Skip to content

Free 1-Hour Microsoft Copilot Course: Pro Tips & AI Agent Creation

Title: Free 1-Hour Microsoft Copilot Course: Pro Tips & AI Agent Creation

Description: Master Microsoft Copilot with this comprehensive free course from Microsoft MVP David Foron. Learn how to prompt effectively, automate Excel tasks, manage Teams meetings, and build your first custom AI agent to save hours each week.

Keywords: Microsoft Copilot training, Copilot for business, how to use Microsoft Copilot, Copilot Excel tips, Copilot Teams meeting recap, create Copilot agent, AI productivity course, M365 Copilot prompt guide

Course Summary: Microsoft Copilot from Beginner to Pro

This 1-hour course, created by Microsoft MVP David Foron, is designed to transform you from a novice to a proficient user of Microsoft Copilot. It focuses on real-world tasks and provides a step-by-step guide to leveraging Copilot across the Microsoft 365 ecosystem. The course is structured into four key phases, culminating in building your own custom AI agent.

Phase 1: The Art of Prompting

The foundation of effective Copilot use is mastering your prompts. The instructor introduces the Goal, Context, Expectation, Source (GCES) formula.

  • Task Example: Comparing two weekly sales PDFs from a pizzeria.
  • Method: Use the GCES formula: Goal (compare reports), Context (I own a pizzeria), Expectation (create a table with columns), Source (attach the PDFs).
  • Key Setting: Always select the Think Deeper model for significantly better results, especially on complex tasks.
  • Resource: A free cheat sheet for the GCES formula is available (link provided in description). If you don’t have a paid M365 Copilot license, you can still practice these prompting techniques with the Free Copilot Chat Tutorial: Master M365 AI Without Paid License.

Phase 2: Customizing Your Copilot

Personalize Copilot to match your workflow and communication style using Custom Instructions.

  • Task Example: Replying to an email in Outlook.
  • Method: In Copilot settings, under Personalization, edit Custom Instructions. The instructor sets an instruction to always draft two versions of emails (a full, friendly version and a shorter reply) without preamble.
  • Benefit: This ensures consistency and saves time on repetitive tasks like drafting responses.

Phase 3: Copilot in Microsoft 365 Apps

This phase demonstrates the power of Copilot integrated directly into Microsoft 365 applications, like Excel and Word.

Excel Pro Tips (7 Key Features)

  1. Create a Sales Dashboard: Ask Copilot to "Build me a sales dashboard from this data. Show the top five salespeople." It generates charts and insights, using your company branding if requested.
  2. Split Name Columns: Instead of manual formulas, ask Copilot to "Split the full name column into first name and last name." It adds new columns and uses a formula. Remember to paste as values before deleting the original column.
  3. Remove Duplicates: A simple prompt like "Find the duplicate rows in this table and remove them" works effectively.
  4. XLOOKUP for Data Matching: Ask Copilot to "Pull the phone number for each of my customers from the 'Full Names' sheet." It creates the complex XLOOKUP formula for you.
  5. Build Pivot Tables: Prompt for a pivot table on a new sheet with specific requirements like slicers and percentage of grand total. Pro Tip: Always select the correct model (e.g., GPT-5.6) to avoid crashes.
  • General Advice: Transform your data into a structured Excel Table (Ctrl+T) and name it. This makes it much easier for Copilot to understand and work with your data.

Copilot in Microsoft Teams

  • Prerequisite: Requires a paid M365 Copilot Premium license.
  • Setup: When creating a meeting, go to Options > Recording & transcription and enable Record automatically and Transcribe automatically. Also turn on the Facilitator agent for meeting prompts.
  • In-Meeting Features:
    • Ask Copilot during the meeting to recap missed portions.
    • The Facilitator Agent provides agenda-based prompts and warns when time is running out.
  • Post-Meeting Features:
    • AI Summary: Automatically generates a recap with key discussion points.
    • Meeting Notes: Timestamped notes that link directly to the recording.
    • Follow-up Tasks: Automatically extracts action items.
    • Download Transcript: Download the full transcript to use with other apps.
    • Video Recap: An experimental but high-quality AI-generated video summary.
    • OneNote Integration: Meeting notes can be seamlessly sent to OneNote.

For a deeper dive into using Copilot in meetings and Outlook, see the Master Microsoft Copilot in Teams & Outlook: Communicate Better with AI guide.

Phase 4: Building Your First Copilot Agent

An agent is a custom version of Copilot trained for a specific, repetitive task, like a travel agent specializing in holiday planning.

Creating Your Agent (PDF Comparison Analyst)

  1. Go to m365copilot.com and click New agent.
  2. Use the Agent Builder to describe your agent. For example: "Create an agent called 'PDF Comparison Analyst'. Its job is to compare two PDF documents and explain differences... Start with a summary table."
  3. The builder will auto-generate instructions, skills, and suggested prompts.
  4. Fine-Tune Your Agent:
    • Set Think Deeper Default: In the agent settings, toggle on Use Llama 4 Maverick (Think Deeper).
    • Edit Instructions: Use hashtags (#) for headings and hyphens (-) for unordered steps. Numbered lists enforce strict order.
    • Add Knowledge: Upload example files or connect to SharePoint. Use this to give the agent your tone, style, or specific templates.
    • Set Suggested Prompts: Create pre-built prompts to save time for you or your team.
    • Share: Share with colleagues. The agent inherits their file permissions.
  5. Using Skills: Add skills for specialized tasks. For example, a "Contract Comparison" skill can auto-extract specific data (e.g., payment terms, liability caps) when comparing supply agreements, ensuring the agent focuses on the right details for that specific task.

To learn more about building custom agents without code, explore the Build AI Agents with Microsoft Copilot Studio – No Code Guide and the How to Use Copilot Studio: Complete Beginner Tutorial for Building AI Agents.

Key Takeaway

An agent is powerful because it gives consistent, structured, and pre-trained responses. It eliminates the need to write a long prompt every time you perform a repetitive task. The agent's instructions act as its brain, ensuring it follows your specific workflow.

Next Steps: Deepen Your Skills

  • The instructor offers a free webinar on saving 5+ hours with Copilot (registration link in description).
  • A paid signature course, "Copilot Essentials: From AI Beginner to Proficient," is available for a comprehensive, step-by-step journey. It includes lifetime access and a 14-day money-back guarantee.
  • For a broader walkthrough of Copilot across all M365 apps, check the Microsoft 365 Copilot Complete Tutorial: How to Get Real Value.

Keep this summary

Save it to LunaNotes and it becomes a real note in your library — editable, searchable, and ready to turn into flashcards or a diagram. Free to start.

Save to LunaNotes

Or summarise for another video.

This summary and transcript were automatically generated using AI with the Free YouTube Transcript Summary Tool by LunaNotes.

Related summaries

Microsoft 365 Copilot Complete Tutorial: How to Get Real Value

Microsoft 365 Copilot Complete Tutorial: How to Get Real Value

Learn how to master Microsoft 365 Copilot in this comprehensive guide. Move beyond basic prompts to harness its full Work IQ for enhanced productivity across Teams, Outlook, Word, and Excel, with actionable strategies for creating agents and notebooks to automate tasks and get better results.

Free Copilot Chat Tutorial: Master M365 AI Without Paid License

Free Copilot Chat Tutorial: Master M365 AI Without Paid License

Learn how to use Microsoft Copilot Chat for free with your work Microsoft 365 license. This comprehensive guide covers secure enterprise chat, advanced prompting techniques, building custom AI agents, and leveraging Copilot across Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote—all without a premium subscription.

Complete Guide to Copilot Agents in Microsoft 365: Free vs Paid

Complete Guide to Copilot Agents in Microsoft 365: Free vs Paid

Master Copilot agents in Microsoft 365, from basic concepts to advanced usage. This comprehensive tutorial covers both free Copilot Chat and paid Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses, showing you how to build custom agents, use out-of-the-box Researcher and Analyst agents, and maximize productivity with grounded knowledge sources.

Build AI Agents with Microsoft Copilot Studio – No Code Guide

Build AI Agents with Microsoft Copilot Studio – No Code Guide

Learn how to create custom AI agents using Microsoft Copilot Studio without writing any code. This step-by-step tutorial covers building a customer service bot, connecting it to company documents, automating email responses, and publishing it for your team.

Master Microsoft Copilot in Teams & Outlook: Communicate Better with AI

Master Microsoft Copilot in Teams & Outlook: Communicate Better with AI

Learn how Microsoft Copilot can transform your workflow in Teams and Outlook. This tutorial shows you how to use AI to summarize meetings, draft emails, coach your writing, and manage action items, saving you time and improving communication.

Found this summary useful?

Take it with you. One click puts it in your own LunaNotes library.

Save to LunaNotes

Start taking better notes today with LunaNotes