🎯 Learning Objectives
- Understand what a prompt is and how to craft effective prompts using Goal, Context, Scope, and Format
- Save and reuse finance-specific prompts for daily productivity
- Use Copilot in Outlook to draft professional finance communications
- Leverage Copilot in Teams to recap meetings and surface financial updates
- Explore the Analyst agent for data analysis, financial modeling, and visualization
- Use the Researcher agent for industry benchmarking, regulatory research, and competitive intelligence
📋 Prerequisites
Microsoft 365 Copilot License
Access to m365copilot.com
Outlook (Web or Desktop)
Microsoft Teams
OneDrive / SharePoint access
Sample financial files (optional)
Part 1: Copilot Chat — The Basics
💡 Why This Matters: Every AI interaction starts with a prompt — the instruction you give Copilot. The better your prompt, the better the output. Finance professionals who master prompting can transform how they summarize data, prepare reports, and surface insights.
🧬 Anatomy of a Great Prompt
Every effective prompt includes up to four components. You don't always need all four, but the more context you provide, the better Copilot's response:
Goal
What do you want Copilot to do? (e.g., "Summarize…", "Draft…", "Analyze…")
Context
Background or role info (e.g., "I work in corporate finance…", "For a board presentation…")
Scope
Boundaries and limits (e.g., "From the last 7 days…", "Only from my team…")
Format
How should the output look? (e.g., "In a table…", "As bullet points…", "In 3 paragraphs…")
Remember: You can always iterate! If the first result isn't perfect, refine your prompt and try again. Think of it as a conversation, not a single command.
Practice 1: Your First Prompt — Catch Up on Your Day
- Open a new browser tab and navigate to M365copilot.com
- Make sure you see "Work" mode enabled (this lets Copilot search your Microsoft 365 data)
- In the prompt window, type the following:
Copilot, summarize my emails, Teams messages, and channel messages from the last 1 workday. Categorize them as internal activities, external activities, or messages from my team or manager, and prioritize them for my attention. List action items in a dedicated column and suggest follow-ups if possible, in a dedicated column.
The table should look like this:
Type (Mail/Teams/Channel) | Topic | Summarization | Category | Priority | Action Item | Follow-up.
If I have been directly mentioned, make the font of the topic bold.
🔍 What just happened? Copilot searched your Microsoft 365 data — your emails, Teams chats, and channel messages — and organized everything into a prioritized table. This is Copilot working in "Work" mode, grounded in your organizational data.
Practice 2: Save a Finance-Specific Prompt
Saving prompts lets you reuse them daily without rewriting. Let's create one tailored to your finance workflow:
- In Copilot Chat, type and run the following prompt:
Summarize all emails and Teams messages I received this week related to budget reviews, financial reports, month-end close, forecasting, or approvals. Highlight any action items, deadlines, or pending approvals I need to address.
Present results in a table:
Source (Email/Teams) | From | Topic | Summary | Priority | Action Required | Deadline.
- Save the prompt: Hover over your prompt → click Save Prompt → name it something clear like "Weekly Finance Catch-Up"
- Access saved prompts anytime: Open Copilot → click See more → select Prompt Gallery → go to Your prompts
- Use clear names for prompts (e.g., "Weekly Finance Catch-Up", "Month-End Status Check")
- Share your most useful prompts with your finance team for consistency
- Regularly review and update saved prompts to keep them relevant
Practice 3 (Optional): Memory & Custom Instructions
Copilot Memory creates a personalized experience based on your previous chats, work profile, and custom instructions. This helps Copilot understand your role and preferences.
- In Copilot, click the "…" menu
- Open Settings → select Personalization → then Custom Instructions
- Add instructions that reflect your finance role. Here's an example:
I work in corporate finance. When I ask about financial topics, assume I understand accounting terminology (GAAP, IFRS, EBITDA, etc.). Format financial figures with dollar signs and commas. Default to quarterly timeframes unless I specify otherwise. When drafting communications, keep the tone professional and concise. Always include data sources when citing financial figures.
✅ Self-Check: Part 1
Part 2: Copilot in Outlook — Draft Finance Communications
💡 Why This Matters: Finance teams send critical communications daily — variance explanations, budget approvals, close status updates, and executive summaries. Copilot can draft these in seconds, letting you focus on the analysis itself rather than wordsmithing.
Draft a Budget Variance Email
- Open Outlook (web or desktop application)
- Select New Email
- Select Copilot in the ribbon
- From the drop-down menu, choose Draft with Copilot
- In the "What do you want this email to say?" prompt window, type:
Draft an email to the finance leadership team summarizing the key findings from this month's budget variance analysis.
Revenue came in 3% above forecast driven by strong Q2 performance. Operating expenses were 2% under budget overall, but two areas need attention: travel expenses are 15% over budget and contractor costs are 10% over budget.
Request that department leads provide written explanations for material variances by end of week. Include a reminder that the quarterly business review is in two weeks.
Keep the tone professional but collaborative.
- Review the generated draft
- Use the Adjust feature to modify tone (formal/casual), length (shorter/longer), or level of detail
- Edit any specific numbers or names to match your actual data before sending
💡 Tip: You can refine the email further by asking Copilot follow-up questions like:
Make the tone more urgent and add a sentence about the importance of staying within budget for the remainder of the fiscal year.
Shorten this email to 3 concise paragraphs and add a bullet-point summary of the key variances at the top.
Optional: Additional Finance Email Prompts
Try these other common finance email scenarios:
Draft an email to the CFO providing a month-end close status update. Three of five close tasks are complete. The remaining two — intercompany reconciliation and revenue recognition review — are on track for completion by Friday. Highlight any risks and request a 15-minute check-in if needed.
Draft an email to department heads requesting their updated Q3 forecast submissions by next Monday. Emphasize the importance of accuracy for the upcoming board meeting and provide a brief reminder of the submission template location on SharePoint.
✅ Self-Check: Part 2
Part 3: Copilot in Teams — Meetings & Conversations
💡 Why This Matters: Finance teams spend significant time in meetings — close calls, budget reviews, forecast alignments, and leadership briefings. Copilot in Teams can capture decisions, action items, and key financial figures so you can focus on contributing rather than note-taking.
A. Meeting Recap
After a finance meeting (or during a live meeting with transcription enabled), use Copilot to get an instant summary:
- Open a recent Teams meeting that had transcription or recording enabled
- In the meeting chat, click the Copilot icon
- Enter the following prompt:
Summarize the key decisions, action items, and financial figures discussed in this meeting. Organize by topic and highlight any deadlines or owners assigned.
You can follow up with more specific questions:
What were the main concerns raised about the Q2 forecast? Who committed to follow-up actions?
List all financial figures and metrics mentioned in this meeting in a table format.
B. Copilot in Teams Chat & Channels
Use Copilot to catch up on conversations happening in your finance channels:
- Open a Teams chat or channel where finance discussions happen
- Click the Copilot icon in the chat
- Enter the following prompt:
What updates have been shared about the monthly close process in the last 7 days? Summarize any blockers, open items, or decisions made.
🎤 Instructor Note: If delivering this live, show a real meeting recap from a recent meeting in your tenant. If no meeting is available, walk through the steps and explain the experience. Copilot in Teams requires transcription/recording to be enabled.
✅ Self-Check: Part 3
Part 4: Analyst Agent — Data Analysis & Financial Modeling
💡 Why This Matters: Finance professionals spend hours building models, creating charts, and analyzing data in Excel. The Analyst agent thinks like a data scientist — it can analyze spreadsheets, run calculations, build financial models, and generate visualizations instantly, even if you don't write code.
What is Analyst?
Analyst is an expert agent built into the Copilot app. It can perform advanced data analysis and Python-powered computations — turning your financial data into actionable insights with charts and models in seconds.
How to Access Analyst
- Open the Copilot app from m365.cloud.microsoft
- Use the left navigation to select Analyst
📎 Note: Attach your Excel files using the + button or reference files from OneDrive/SharePoint using / in your prompt. Analyst works best with structured data (tables with headers).
Prompt 1: Financial Projection
Build a 5-year revenue projection based on the attached data. Include a visualization showing year-over-year growth trends and highlight any inflection points. Summarize the key assumptions driving the projection.
📎 Attach: Your revenue/financial data Excel file using + or /
Prompt 2: Budget vs. Actuals Analysis
Analyze this budget vs actuals data. Identify the top 3 departments that are over budget and the top 3 that are under budget. Create a waterfall chart showing the variance by department and recommend areas for cost optimization.
📎 Attach: Budget vs. Actuals spreadsheet
Prompt 3: Scenario Analysis
Using this financial data, model three scenarios for next fiscal year: conservative (2% growth), base case (8% growth), and aggressive (15% growth). Show a comparison chart and summarize the key assumptions and financial impact for each scenario.
📎 Attach: Financial planning spreadsheet
Additional Analyst Prompts
Try these for variety — each follows the same pattern: Prompt → Attach file → Submit → Review results:
Analyze our operating expense trends over the last 8 quarters. Identify which expense categories are growing fastest and flag any that exceed a 10% quarter-over-quarter increase. Visualize the trends in a line chart.
Calculate the key financial ratios from this data — current ratio, quick ratio, debt-to-equity, and return on equity. Present results in a dashboard-style table and flag any ratios that fall outside healthy industry benchmarks.
Key Takeaway: Analyst explains its reasoning transparently so you can validate the results. It's like having a data scientist on your team — available on demand.
✅ Self-Check: Part 4
Part 5: Researcher Agent — Strategic Research & Intelligence
💡 Why This Matters: Finance teams often need to research industry benchmarks, regulatory changes, and competitive landscapes to inform strategy. The Researcher agent acts like a highly paid consultant — blending internal files, web data, and competitive intelligence into structured, well-cited deliverables.
What is Researcher?
Researcher is an expert agent built into the Copilot app. It handles multi-step research tasks by combining web sources with your company's internal files and knowledge. It cites all sources so you can validate its work.
How to Access Researcher
- Open the Copilot app from m365.cloud.microsoft
- Use the left navigation to select Researcher
📎 Note: Researcher can reference internal files from OneDrive/SharePoint using /. For best results, point it to relevant financial summaries, reports, or strategy documents.
⏳ Important: Researcher prompts may take a few minutes to process because they involve multi-step reasoning. Consider submitting your first prompt early in the session so results are ready when you return to this section.
Prompt 1: Industry Benchmarking
Research current industry benchmarks for operating margins, revenue growth, and cost-to-revenue ratios in [our industry]. Compare these benchmarks against our company's performance using the attached financial summary. Provide recommendations on where we have room to improve and where we are performing above average.
📎 Attach: /[Company Financial Summary document]
💡 Replace [our industry] with your actual industry (e.g., "consumer packaged goods", "personal care", "retail", etc.)
Prompt 2: Regulatory & Accounting Standards Research
Research the latest changes in SEC reporting requirements and FASB accounting standards updates for 2025–2026. Summarize the key changes that could impact our financial reporting processes and recommend preparation steps our finance team should take.
Prompt 3: Competitive Financial Intelligence
Analyze the financial performance of [Competitor A] and [Competitor B] based on their latest publicly available earnings reports. Compare their revenue growth, profit margins, and capital expenditure trends over the last 4 quarters. Present findings in a structured comparison table and highlight areas where our company could gain competitive advantage.
💡 Replace [Competitor A] and [Competitor B] with actual competitor names.
Key Takeaway: Researcher shows its reasoning path ("chain of thought") and cites sources so you can trace every insight back to its origin. It accelerates strategic work that would normally take days of manual research.
✅ Self-Check: Part 5
🔑 Key Takeaways
🌱
Start Simple, Build Up
Begin with basic prompts and add detail as you get comfortable. Every great prompt started as a simple question.
🔗
Chain Your Tools
Use Copilot Chat to research → Analyst to model → Outlook to communicate. Chain tools for end-to-end workflows.
🔄
Iterate, Don't Accept First Draft
Refine and follow up. Copilot gets better with each iteration — treat it as a conversation, not a one-shot answer.
🧠
AI Assists, You Decide
Copilot accelerates your work, but your finance expertise and judgment remain essential. Always review and validate.
🚀 What's Next?
This session was just the beginning. These virtual sessions are designed to get you moving quickly — building confidence, practical fluency, and real momentum.
Coming up: A deeper, hands-on workshop at the Microsoft Innovation Center in St. Louis, where we'll spend one to two days working through real finance scenarios, prompts, and use cases together.
In the meantime — practice what you learned today, save prompts that work for you, and share them with your team. The more you use Copilot, the more it becomes a natural part of how you work.
💬 Discussion Questions
- Which part of your daily finance workflow would benefit most from Copilot? (e.g., close process, reporting, forecasting, ad-hoc analysis)
- How could saved prompts be standardized across the finance team for consistency?
- What financial data would you want to bring to the Analyst agent for deeper analysis?
- How could Researcher help you prepare for the next quarterly business review or board meeting?
- What concerns or questions do you have about using AI for financial data and communications?
🛠 Troubleshooting
| Issue | Solution |
|---|---|
| Copilot says "I can't find that information" | Make sure you're in Work mode (not Web mode) when searching organizational data. Check that the files are stored in OneDrive or SharePoint. |
| Draft email doesn't include specific details | Provide more context in your prompt — include the actual numbers, names, and dates you want referenced. |
| Teams Copilot not available for a meeting | Meeting transcription or recording must be enabled. Check with your IT admin if the feature is turned off. |
| Analyst isn't analyzing my file | Make sure the file is a structured Excel spreadsheet with clear headers. Upload using + or reference from OneDrive using /. |
| Researcher is taking a long time | Researcher performs multi-step reasoning and may take 2–5 minutes for complex prompts. This is expected — be patient. |
| Results seem inaccurate or incomplete | Refine your prompt with more specific context. Break complex questions into smaller, focused prompts. |
| Copilot icon not visible in Outlook or Teams | Confirm your Microsoft 365 Copilot license is active. Try the web version of the app if the desktop icon is missing. |