Authored By: Matt Evans-Peace
Sales Director
In the perpetual pursuit of mastering time management, we’ve all delved into an array of resources – books, articles, blogs, and videos – seeking that elusive formula for enhanced productivity.
The wisdom often shared is that time itself cannot be managed; it simply ‘is.’ We’re left with the task of steering our activities within the confines of 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year (well 366 in a leap year – a bonus we gladly accept!). The challenge, then, becomes maximising our time to focus on what truly matters, both professionally and personally.
As Sales Director at mhance, my role involves extensive collaboration with customers, partners and colleagues which, if not managed, can take a lot of time from the working week. Whilst this is great and collaboration is a cornerstone of mhance’s core values, not every meeting demands our active participation. Recently, Microsoft Viva provided me with a numerical snapshot of my time which really opened my eyes – wouldn’t it be great if we all had a Personal Assistant that could handle some of these tasks? Enter Microsoft Copilot….
Following the recent announcement from Microsoft regarding the removal of the 300 seat restriction on Copilot, we have been busy at mhance embracing Copilot internally and the impact has been game changing. Here are some key takeaways from my initial experience of this amazing tool:
- Effortless Proposal Drafting: Copilot assisted in creating a first draft for a proposal which was scarily accurate!
- Real-Time Support Issue Summaries: Summarising a support issue during a customer call using the D365 Copilot in case management eliminated the need for scrolling through timelines to grasp the technical details.
- Meeting Updates on Demand: Copilot efficiently summarised internal meetings I couldn’t attend, keeping me in the loop seamlessly.
- Email Inbox Speed Check: I could quickly get up to speed on my email inbox after a day out of the office with Copilot in Outlook.
And finally, surprisingly, even when I tried to be deliberately ‘disruptive’ during a Friday call, Copilot’s response was nothing short of impressive, detecting that I was pulling its leg!
In essence, while I may not be able to manage time, Copilot is providing me with what I already feel is a fundamental, indispensable resource, delivering information to me without demanding a substantial investment in time. The result of all this is that I can focus on the really important stuff that requires my direct attention, whilst remaining informed. In a world where costs continue to rise, I’d like to thank Microsoft and mhance for investing in my new assistant and I can’t wait to discover more. This means we shouldn’t feel bad for not attending every single call. It encourages keeping our diaries clear for focused and strategic thinking – I think we would all welcome more of that!
Looking ahead, I’m particularly excited to talk to customers and my colleagues about their experiences with Copilot, because after all, we are collectively navigating this exciting AI journey together the possibilities are endless!
What we do know is that the future is AI and there are some things you should be aware of in terms of being set up ready to fully embrace it, so do reach out to me or any of our team if you want a chat on how you might be able to join this exciting journey. If nothing else, we can share more about how great Copilot is and how it’s improving efficiency across our organisation!
