Be an email Ninga with Copilot in Outlook

Copilot in Microsoft 365 is an AI-powered assistant designed to provide information, answer questions, and engage in conversation. It uses Open AI’s ChatGPT 4 technology plus your apps and data to deliver relevant and useful responses directly from the browser or from your Office apps like Word, PowerPoint, and Outlook, making it a hugely accessible and valuable.

Note: Copilot is not included within the standard Office 365 subscription, meaning that to access Copilot across your Microsoft 365 apps and services you need either a Copilot for Microsoft 365 license ($30 pupm for organisations) or a Copilot Pro license ($20 pupm for individual and family subscriptions).

Copilot in Outlook

Copilot adds huge value across many of the core Microsoft 365 apps and service, but in the context of Outlook, I see Copilot as a huge time saver and productivity booster. Copilot in Outlook can help users manage their emails more efficiently, easily schedule meetings, quickly following up on emails and authoring better emails. Since Copilot understands the context of the email, the wider thread, and even tasks, Copilot can provide suggestions and actions that are tailored to the user’s needs.

Let’s look at how Copilot in Outlook works and what it can do.

Using Copilot in Outlook

First things first, to use Copilot in Outlook, you need to be using the new Outlook experience (or Outlook on the web). To do this check that the new Outlook Experie4nce toggle is set to on.

1. Summarising an email thread.

With an email open, you’ll see the Copilot Summarise icon at the top of the email thread. With an email selected, you can simply click “Summary by Copilot” and Copilot will scan through the entire email thread to look for key points and will then generate a summary for you.

The Copilot summary will appear at the top of the last email of the conversation as illustrated below.

Within the summary, Copilot includes citations (indicated by small reference numbers), which are hyperlinks back to the corresponding email within the conversation thread. You can see here; five emails have been pulled together to create the key points I need to know.

2. Drafting an email

In my experience, this is the feature that will save you the most time whilst also helping to ensure your email is polite, on-point, profession and inclusive in tone.

To use the Draft with Copilot feature, simply click on the button to reply to an email or start a new one. You’ll see that Copilot automatically offers you several quick options. Select “Custom” to generate a personalised draft. In the example below, I am going to use Copilot to help me author an email to my builder.

In the Draft with Copilot dialog, we simply describe what we would like to say. You can use the settings button to change things like tone and length.

Copilot will then generate you a response. Once created you can tweak the response, change, modify it or ask Copilot to regenerate. Copilot can be quite “creative” so be sure to review the draft and modify it as needed. The video example below shows the immediate response and a change I ask it to make. You can keep asking for changes until you are happy or accept the draft and make the final changes.

Drafting with Copilot in Outlook.

3. Replying to an email with Copilot

This is like drafting new email, but when replying to an email, Copilot also has better context, since it has access to the entire email thread making the drafted responses, in my experience, more accurate on first take!

In this example, I am replying to an email about a Gang Show event being run by the Cubs and Scouts.

When I click Generate, Copilot drafts me an email. Notice how it has read the context of the email I am replying to and has even automatically calculated the cost of the tickets I want to purchase based on the pricing that was shown and by assuming that I might want two adult and two child tickets. Adult tickets are £10 and children’s tickets are £6, so the £32 is correct!

Using Copilot in Outlook to reply to an email.

4. Coaching with Copilot

The next area Copilot in Outlook can help you is in its “coaching” ability. Here, you do the drafting and let Copilot help you with making sure the email is “on-point”. This is like using tools like Grammarly or Microsoft Editor but is more aligned to the specific email you are writing or replying to.

Using my previous example of the email to my builder, I am this time drafting an email and then asking Copilot to “coach me”. You can see in the video below, that Copilot provides me with tips to make the email better. It does this by suggesting changes to tone, specific detail and clarity based on the context of the email content.

Coaching by Copilot in Outlook.

In coaching mode, Copilot does not make changes to the email for you. Instead, it provides guidance and advice for changes based on its suggestions. You can then copy and paste the suggestions directly into the email draft.

5. More features coming soon.

Microsoft Copilot in Outlook is already great and saves lots of time, especially in drafting and summarising emails. Copilot, like the rest of Microsoft 365 is constantly evolving and there is a roadmap you can access here. Of interest in Copilot for Outlook – my upcoming favourites are:

Schedule from email with Copilot: Often you may want to transition a conversation from an email thread to a meeting. From March 2024, Copilot will help you do this by being able to start scheduling right from the email conversation. This will save time and effort by generating a meeting invite that’s ready for you to review and send. Soon, when you click on “Schedule with Copilot” a meeting form will appear with a Copilot generated meeting title, agenda, and conversation summary as well as a pre-filled attendee list from the email thread and an attachment of the original email thread.
Follow a meeting: This is new meeting response (RSVP) option coming in June 2024, that will go beyond the traditional Accept, Tentative and Decline choices geared towards individuals with high meeting loads and conflicting meetings each day. Follow is the ideal RSVP option for meetings you can’t attend but still want to stay engaged and receive info about. Other attendees will be able to see if you are following a meeting.

Conclusion

Outlook has long been a staple in the world of email and personal organisation. With the integration of Copilot, it takes a significant step forward in enhancing user experience. Copilot’s features are designed to streamline the way users manage their emails and schedules.

Drafting emails can often take up a significant portion of your day. Copilot assists with email composition by providing suggestions and completing sentences, making the process of writing more efficient. This is especially useful when you’re drafting responses to a large volume of emails or need to quickly send out a professional reply. Copilot’s AI-driven writing assistant helps maintain consistency and tone across your communications.

Microsoft’s aim is to make Outlook not just a tool for reading and sending emails, but a comprehensive assistant that augments productivity and organisation. With Copilot, Outlook becomes more than just an email client; it’s a powerful ally in managing your digital communication and scheduling needs. Copilot also works on Web and Mobile.

November 14, 2023November 13, 2023

Be a meeting Ninja with Scheduling Polls in Outlook.

Microsoft has replaced the legacy FindTime plug in for Outlook with a new native experience called “Scheduling Polls” which is now built directly into Outlook on desktop and the web experience.

Information regarding the end of support for FindTime can be found in the Message Centre article MC688929

Introducing Outlook Scheduling Polls

Scheduling Poll (which replaces a similar tool called FindTime) is now available to all users of Outlook on the Web and Mac. It is available to Classic Outlook for Windows users in Current Channel, Monthly Enterprise Channel, and Semi-Annual Enterprise Preview. It will become available to Classic Outlook users on the Semi-Annual Enterprise Channel in January 2024, and to the Semi-Annual Extended Channel in June 2024.

Users who do not have access to Scheduling Poll yet can either switch to the Current Channel, Monthly Enterprise Channel, or Semi-Annual Enterprise Preview in Classic Outlook for Windows; or they can use Outlook on the Web to create polls.

Creating and using Scheduling Polls

Using Meeting Polls is really simple. You need to be using the Outlook Desktop app or Outlook on the web, and it’s not currently available on mobile devices but hoping that will change as I create lots of meetings on the go!

Step 1: Start with an email message

We start a new Scheduling Poll from an email (not from Calendar). For example we might start with an email to a team of people (or it could be reply) and instead of asking for or suggesting a list of dates “that work”, we simply click on the Scheduling Poll button on the Toolbar as shown below.

I’d advise adding the people you need to the email message before clicking on the button.

Step 2: Create the Scheduling Poll

Try to ensure you have added the people you need to the email before you click the “New Scheduling Poll” button. You can add them later, but it makes the process a little slicker.

Once you click the “New Scheduling Poll” button, you’ll be presented with a new side-bar screen with some options within it.

From here, you can choose the meeting duration (default is 30mins), and then you’ll see availability of your “invited” attendees, based on calendar availability at the time of creating your poll.

You can see below, that there is availability on the 13th Nov but limited availability on the 14th November. You can also look as far out as you need to, but Scheduling Polls will help you find suitable dates.

Using Meeting Polls within Outlook — Scheduling Poll side bar in Outlook (picking options).

When you have finished picking the best dates for you (you are the organiser after all), you can click the “Next” button.

You are then presented with the ability to customise the meeting poll including:-

Meeting Location: For example Boardroom, Nero Coffee etc or online (via Teams).
Schedule with attendees reach consensus: This means once everyone has voted on a date that everyone can do, Outlook will automatically schedule the meeting
Hold Selected Dates on my calendar: Means the options you offered get blocked until the meeting is scheduled – in case someone books you first.
Notify me about poll update: Means you get an email notification when someone votes.
Lock Poll for attendees: Means attendees can’t suggest alternative dates.

When you are happy with the options (the ones below are default), you can click Create Poll.

Step 3: Send the Scheduling Poll

You can then check your email body and simply send the email with the poll attached. You can also if you need to add other people at this point which can also include external attendees such as customers or partners from other organisations.

Once everyone has voted on the meeting and a common time is agreed, Outlook will schedule the meeting for you and free up and “blocked” time.

Step 4: Editing or Viewing your Polls

You can get back to your polls at anytime to update them, cancel them or review the status of the voting, before and after the meeting is scheduled. You can do this from the email with the poll it or from the “Scheduling Poll” button in Outlook.

You’ll see that from here, you can do things like:

Send a reminder – this emails all attendees to remind them to vote (I use this a lot)
Cancel the poll – this cancels the poll and frees up your diary again
Add or Remove attendees – perhaps some one emails you and asks you invite someone
Update your preferred times – just like attendees you can pick a time you “prefer”

Responding to a Scheduling Poll as another person.

Any one receiving a Scheduling Poll will see the following within their email when the poll is sent. This is the email sent in the previous step and invites each requested attendee to vote.

Image showing the meeting poll email as received by a user. — Scheduling Poll email received from meeting organiser.

Each requested attendee then, simply needs to click on the vote button and choose the times they prefer, can attend or cannot attend. At the time of voting, the scheduling tool updates availability options based on their Outlook Calendar.

Depending on the options chosen by the meeting organiser (host), they can also see how others voted and can request a different date and even add additional attendees. These settings are controlled by the meeting organiser.

When everyone has voted the meeting is automatically scheduled. It not everyone votes, the meeting organiser can choose to schedule the meeting based on their own choice.

Voting on a meeting Scheduling Poll in Outlook. — Voting on a meeting Scheduling Poll in Outlook

Forcing the meeting to be scheduled.

Every time an attendee votes, (depending on the options you chose), you’ll receive an email notification like that below. This also includes the current status of everyone else that has voted (you’ll see here that 3 of the 4 attendees have voted).

I have the choice to wait until everyone has voted and the meeting get’s arranged for me, or if there are certain attendees that have not voted, I can choose to go with the majority and just book the meeting.

To do this I simply need to

Click on “view all your polls” to go see all my meeting schedules .
Select the meeting I want to schedule.
Decide if I want to send a final reminder.
Update the meeting time options or attendees
Schedule the meeting I think is best.

Choosing to schedule a meeting in Outlook Scheduling Polls — Choosing to force the meeting to be scheduled.

Once this is done, the meeting is scheduled and an invite sent to every user.

Attendees still need to accept or decline the meeting as usual.

That’s it – an overview and guide on using Scheduling Polls in Outlook.

May 16, 2023May 19, 2023

Set and change work hours and location from Outlook

Microsoft has announced a new feature to Outlook (initially on the web) that will allow employees to set up their work hours and location (WHL). Originally teased almost 18 months ago, the feature (tagged 88822 in the Microsoft 365 Roadmap) will let users specify the hours they will be working, and if they will be in the office or working remotely.

The feature is rolling out now (May) to preview users and will be generally availability by June 2023.

This comes because, according to Gartner, from the home office to flexible working, to days in the office and to the front line – the way we work continues to change and evolve. There’s more permanence in the flexibility people have come to expect in how they work.

By the end of 2023, 39 percent of global knowledge workers will work hybrid, up from 37 percent in 2022.
Gartner 2023

An “Outlook” for flexible work

With more people working longer days, shorter weeks or flexible hours, employees will be able to specify different working hours per day, or multiple work slots in a day (for example to fit around school / childcare). For those organisations using Microsoft Teams, which have this feature enabled in Outlook, the location status will also be displayed on their Teams profile card.

The new WHL also impacts how “suggested times” work when creating a meeting event in Outlook on the web. Suggested times will take into account the WHL of the attendees before suggesting times when people are available.
Microsoft.

Other employees within the in the organisation will be able to see their team and colleagues, working hours, and whether they are working in the office or remote when using the Scheduling Assistant in Outlook on the web or in the Teams profile card.

If users don’t set up WHL, nothing will change.

This feature lays the foundational groundwork needed to support the upcoming Microsoft Places.

Setting your work hours and location

To set your work schedule in Outlook on the web, you simply need to:

Select Settings > View all Outlook settings > Calendar.
Choose Work hours and location, and then define your work schedule by choosing days, times, and locations.

When your schedule changes, you can make the changes in the Calendar view in Outlook or directly from within Microsoft Teams.

Viewing others work schedules

You can view others’ locations when scheduling from Outlook or when viewing their profile card in any the Office apps.

From Outlook, when scheduling a meeting, any employee that has set up their work hours and location, will have their work location and availability shown in the Scheduling Assistant, as shown below. This is also great for shift and part time workers.

May 19, 2022May 19, 2022

Microsoft’s One Outlook is now available to preview for Office Insiders

The new (beta version) of the One Outlook experience is available to paying Microsoft 365 or Office 365 Business and Education customers enrolled on the Office Insiders Beta Channel.

One Outlook is a new “unified email experience”, which will bring together the various versions and experiences from across their platforms into a single unified and consistent experience. This means it will eventually replace the existing Win32 and UWP apps on Windows, Outlook Web Access, and the Apple macOS versions. Microsoft will also be using it to host their Outlook for Web on browsers.

Microsoft’s longer-term goal is to also to replace the built-in Windows 11 Mail & Calendar apps with this version of the client – but this is likely to be someway off, but Windows Insiders are hoping to be able to start testing it in coming week meaning it might make its way into an early 2023 build of Windows 11.

One Outlook takes most of its inspiration and design from the Outlook web version, matching it closely in terms of design, features, and functionality – though there are still more things to come.

“Today, we are taking our next step by sharing a preview of the new Outlook for Windows, designed to bring consistency across our Windows and web codebases to help you be more productive and stay in control of your inbox.”
Microsoft Office Insider Team

Main Differences and Features

The new Outlook is built well and runs super quick (old outlook was a bit heavy on resources). The UX has some really clean lines though out the design too – it looks modern and fresh, and the design overall is a much more minimalistic and feels less cluttered.

This One Outlook also adds a few new things not found in the Win32 version including: –

New look and feel aligned to the Outlook on the Web experience which adds a single view for calendar, email, and to-do items
Message reminders which use “AI” to automatically remind users about missed messages that need attention – these reminders appear at the top of the inbox until the user dismisses them,
Microsoft Loop components (which was previously confined to just Teams chat)
@mention for files – providing the ability to more easily share files using the “@thenameofthefile” convention to more quickly attach files and documents saved in the cloud to email messages without having to browse for the files.
New Outlook RSVP feature designed for hybrid work. This allows users to RSVP but also clarify whether they will be attending a meeting in-person or online.

Let’s quickly cover Microsoft Loop…

So I love ‘loop compoents’. Why? Loop will IMO, soon transform (again) modern co-authoring and Collaboration. With Loop, rather than collaborating on a whole documents, you can edit/author in real time components like lists, tables, paragraphs etc. With this now in Outlook, it should hopefully start to end the endless reply-to-all storms since loop compoents can be edited and changed in real time. I covered loop in a previous blog.

There are some important things missing for Enterprise

Firstly, of course, this is a preview, which means it is not the final version. This is only currently available on the Insiders Beta Channel and as such there are some features (some small and some big) key features missing. The key ones missing for me (which I think will reduce the number of users willing or able to test it) are:

Multi-account support
Offline / Cached Mode support.
Search Folders,
Quick Steps
Support for Personal accounts & third-party services (like Gmail) – but that’s coming

In addition, this beta release lacks some of the legacy Outlook extensions that many power users need in enterprise environments including older add-ins and COM object support. I suspect some of this is on purpose to get a better feel of what add-ins and extension organisations actually need and use.

Thumbs Up and Thumbs Downs

The new design (while missing some features) is really nice
Outlook RSVP (though expect to come to the “old” version too)
Loop Components – these are awesome
@filementions for easy sharing of cloud files

Thumbs up
^👍The new design (while missing some features) is really nice
👍Outlook RSVP (though expect to come to the “old” version too)
👍Support for Microsoft Loop Components – these are awesome
👍@filementions for easy sharing of cloud files

Thumbs Down
👎Menu layout freaks you out a little – and no file menu – this will put people off
👎No Offline use (yet), which in a hybrid world – almost makes it unusable for now

How to get it and test it

To get and test drive the new Outlook experience, your need to be enrolled in the Office Insider Beta builds, ensure you have a minimum Office beta build of 15225.20000 and then enable the “Try the New Outlook” toggle button.

Switching to the new One Outlook preview

Remember, as with anything new or different, user feedback is critical and as Office Insiders Microsoft are expecting feedback (good and bad from its testers). As such it is important (if you are an Office Insider) to provide constructive and useful feedback about things you like that you think are missing or that you love.

If you are a tester, want to shape it’s future (and you can) – go test it and feedback to Microsoft on your experience.

June 23, 2021June 23, 2021

New Edge browser extension for Outlook aims to keep you informed while browsing.

The Outlook extension is in beta (due to be released in July) but is available to download now from the Microsoft Edge add-ons store.

What does it do?

The Outlook Edge browser extension enables users to read, send, and manage emails and even receive outlook notifications without the need to open a new tab or flip to the app.

The extension is designed to keep users productive while browsing allowing them to:

Reading an important email
Checking your calendar
Adding a task based on what you’re reading on the web
Fast look up of a contact’s phone number
Referring to info on a webpage while writing an email.

How to get it and set it up

The Outlook extension is in beta but is available to download on the Microsoft Edge add-ons store. You can get it here.

Once downloaded and enabled, an Outlook icon will be added to the Edge address bar. Users will need to sign in with their work or personal account to see their emails, calendar, contacts, and tasks, and more in a pop-up menu while browsing the web.

To use the extension, you of course need to login within your Microsoft or a Microsoft 365 account

April 22, 2021April 22, 2021

Coming Soon:Outlook will be able to book you travel time between your ‘physical’ meetings

As we start to thing about post covid working it’s likely that more us will go back to have at least some physical meetings with our clients and customers and this means travel time!

Outlook will soon be getting some clever new important updates around recognising where meetings are and allowing travel time to be automatically booked.

Coming to the Outlook Web client first, this new feature will allow users to book travel time appointments and also transportation between meetings. “Now when you need to go to a different building or place between meetings, Outlook will enable you to book travel time and way of transportation between the places you need to go,” is the how the feature is explained in the Microsoft 365 roadmap.

Until now there have been numerous third-party add ons available that do similar things but I’ve never found these much good and they don’t work cross platform. Presumably this feature once realised will also makes its way to desktop and mobile too.

I would expect this to enter public preview as part of the #OfficeInsider programme in the next month or so.

Thoughts?

What do you think of this addition? .Maybe it’s because people have forgotten how tenuous travel between meetings used to be now that most of our meetings are all online!

Tag: Outlook

Be an email Ninga with Copilot in Outlook

Copilot in Outlook