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Getting started with Copilot - Word

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In this Video:

Unlock the power of Microsoft Word with Copilot and transform your document management experience. In this video, we dive into how Copilot enhances productivity by simplifying tasks that once took valuable time.

Key highlights include:

  • Accessing Copilot: Learn how to easily find and activate the Copilot feature within Microsoft Word to streamline your workflow.
  • Efficient Data Extraction: Discover how to quickly extract information from emails or attachments and auto-fill templates, reducing manual effort from minutes to seconds.
  • Reviewing Changes: Understand the importance of verifying Copilot’s edits to ensure accuracy and maintain quality in your documents.
  • Enhancing Document Formatting: See how Copilot can assist in updating document layouts and adding new sections while keeping formatting consistent.
  • Versatile File Handling: Explore Copilot’s ability to work with various file types, including PDFs and Excel documents, making it a versatile tool for all your document needs.

By the end of the video, you’ll gain actionable insights into using Microsoft 365 Copilot effectively, enabling your team to work smarter and more efficiently. Embrace a future of seamless document management and elevate your productivity with these powerful tools at your fingertips.

FAQ

1. What can Microsoft 365 Copilot do in Word?

Microsoft 365 Copilot can help you draft, update, and reformat Word documents using the context of the file you already have open. It can also pull information from uploaded files, such as emails, PDFs, spreadsheets, or attachments, and use that information to fill in a document template.

2. Can Copilot fill in a Word template from an email attachment?

Yes. Copilot can read an uploaded email, identify the attachment, extract the relevant details, and use that information to complete a Word template. This can be useful for admin-heavy tasks such as onboarding forms, internal documentation, or client-facing documents that rely on information coming from another file.

3. How do I prompt Copilot to extract details and complete a document?

A clear instruction is usually enough. For example, you can upload the email and ask Copilot to “extract it and fill in this template.” If the source material contains the right detail, Copilot can begin populating the document straight away.

4. Do I still need to review the document after Copilot fills it in?

Yes. Copilot can save time on the first pass, but it is still important to review the document before sharing it with a colleague or client. You should check that the extracted details are accurate, confirm that nothing important has been missed, and make sure the final version is ready to use.

5. Can Copilot show me what it changed in a Word document?

Yes. Copilot can show where it has made edits, and in many cases it gives you options such as Done, Undo, or a way to review the changes. That makes it easier to confirm the document still says what it should, especially when you are working in a longer file.

6. Can Copilot help keep formatting consistent when I add new sections?

Yes. Because Copilot has the context of the current document, it can add new sections while keeping the existing look and feel more consistent. For example, if a form already uses boxed fields or a certain structure, Copilot can often follow that pattern when adding new content.

7. What kinds of source files can Copilot use in Word?

Based on this workflow, Copilot can work from more than one file type. That may include emails, PDFs, Excel files, CSV files, and files stored in places such as OneDrive. This makes it useful when information starts in one format but needs to end up in a polished Word document.

8. Should I use Copilot inside Word or in the wider Copilot app?

It depends on the task. If your goal is to work directly on a document, using Copilot inside Word can be the most efficient option because it already has the document context. For more research-heavy work or longer back-and-forth conversations, the broader Copilot app may be better suited.

Okay. So then on to Microsoft Word. So similar to PowerPoint and Excel, uh, the button for Copilot is just in the app itself. So I’ll have to hide myself here for a moment. Uh, let’s go here and make me disappear. Down the bottom right here, you’ve got the little Copilot, uh, app icon.
So if you click that, then it will, uh, it’ll make Copilot appear. Uh, and so here is where you can drop and drag in, uh, files. So, uh, if I bring myself back here now. Cool. So I have an email. Uh, I just have it, uh, sitting on, in my…
on my desktop. Uh, but it’s an email with an attachment, and the attachment is what has the detail of the new starter. And so I can just come in here, drop and drag it in. It’ll download that, uh, it’ll upload that email, and then I can, similar to, to the others, I can just ask it to do the work.
So, uh, this email has all the detail about the new starter. Extract it and fill in this template. Now it’s gonna go and, uh, read the email. It’ll find that there is an attachment. Uh, cool. Damaged email. And you can see it’s already doing the work, right? So it’s filling it in literally as we s- as we sit here and watch it.
Um, and so it’ll go through and, and, and, uh, fill in the details. Now, keep in mind that as with everything we’ve looked at, my job has been made far simpler. It, it now only takes, you know, 10 seconds for me to have it go and do the extraction bit, right?
Instead of, you know, a few minutes of me copy pasting. However, it is still my responsibility, and I’ll ke- I’ll keep banging on about this. It’s still my responsibility to come in and double-check this stuff, right? Don’t just, uh, have Copilot do something and throw it over the wall to a team member.
Uh, you come back, y- you should come back and check it. And so, uh, you can see here it’s like, yeah, cool, did a bunch of stuff. Oh, I left the signature blank. And that’s nice, Copilot. Let’ me still sign my name on. things. Uh, but you can see here that, again, similar to what happened in, Excel, it’s giving us the, the option here to say Done, Undo, uh, and then you can even go through the edits.
Uh, so, you can, um, so you can review what it’s done. Um, now, this is a blank template, so again, there’s nothing in here that would’ve been, uh, you know, destroyed. However, you could imagine, you know, if you’re working in an existing Word document that’s already, you know, 20 or 30 pages long, and you say, “Hey, make a change to this thing,” it’ll tell you where it’s made that change.
You can make sure it’s not gone, you know, gone off, gone rogue, uh, and made changes elsewhere in the, in the document. And so that’s, uh, that’s why it’s appeared here. So I’ll say that’s done. Uh, and now. I can continue on, with my. regular workload. Now, uh, that’s not all, uh, Copilot can do here.
It’ has the context of this document. And so I can start a new chat and have it help me update the formatting. Hey, we’ve got a new section. We now need to, um… we need to ask questions about, you know, what our, what our, what a new onboarding person’s favorite color is, um, because we, we deeply care about that, for some reason.
And it’ will go and add those sections in for you. And it does a pretty good job of keeping the appearance consistent. Uh, and so, rather than, you know, it adds a new set of text fields in that aren’t in boxes. It sees we’d used a lot of boxes here.
Uh, and so it’ll maintain that formatting. And so you can ask it to do things like that. Um, this document looks pretty plain. You know, maybe I wanna, maybe I wanna come and have it do some formatting stuff. Um, and so that’s, that’s the kind of thing you can do with Copilot.
Again, out of the box, day one. Now, that was an email. It could’ve been a PDF document. It could’ve been an Excel document. You know, we often get, uh, uh, quotes from, uh, suppliers that will be a CSV file or, or an Excel file, but we need to put it into our Word doc to send to a client.
Cool. Copilot’s just gonna do that for me now. Um, and so, you know, it’s, it’s pretty good. Pretty good set of tools that, that are just there sitting, waiting to be used. Uh, now again, similar to the, um, uh, similar to the, the Copilot app, it does have some extra options, right?
So you can do more work. You can have research. You go and do research and then fill out the Word doc. I tend to not do that kind of thing here. Uh, I’d much rather do that in the Copilot app. It’s far bigger, so it’s a lot easier to have a back-and-forth conversation a number of times.
Um, and you can see here, you know, there’s some frontier options for Word. Now, this didn’t appear in, in the Copilot app. So this, uh, legal agent is a frontier, and you’ll see frontiers sometimes. That means, you know, essentially a beta, um, that your company may or may not be signed up to have access to.
Uh, but this is a Word-specific one, so interesting. Looks like they’re doing some precedent work there. Um, but again, I can add Word content, so I can reference an email. I can upload files. I can attach stuff from OneDrive. Um, uh, and so there’s some things that you, you can do there, uh, above and beyond.
So yeah, that’s, uh, that’s Word with Copilot. Uh, let’s move on.
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