Automate Repetitive Tasks with Copilot

Excel Copilot has been out for a while now. But most people I talk to either don't use it or tried it once and gave up. I get it, another AI tool that's supposed to change everything but ends up being more work than it's worth. So I spent time testing what actually works, and I'm going to show you the real use cases that'll save you hours. → Excel Copilot in Action The Formula Column Generator writes calculations from simple prompts. You can ask it to calculate profit margin from revenue and cost columns, and it builds the formula for you. Data Insights highlights patterns you might miss on your own, like identifying your top 3 sales regions with year-over-year growth. It formats pivot tables and applies conditional formatting rules without you clicking through menus. Chart Builder creates visualizations from natural language. Ask for a waterfall chart showing monthly cash flow, and it handles the categories and formatting. → Advanced Copilot Techniques Cross-Sheet Analysis compares data across multiple worksheets using automated VLOOKUP formulas. You can compare Q1 sales in one sheet against Q1 budget in another and show variance by category without manually linking cells. Dynamic Dashboards build interactive reports that update automatically when your source data changes. Copilot generates the VLOOKUP formulas and handles variance calculations. Error Debugging helps you fix broken formulas by identifying exactly where things went wrong instead of you staring at nested IF statements for 20 minutes. → Python in Excel This one changed how I handle data cleaning. Advanced Data Cleaning imports pandas to remove duplicates and fill blanks in one step. The code runs directly in Excel without opening a separate Python environment. You can build predictive models without leaving your spreadsheet. → Power Query AI Assistant Automated ETL Process handles the entire data pipeline from one prompt. Tell Copilot to load CSVs from a folder, merge on ID column, remove errors, and create date hierarchy. The result is a complete Power Query that refreshes whenever you need updated data. Data Transformation Steps converts natural language into query actions. Ask to unpivot monthly columns to rows and extract year from headers, and it creates reusable templates that save hours of manual work. → Real-World Scenarios Financial close with Python auto-match flags discrepancies automatically instead of manual reconciliation. Sales reporting uses Copilot to generate dashboards from prompts instead of copying and pasting from your CRM. → What This Actually Means The people using these tools are finishing work in hours that used to take days. The question isn't whether these tools work anymore, it's whether you're willing to spend a few hours learning them. Because once you do, you're not going back to the old way. === Which Excel Copilot feature are you most curious about?

Your consolidation process is still manual. Copilot in Excel just made that obsolete. See how Copilot changed Excel: https://lnkd.in/dFD2Fhk2 Everyone thinks Copilot in Excel is useless. I just proved them wrong with 3 use cases that took minutes instead of hours 👇 Use case 1: Cost analysis dashboard - I had cost data by department, category, headcount, and a pivot table - One prompt to Copilot asking to build a dashboard as the best Excel specialist - In a few minutes: KPIs at the top, cost analysis by department and category, heat map, conditional formatting, and real graphs linked to the data - Everything uses formulas, not hard-coded numbers, so you can audit every result - This would normally take hours to build manually Use case 2: 24-month SaaS financial model - I asked Copilot to build a revenue forecast for three pricing tiers: standard, premium, and gold - It published the assumptions, built 24 months of quantity and revenue calculations, and created the graphs - No template needed. Started from a blank workbook with dummy data - Pro tip: ask Copilot to add an audit tab that recalculates the model independently so you can verify there are no formula errors or inconsistencies Use case 3: Bank statement consolidation and cleaning - Multiple tabs of messy bank statements with columns I didn't need and lines to remove - One prompt to consolidate all tabs into one, keep only the relevant columns, and create analysis by cardholder - Copilot created a consolidated tab, an audit tab confirming the totals match, spend analysis with graphs, and pivot tables for further analysis - All in a few minutes with everything linked and verified The biggest change in 2026 is that Copilot now uses real formulas, not hard-coded values. That means you can audit the output, trust the calculations, and build on top of what AI creates. If you and your team are still doing dashboards, models, and consolidations manually, it's time to change. Delegate to AI first, let AI review, then review yourself. You still own the output, but you save hours every cycle. 👉 Join my free AI CFO Masterclass: https://lnkd.in/dFD2Fhk2 💬 Have you tried Copilot in Excel recently? 🔁 Repost if your finance team is still doing this manually.

🚀 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝘂𝘀𝗲 Microsoft 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗹𝗼𝘁 (𝗽𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆, 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗼𝗿𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆) Copilot isn’t just a chatbot — it’s embedded across Microsoft 365 to help you write faster, analyze smarter, and present better. 𝗛𝗲𝗿𝗲’𝘀 𝗵𝗼𝘄 𝗶𝘁 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗮𝗱𝗱𝘀 𝘃𝗮𝗹𝘂𝗲 👇 📝 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗱 • Draft documents from short prompts • Rewrite or shorten content for clarity & tone • Summarise long documents into key takeaways 👉 Pro tip:“Summarise this document into 5 bullet points.” 📊 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝗘𝘅𝗰𝗲𝗹 • Build charts, formulas & pivot tables from text • Clean, messy data (duplicates, formats, errors) • Instantly surface trends & insights 👉*Pro tip: Select data and ask, “What’s driving this number?” 📽 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝗣𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗣𝗼𝗶𝗻𝘁 • Create full decks from Word docs • Convert dense text into visuals • Auto-generate speaker notes 👉 Pro tip: “Turn this report into a 7-slide presentation.” 💬 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗖𝗵𝗮𝘁 (𝗠𝗶𝗰𝗿𝗼𝘀𝗼𝗳𝘁 𝟯𝟲𝟱) • Search emails, files & chats instantly • Summarise meetings, docs & action items • Prep for meetings in minutes 👉 Pro tip:“Summarise everything I missed this week.” Copilot works best when you ask specific, outcome-driven prompts — not generic questions. How are you using Microsoft Copilot today — writing, analysis, or presentations? 👇

90% of finance teams still spend more time building reports than analyzing them. AI Tools like Copilot can help you change that. But how exactly? Here are 3 practical ways CFOs and FP&A Teams are using AI to turn Excel chaos into instant insight If you want the Excel file with the sample data I used and the prompts, comment Copilot 1. Copilot Chat Upload your dataset and simply ask: “Analyze this dataset and provide graphs using descriptive and diagnostic analytics. Act as a CFO expert in data visualization.” Copilot summarizes trends, highlights drivers, and builds visuals. 2. Copilot Analyst Agent Take it further with an AI analyst that remembers context across sessions. It can compare periods, identify variance drivers, and surface actionable insights automatically. Perfect for forecasting, budgeting, and management reports. 3. Custom Copilot Agent Build your own finance Copilot, trained on your company’s KPIs, past analyses, and reporting formats. Now it doesn’t just analyze data, it can think like your FP&A team. Finance is changing fast. The question isn’t if you’ll use AI. It’s how quickly you’ll integrate it into your workflow. Hope this helps! BONUS: These are 3 extra resources I recommend: Copilot Formula in Excel Guide https://lnkd.in/eXwB7Vhm Agent Mode in Excel Guide https://lnkd.in/eqN6c9yG ROI Framework on AI - Finance Edition https://lnkd.in/eGRiy3rK

Copilot just got a whole lot more interesting. Microsoft dropped something new called Copilot Cowork and the idea is simple: describe a task, walk away, come back to a finished result. I've been digging into it and posted a full breakdown on my channel covering everything you need to actually use it. What it is, how it's different from regular Copilot, how to get access through the Microsoft Frontier Program, the 13 built-in skills, scheduled tasks, and how to create your own custom skills with a markdown file. I also show real demos like auto sending a weekly team email, drafting from a retro doc, and having it research and write a blog post. If you want hands-on labs to go with it, check out the Cowork Collective at Agent Academy. Myself and Daniel Laskewitz have several missions to get you started here: aka.ms/agent-academy Link to the full video in the comments. #CopilotCowork #Microsoft365Copilot #MicrosoftCopilot https://lnkd.in/g6iPFi24

𝗠𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗸 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝗘𝘅𝗰𝗲𝗹 𝗶𝘀 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 ‘𝗰𝗵𝗮𝘁𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗔𝗜.’ 𝗜𝘁’𝘀 𝗻𝗼𝘁. I recently sat down with the Microsoft product team to dig into what Copilot can 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 do in Excel, and honestly, it was a great discussion. Turns out, it's not just about generating formulas (though it’s very good at that). It's how deeply integrated it is. Ask it to “highlight duplicates in column C” → it builds the conditional formatting rule for you. Start typing “John” under a full name → it finishes the split for first and last names using a formula by example. Need to merge data from payroll into sales reports? Just ask. Copilot builds the XLOOKUP for you. Even the “clean data” feature now spots formatting issues before you do! The best part? This isn’t just for Excel nerds. Copilot helps beginners, too, especially those doing math on calculators and typing totals into cells manually (yes, this still happens). If you want to see what it 𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘶𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 looks like to work with Copilot in Excel… I recorded the whole thing. Watch here 👉 https://lnkd.in/eDY-WQ-V Micaela Graiver Adam Callens

GitHub Copilot now runs in your terminal. Here's how to set it up in 9 steps: 𝟏. 𝐈𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐢𝐭 → One command: npm install -g @github/copilot → Also available via curl, Homebrew, or WinGet → Run copilot to launch. Log in with /login 𝟐. 𝐖𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐮𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐟𝐢𝐥𝐞 → Create .github/copilot-instructions .md at your repo root → Define your stack, naming conventions, coding standards → Copilot reads this before every task. No more repeating yourself. 𝟑. 𝐋𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐰𝐨 𝐦𝐨𝐝𝐞𝐬 → Plan mode: builds a plan, waits for your approval before touching code → Autopilot mode (Shift+Tab): runs until the task is done → Start with Plan. Graduate to Autopilot. 𝟒. 𝐏𝐢𝐜𝐤 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐦𝐨𝐝𝐞𝐥 → /model switches mid-session. No restart needed. → Claude Sonnet 4.6, GPT-5.4, Gemini 3.1 Pro → No other terminal tool gives you this flexibility. 𝟓. 𝐔𝐬𝐞 𝐆𝐢𝐭𝐇𝐮𝐛 𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐲 → "Review PR #42" reads the full diff. No config needed. → Access issues, repos, and CI pipelines out of the box → Diagnose CI failures, suggest fixes, file PRs. Autonomously. 𝟔. 𝐑𝐮𝐧 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐥 𝐭𝐚𝐬𝐤𝐬 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 /𝐟𝐥𝐞𝐞𝐭 → Launches multiple agents on independent tasks simultaneously → One command, multiple things done 𝟕. 𝐄𝐱𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐌𝐂𝐏 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬 → GitHub's MCP server ships built in → Add custom servers for databases, APIs, or internal tools → One config file. Infinite extensibility. Your first real task? Type this: "CI is failing on integration tests. Find the root cause, fix it, run the tests, and open a PR if green." That's it. Watch it work. I made a free Visual Guide to Agentic Development. 32 concepts, all illustrated 👇 https://lnkd.in/gUAUSqur

Feeling Copilot Cowork FOMO? Let’s say it out loud. It’s real. And it’s justified. Copilot Cowork is not about better prompts. It changes the relationship. Copilot starts to feel like a teammate who already knows how you work. But here’s the part most people miss. You can start working this way today. Most of us still treat AI like a command line. Write this. Fix that. Try again. Repeat. That only works if AI is brand new every time. It shouldn’t be. The shift is simple. AI needs context about you. Start with two files. ABOUT ME Not a bio. Operational context. Your role, audience, goals, tone, what you care about, what you avoid. WRITING STYLE Real examples. Emails, posts, anything you’ve written. Examples teach better than instructions. Store them in OneDrive so Copilot can access them. Then prompt like this: Use my ABOUT ME and WRITING STYLE files to create [task] for [audience] in [format]. Do not start writing yet. Ask me clarifying questions first. That last line changes everything. It forces alignment before output and breaks the rewrite loop. Now, if you have Copilot Cowork, this is where it levels up. You stop prompting and start delegating. This is where Skills come in. Skills are reusable instruction sets that represent you. Your role. Your tone. Your standards. What good looks like. When to ask questions. How to structure output. Instead of rewriting this every time, you define it once. Then you assign work using those Skills. Copilot works inside your framework, not from scratch. That’s why it starts to feel familiar. Long prompts try to do everything and fail. Skills and context separate identity from task. They persist. They scale. They improve over time. That’s the real upgrade. If you don’t have Cowork, start with Read Me files. If you do, build Skills and use them intentionally. Either way, once you make this shift, Copilot stops feeling generic and starts feeling like part of your team.