familiar
Office apps,
automatically connecting yourwork data in Microsoft 365
to help you in context as you work.
I'm going to start in Outlook,
because who doesn't needhelp with their inbox?
(00:43):
You might already be usingMicrosoft 365 Copilot
in Outlook to help write andquickly respond to emails,
or to get help rewritingyour existing drafts
with auto rewrite,
or by using your own detailed instructions
to get it just right.
And if you haven't alreadytried Copilot in Outlook,
prompt suggestions for thethings you can do in Outlook
(01:03):
are built in for you to get started.
These are all time-savers thatare core to the experience,
but have you ever triedusing Microsoft 365 Copilot
to help you get up to speedon a long email thread?
Well, here, I've beenadded to an email thread,
and I don't necessarilyhave all the context.
As I scroll this super longemail with multiple people,
(01:24):
there's too much to take in,
and it would take a lot ofeffort for me to parse it,
and this is where Copilotin Outlook can help.
By clicking on Summary by Copilot,
the entire email thread is processed,
and I'm left with a quick summary
of the main points from the thread,
including key actions specific to me.
It's boiled down about 10 pages of emails
(01:45):
into these four bullets.
It looks like my teamneeds my help researching
a potential fit for newoutdoor and adventure goods
with our current electronics products,
and I have less than a weekto pull everything together.
This normally would bea time-consuming effort,
but this brings me to mysecond power user tip.
I can now use AI withchain-of-thought reasoning
(02:05):
to gather information and work with me
to create a new product strategy doc.
From the Microsoft 365 Copilot app,
I'll use a new agent called Researcher.
I'll ask Researcher todevelop a product strategy
to enter a new market foroutdoor and adventure goods.
After I enter my prompt,Researcher goes to work.
You can see that as partof its first response,
(02:27):
it's paused, and this time,
it's asking me clarifying questions
about both the scope and formatof what I want it to write.
So I'll respond with key details
to answer both of its questions,
then it uses my response to move forward.
It takes my prompts, understands the task,
and starts to build a plan that it'll use
to author a detailed report,and I can follow along.
(02:48):
It's reasoning over information
that I have permission toaccess from internal locations.
As it works, I can take alook at its reasoning process
in real time.
It tells me what it's doing.
It's identifying ourexisting business lines,
clarifying our product categories,
analyzing the potentialfit for outdoor products,
looking for relevant meetingsthat I've been invited to
(03:10):
to analyze the transcripts,
and even researches industrytrends from the web.
What I love about this agentis that it's actually doing
the research to create what I need.
So let's jump ahead to that final result.
On the right, you cansee that it's delivered
a thorough response with afully-documented product strategy
in line with what I'dexpect from an expert.
(03:31):
Starting with an analysisof my existing business,
it's also analyzed the outdoorand adventure gear sector.
Then it's built insights basedon our existing business,
and how it intersectswith outdoor products.
It's added strategic positioning,
and a detailed go-to-market plan.
So I've saved a ton of time,
and now, I have a solid,well-researched draft
(03:52):
that I can build on with my team.
Next, because my teamuses Word to build out
these types of plans,
I brought everything over to a new doc,
and in Word, there are two power user tips
for building on existingcontent using Copilot
that I'll show you.
First, you can pull upCopilot on any blank line
using the Copilot icon or theAlt + I keyboard shortcut.
(04:15):
Beyond what's here, I know that my team
just brainstormed ideasabout in-store experiences
during a Teams meeting,
and I want to use those details directly
from the meeting recapto add that to our plan.
With Copilot, I can do that by using
the Reference Your Content button.
In the Meetings tab, I'lllocate the meeting I want,
this one, for location planning,
(04:36):
which uses the sameCopilot-generated content
for meeting recaps in Teams.
I'll pause a second before Icomplete this prompt in Word
to show you the meeting recap first,
and give you some context on that meeting.
For any transcribed meeting,I can find the recap
by going back to theoriginal meeting invite
from my calendar, thenclicking on the Recap tab.
(04:58):
These are AI-generated, andcapture what was discussed
in meetings that you were in,meetings you were late to,
or meetings that you wereinvited to but couldn't attend.
For example, I missed this meeting,
and without anyone taking notes,
from AI notes, I can see they discussed
placing outdoor productsin our retail stores
and creating connectedoutdoor display in our store.
(05:19):
There are five citieslisted here in Washington
and Oregon to launch them.
If I go to the Mentions tab,
you can see that I was even mentioned
33 minutes into the meeting.
So with that context, I'mgoing to go back to Word
and finish writing my prompt.
I'll ask Copilot to add a paragraph
for creating in-store displaysdiscussed in the meeting,
with a few additional instructions,
(05:41):
and it's taken thedetails from the meeting
and adding it to our plan.
And you can see those five store locations
that we saw before in the meeting recap,
and in seconds, we'vetransformed the actions
from a spoken Teams meetingto add to our written plan.
It didn't just insert theparagraph to the rest of the doc,
it's actually matchedthe tone and altitude
of the rest of our plan, soit doesn't feel out of place.
(06:04):
And now, everyone's workingtogether on this document.
I can see Adele and Daichi are here.
In fact, as I scroll down,
there's also a comment from Daichi
to add details about our outdoor products
that we're already working onto release later this year.
For this power usertip, I'll open Copilot,
and use a forward slash and start typing.
Then choose the email from Daichi,
(06:26):
and complete my promptto add those details.
Now, we have details aboutthe outdoors electronics
we'll be launching soonto complete our plan.
And by the way, if I need more inspiration
from Copilot in Word,
I can use Copilot from the ribbon,
and then use the Addmenu in Copilot in Word
to ask an agent, add an image,
and view prompts from the prompt gallery
(06:47):
with lots of great options here.
This is also available acrossother Microsoft 365 apps
with prompt tips specific to each app.
That said, let me showyou our next power tip,
which is something that's super powerful.
If you're ever late to a meeting,
and join the meeting after it started,
you can use Copilot tocatch up on what you missed,
even shared visualcontent that was presented
(07:09):
during the meeting.
Here, I'm joining a brainstorming meeting,
and you can see that I've missed
the first seven and a halfminutes, but that's okay.
I can ask Copilot to bring me up to speed
by asking what I missed,
and Copilot tells meexactly what was covered
before I joined.
Next, I can also ask if therewere any visuals shared,
and not only does it provide a summary
(07:29):
of the content that I missed on screen,
including embedded text,
but it also shares still images
of the shared content themselves.
This one is an important prototype
of the in-store campsite display,
highlighting our product lineup.
I can even zoom in for acloser look at the image.
And because I'm caught upwith everything I missed,
I don't need to ask my team to back up
(07:50):
and repeat what they've already presented.
As you saw with the power user
tips I shared today,
whenever you use Microsoft 365
Copilot inside your apps,
your work data is automatically delivered
into the experience.
There's no need to uploador paste work content
into your prompts.
This also means that your work information
retains its protections.
For more things to try, checkout the free Copilot Academy
(08:13):
at aka.ms/copilotacademy.
And keep watching Mechanics
for the latest updates from Microsoft,
and thanks for watching.
If you have Microsoft 365
Copilot in your organization today,
I'm going to walk you
through the top five power user tips,
and the lesser known waysin which you can really
put Copilot to work foryou, saving you time.
We'll go beyond the richMicrosoft 365 Copilot
chat experience that's available
to every Microsoft 365 user,
where you might be uploading information
(00:23):
to inform generated responses.
And I'll focus on what you can do
with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license,
which lights up experienceswithin your familiar
Office apps,
automatically connecting yourwork data in Microsoft 365
to help you in context as you work.
I'm going to start in Outlook,
because who doesn't needhelp with their inbox?
(00:43):
You might already be usingMicrosoft 365 Copilot
in Outlook to help write andquickly respond to emails,
or to get help rewritingyour existing drafts
with auto rewrite,
or by using your own detailed instructions
to get it just right.
And if you haven't alreadytried Copilot in Outlook,
prompt suggestions for thethings you can do in Outlook
(01:03):
are built in for you to get started.
These are all time-savers thatare core to the experience,
but have you ever triedusing Microsoft 365 Copilot
to help you get up to speedon a long email thread?
Well, here, I've beenadded to an email thread,
and I don't necessarilyhave all the context.
As I scroll this super longemail with multiple people,
(01:24):
there's too much to take in,
and it would take a lot ofeffort for me to parse it,
and this is where Copilotin Outlook can help.
By clicking on Summary by Copilot,
the entire email thread is processed,
and I'm left with a quick summary
of the main points from the thread,
including key actions specific to me.
It's boiled down about 10 pages of emails
(01:45):
into these four bullets.
It looks like my teamneeds my help researching
a potential fit for newoutdoor and adventure goods
with our current electronics products,
and I have less than a weekto pull everything together.
This normally would bea time-consuming effort,
but this brings me to mysecond power user tip.
I can now use AI withchain-of-thought reasoning
(02:05):
to gather information and work with me
to create a new product strategy doc.
From the Microsoft 365 Copilot app,
I'll use a new agent called Researcher.
I'll ask Researcher todevelop a product strategy
to enter a new market foroutdoor and adventure goods.
After I enter my prompt,Researcher goes to work.
You can see that as partof its first response,
(02:27):
it's paused, and this time,
it's asking me clarifying questions
about both the scope and formatof what I want it to write.
So I'll respond with key details
to answer both of its questions,
then it uses my response to move forward.
It takes my prompts, understands the task,
and starts to build a plan that it'll use
to author a detailed report,and I can follow along.
(02:48):
It's reasoning over information
that I have permission toaccess from internal locations.
As it works, I can take alook at its reasoning process
in real time.
It tells me what it's doing.
It's identifying ourexisting business lines,
clarifying our product categories,
analyzing the potentialfit for outdoor products,
looking for relevant meetingsthat I've been invited to
(03:10):
to analyze the transcripts,
and even researches industrytrends from the web.
What I love about this agentis that it's actually doing
the research to create what I need.
So let's jump ahead to that final result.
On the right, you cansee that it's delivered
a thorough response with afully-documented product strategy
in line with what I'dexpect from an expert.
(03:31):
Starting with an analysisof my existing business,
it's also analyzed the outdoorand adventure gear sector.
Then it's built insights basedon our existing business,
and how it intersectswith outdoor products.
It's added strategic positioning,
and a detailed go-to-market plan.
So I've saved a ton of time,
and now, I have a solid,well-researched draft
(03:52):
that I can build on with my team.
Next, because my teamuses Word to build out
these types of plans,
I brought everything over to a new doc,
and in Word, there are two power user tips
for building on existingcontent using Copilot
that I'll show you.
First, you can pull upCopilot on any blank line
using the Copilot icon or theAlt + I keyboard shortcut.
(04:15):
Beyond what's here, I know that my team
just brainstormed ideasabout in-store experiences
during a Teams meeting,
and I want to use those details directly
from the meeting recapto add that to our plan.
With Copilot, I can do that by using
the Reference Your Content button.
In the Meetings tab, I'lllocate the meeting I want,
this one, for location planning,
(04:36):
which uses the sameCopilot-generated content
for meeting recaps in Teams.
I'll pause a second before Icomplete this prompt in Word
to show you the meeting recap first,
and give you some context on that meeting.
For any transcribed meeting,I can find the recap
by going back to theoriginal meeting invite
from my calendar, thenclicking on the Recap tab.
(04:58):
These are AI-generated, andcapture what was discussed
in meetings that you were in,meetings you were late to,
or meetings that you wereinvited to but couldn't attend.
For example, I missed this meeting,
and without anyone taking notes,
from AI notes, I can see they discussed
placing outdoor productsin our retail stores
and creating connectedoutdoor display in our store.
(05:19):
There are five citieslisted here in Washington
and Oregon to launch them.
If I go to the Mentions tab,
you can see that I was even mentioned
33 minutes into the meeting.
So with that context, I'mgoing to go back to Word
and finish writing my prompt.
I'll ask Copilot to add a paragraph
for creating in-store displaysdiscussed in the meeting,
with a few additional instructions,
(05:41):
and it's taken thedetails from the meeting
and adding it to our plan.
And you can see those five store locations
that we saw before in the meeting recap,
and in seconds, we'vetransformed the actions
from a spoken Teams meetingto add to our written plan.
It didn't just insert theparagraph to the rest of the doc,
it's actually matchedthe tone and altitude
of the rest of our plan, soit doesn't feel out of place.
(06:04):
And now, everyone's workingtogether on this document.
I can see Adele and Daichi are here.
In fact, as I scroll down,
there's also a comment from Daichi
to add details about our outdoor products
that we're already working onto release later this year.
For this power usertip, I'll open Copilot,
and use a forward slash and start typing.
Then choose the email from Daichi,
(06:26):
and complete my promptto add those details.
Now, we have details aboutthe outdoors electronics
we'll be launching soonto complete our plan.
And by the way, if I need more inspiration
from Copilot in Word,
I can use Copilot from the ribbon,
and then use the Addmenu in Copilot in Word
to ask an agent, add an image,
and view prompts from the prompt gallery
(06:47):
with lots of great options here.
This is also available acrossother Microsoft 365 apps
with prompt tips specific to each app.
That said, let me showyou our next power tip,
which is something that's super powerful.
If you're ever late to a meeting,
and join the meeting after it started,
you can use Copilot tocatch up on what you missed,
even shared visualcontent that was presented
(07:09):
during the meeting.
Here, I'm joining a brainstorming meeting,
and you can see that I've missed
the first seven and a halfminutes, but that's okay.
I can ask Copilot to bring me up to speed
by asking what I missed,
and Copilot tells meexactly what was covered
before I joined.
Next, I can also ask if therewere any visuals shared,
and not only does it provide a summary
(07:29):
of the content that I missed on screen,
including embedded text,
but it also shares still images
of the shared content themselves.
This one is an important prototype
of the in-store campsite display,
highlighting our product lineup.
I can even zoom in for acloser look at the image.
And because I'm caught upwith everything I missed,
I don't need to ask my team to back up
(07:50):
and repeat what they've already presented.
As you saw with the power user
tips I shared today,
whenever you use Microsoft 365
Copilot inside your apps,
your work data is automatically delivered
into the experience.
There's no need to uploador paste work content
into your prompts.
This also means that your work information
retains its protections.
For more things to try, checkout the free Copilot Academy
(08:13):
at aka.ms/copilotacademy.
And keep watching Mechanics
for the latest updates from Microsoft,
and thanks for watching.
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