{"id":15143,"date":"2024-06-14T12:45:13","date_gmt":"2024-06-14T19:45:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/insidetrack\/blog\/?p=15143"},"modified":"2025-11-07T10:59:03","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T18:59:03","slug":"unlocking-the-potential-of-copilot-for-microsoft-365-at-the-role-level","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/insidetrack\/blog\/unlocking-the-potential-of-copilot-for-microsoft-365-at-the-role-level\/","title":{"rendered":"Unlocking the potential of Microsoft 365 Copilot at the role level"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
There\u2019s no question: Microsoft 365 Copilot is changing how work gets done here at Microsoft and beyond. An intelligent digital assistant with access to any company data you need, and that can process and accomplish requests using natural language\u2014that\u2019s a powerful productivity booster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But how do you zero in on the scenarios and use cases that matter most to individual employees?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At Microsoft Digital, our company\u2019s IT organization, we\u2019re helping our employees get the most value out of this powerful new tool by identifying the roles where AI assistance can drive the most upfront impact, then developing hero scenarios to help them start using Copilot. The result is our Microsoft 365 Copilot Hero Scenario Playbook<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>a functional framework that helps teams discover ways that specific roles can adopt Copilot into their work and drive value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we started rolling Microsoft 365 Copilot out across the company, our priority in Microsoft Digital was giving as many employees as possible the chance to explore this exciting new tool. In a sense, we gave everyone the keys to the car and invited them to drive AI\u2019s open road.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It resulted in a lot of exploration, increased usage, and some very eager early adopters. To help as many people get up to speed with Copilot as possible, we focused our initial adoption efforts on a common professional persona: the modern information worker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is the beginning of an entirely new meta-skill,\u201d says Don Campbell, a senior director on Microsoft Digital\u2019s Employee Experience Success team. \u201cPeople are thinking through new habits and ways of working as they learn what Copilot is capable of enabling.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Because of the excitement around AI, uptake was rapid and enthusiastic. Our next step was building on that initial surge of adoption and experimentation to drive more profound, targeted impact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As Microsoft 365 Copilot usage began to mature across the company, we saw opportunities to build on this momentum by presenting more contextual applications for AI. Within Microsoft Digital, we decided to create a standardized process for defining Copilot hero scenarios in roles where initial applications of AI could have the greatest impact. Concrete scenarios would resonate with those professionals by addressing real-world challenges they face every day, saving them time and bandwidth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ultimately, we had one goal: accelerating time to value for Copilot users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe wanted to explore how we could make Copilot more real to the individual,\u201d Campbell says. \u201cThey\u2019re asking how they can use this in ways that are specific to their role, in their function, in their organization.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n We identified five main objectives to help us get there:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFrom the beginning, we set out to articulate our objectives and our deliverables, then worked back from there,\u201d says Heather Layne, a director of program management on the Employee Experience Success team in Microsoft Digital. \u201cWhen it came to research, we relied on our EX Studio for step-by-step guidance on purposeful engagement.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n That process unfolded in a layered approach. First, we identified the Microsoft organizations that were best positioned to receive our support. Thanks to strong interest and a robust cohort of early adopters, sales, HR, and finance were excellent candidates for our first efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From there, we worked with stakeholders and AI adoption teams within each of those organizations to prioritize roles according to a rubric of criteria. Those criteria focused on enthusiasm for adoption, readiness for the next level of engagement, the number of people represented by that role within their organization, and Copilot\u2019s applicability for their work\u2014especially for repetitive, context-rich, or communication-intensive tasks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn HR, for example, we ensured there was complete thinking regarding a reimagination of our business functional architecture,\u201d says Christopher Fernandez, corporate vice president in HR. \u201cWe identified key roles and corresponding workflows that could directly benefit from Microsoft 365 Copilot by removing mundane and repetitive tasks and providing insight to creative solutions needed to deliver business value.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n After we identified those roles, we moved into focus-group sessions with 10 to 20 participants, all selected because they had been actively using Copilot and could provide practical ideas and suggestions. It was an opportunity to tap into willing talent and let our leaders lead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The output of those sessions came down to three hero scenarios per role, each with six steps and six Copilot prompts to propel those processes forward, as well as the relevant Microsoft tools where the prompts would apply. We also ensure these scenarios align with the company\u2019s Responsible AI principles<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n For example, our Finance team identified operations manager as a priority role. One of its key scenarios included managing contracts, and it demonstrates how prompts come together across several apps to create a process bolstered and streamlined by automation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat output then served as an input in a few different places,\u201d Campbell says. \u201cWe evangelized it out to the organization itself to help drive ideation, adoption, and usage, to our product marketing group for customer scenarios, and to our Copilot Lab to provide freely available examples of prompts.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n As a result, we\u2019ve been able to boost Copilot adoption and usage across Microsoft, providing specific, concrete opportunities for people to apply this new way of working to their roles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This process has the benefit of being structurally simple, modular, and repeatable\u2014so much so that we\u2019ve made it freely available to any organization that\u2019s using Microsoft 365 Copilot in the form of our Microsoft 365 Copilot Hero Scenario Playbook<\/em>. Whether you\u2019re adopting Copilot across your entire organization, a department, a business group, or a team, we strongly encourage you to work through this exercise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe want organizations to know that there are opportunities to keep this process controlled and standardized,\u201d Layne says. \u201cBy aligning with rubrics and setting up standard practices, you know you\u2019re not just putting in time to create something that isn\u2019t helpful or impactful.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Our playbook walks adoption leaders through a four-stage process that includes readiness, engagement, delivering an output, and sharing results with employees. To accelerate time to value, we\u2019ve designed the process implementation across three weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By following the playbook through all four phases, you can do what we\u2019ve done at Microsoft: understanding what those in priority roles need to be successful, articulating hero scenarios tailored to their work, and sharing the outputs with your organization to accelerate time to value for Copilot users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This phase will help your organization, department, or team prepare for the process. It involves aligning with leadership and sponsors who will be accountable for driving Copilot value within their organization. It\u2019s also where you\u2019ll select the priority roles, draft outlines of those roles so you can clarify your understanding of their needs and wants, and seek out feedback from leaders, managers, and subject matter experts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Engaging with employees delivers the core value of this exercise. In the engagement phase, you\u2019ll identify participants from your priority roles who demonstrate enthusiasm and early aptitude with Copilot. From there, you choose an engagement approach that might include in-person group sessions, virtual Microsoft Whiteboard sessions, one-on-one interviews, Microsoft 365 Loop collaboration, or whatever modality works best, then communicate the process to participants and conduct your engagement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ideating hero scenarios is how you discover value. The delivery phase defines that value and organizes it into a useful, consumable format. It starts with reviewing and analyzing the outcomes of your sessions to gain insights and identify themes. Now is the time to document your hero scenarios and the value they add, as well as blockers and accelerators. Finally, you\u2019ll provide your output: a comprehensive deck that includes your priority roles, hero scenarios, next steps, and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The final phase of this process involves socializing your scenarios across your team or organization to realize value. If you\u2019re part of a large organization, it\u2019s helpful to radiate these outputs beyond the target group as an opportunity for further Copilot momentum. This stage includes diving deeper into blockers and accelerators that can help your organization as a whole speed time to value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSo much of adoption comes down to the question of \u2018What\u2019s in it for me?\u2019\u201d says Liz Friedman, a senior director of HR AI Transformation. \u201cThe ability to answer that question at the role level, at the level of fidelity that really resonates with what employees actually do, creates a strong bridge between the realm of possibility and day-to-day reality.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n The shift to AI is about more than productivity. It\u2019s about new ways of working and new ways of being.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thanks to the modular nature of this framework, teams across Microsoft can now apply this process to their own professional needs. As time goes on, the goal is for different organizations and roles to uncover robust and efficient ways of working.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWith Copilot, we\u2019re building new skillsets, but also new habits,\u201d says Nathalie D\u2019Hers, corporate vice president of Microsoft Employee Experience. \u201cThat takes experimentation and learning, but the payoff is transformative.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n By learning from our experience and working through the Microsoft 365 Copilot Hero Scenario Playbook<\/em>, your organization can execute best practices that will make the most of your AI investment, deliver value faster, manage change effectively, and scale across your organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Access the Microsoft 365 Copilot Hero Scenario Playbook<\/em> here.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Here are some tips for getting started with developing persona-specific scenarios for priority roles at your company: <\/p>\n\n\n\n New to Microsoft 365 Copilot? Get started today and see what\u2019s possible<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n
Actioning inspiration: Building a pathway to hero scenarios<\/strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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Finance operations | Contract management<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Crafting your own Microsoft 365 Copilot hero scenarios<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Microsoft 365 Copilot Hero Scenario Playbook<\/h3>\n\n\n\n


Phase 1: Ready<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Phase 2: Engage<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Phase 3: Deliver<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Phase 4: Share<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Capturing the limitless value of AI<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

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