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Simon Doy and Mark Smith explore the rapid shift from experimentation to production use of AI agents. The conversation focuses on practical agent design, Copilot Studio, RAG quality, and where automation fits better than full agents. Simon shares real client work in the NHS, small business realities, and how partners deliver Copilot adoption and agent-led transformation. A recurring theme is choosing the right level of AI, from automation with AI sprinkles to long running agent workflows, while staying pragmatic about cost, governance, and user experience.

🎙 Full Show Notes
https://www.microsoftinnovationpodcast.com/814

👉 What you’ll learn

• How agentic workflows are moving from demos into real production use
• When simple SharePoint grounding is enough and when Azure AI Search is required
• How to combine automation and agents to avoid slow, interactive AI experiences
• Practical approaches to Copilot adoption for leaders and teams
• Why token usage, orchestration, and model choice are becoming operational concerns

✅ Highlights

• “On Friday, I let Claude Opus go and build me a Teams agent overnight.”
• “The agentic side and being able to have these long running tasks is really shifting things.”
• “Customers are now getting much more open to trying things out.”
• “Copilot Studio is the first port of call.”
• “You don’t get the quality back from the agent that you need with complex content.”
• “How you chunk it is so important for RAG.”
• “Not everything needs to be a full on agent.”
• “Automation with AI sprinkles is sometimes the better option.”
• “My world is fast becoming measured by tokens.”
• “You don’t have to use the most expensive model on everything.”

🧰 Mentioned

• Copilot Studio - https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-365-copilot/microsoft-copilot-studio
• Azure AI Search - https://azure.microsoft.com/products/ai-services/ai-search
• EmpowerM365 - https://empowerm365.com
• Microsoft MVP YouTube Series - How to Become a Microsoft MVP - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzf0yupPbVkqdRJDPVE4PtTlm6quDhiu7

✅ Keywords
ai agents, copilot studio, microsoft 365, automation, rag, azure ai search, sharepoint, claude opus, agentic workflows, copilot adoption, power automate, tokens

Microsoft 365 Copilot Adoption is a Microsoft Press book for leaders and consultants. It shows how to identify high-value use cases, set guardrails, enable champions, and measure impact, so Copilot sticks. Practical frameworks, checklists, and metrics you can use this month. Get the book: https://bit.ly/CopilotAdoption

Support the show

If you want to get in touch with me, you can message me here on Linkedin.

Thanks for listening 🚀 - Mark Smith

Get featured on the show by leaving us a Voice Mail: https://bit.ly/MIPVM

Dani Kahil breaks down the growing complexity of Copilot and AI agents in the Microsoft ecosystem and how practitioners can make sense of it. The conversation focuses on practical mental models, minimum viable agents, and real-world use cases, including document-heavy processes in higher education. The core insight is that successful AI adoption depends less on tools and more on clear roles, scoped responsibilities, feedback loops, and realistic expectations of non-deterministic systems.

👉 Full Show Notes
https://www.microsoftinnovationpodcast.com/813

🎙️ What you’ll learn

• How to distinguish between Copilot experiences, products, and build tools across Microsoft platforms
• Why diagrams and visual models help reduce AI and Copilot confusion for teams and leaders
• How to define a minimum viable agent to prevent scope creep
• Why treating agents like junior co-workers improves outcomes
• How feedback loops and incremental task expansion make agents useful in production

✅ Highlights

• “It took me a lot of time to kind of process the information.”
• “I always like visuals and kind of diagrams.”
• “There are so many different versions of the different copilots.”
• “These are completely separate products.”
• “I started looking at them as roles and job functions.”
• “Treat your agent like a co-worker.”
• “In two minutes, you can build an agent, and it’s useless.”
• “Start with a very simple instruction at the beginning.”
• “It will never be 100%. That’s the nature of generative AI.”

🧰 Mentioned

• Diagram to download: https://danikahil.com/microsoft-copilots-and-ai-agents-ecosystem-diagram/
• Youtube video of my walkthrough of the diagram: https://youtu.be/nZ8g11YthYI
• Microsoft Power Platform: https://www.microsoft.com/power-platform
• Azure AI Foundry: https://azure.microsoft.com/products/ai-foundry
• Windows Copilot: https://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-11?wincampaign=Copilot

✅Keywords
copilot, ai agents, power platform, microsoft 365, copilot studio, agent builder, azure foundry, power apps, automation, generative ai, minimum viable agent, ai adoption

Microsoft 365 Copilot Adoption is a Microsoft Press book for leaders and consultants. It shows how to identify high-value use cases, set guardrails, enable champions, and measure impact, so Copilot sticks. Practical frameworks, checklists, and metrics you can use this month. Get the book: https://bit.ly/CopilotAdoption

Support the show

If you want to get in touch with me, you can message me here on Linkedin.

Thanks for listening 🚀 - Mark Smith

Get featured on the show by leaving us a Voice Mail: https://bit.ly/MIPVM

In this episode of AI Unfiltered, Kristen Perdue explains why AI adoption fails when leaders treat it like standard software instead of a fundamental shift in how organisations operate. The conversation focuses on executive mindset, cultural alignment, and communication gaps that quietly derail AI initiatives. Kristen shares how to prioritise the right use cases, close AI literacy gaps, and re‑engineer processes so AI drives growth rather than amplifying broken workflows.

👉 Full Show Notes
https://www.microsoftinnovationpodcast.com/812

🎙️ What you’ll learn

• Why AI adoption is a leadership and culture challenge, not an IT rollout
• How executive misalignment undermines AI strategy and execution
• How to prioritise AI use cases based on real operational bottlenecks
• Why overconfidence in AI skills creates risk across organisations
• When process re‑engineering must happen before automation

✅ Highlights

• “AI is a different way of doing business. It’s not really a tool.”
• “It doesn’t work like software. It is a completely new way of doing business.”
• “Most approached it going, well, should I roll out AI?”
• “We started throwing darts at a dart board anywhere it landed.”
• “AI multiplies good and it multiplies bad.”
• “Only 21% of the companies deploying AI even touched re‑engineering their processes.”
• “That lack of communication is the reason initiatives fail.”
• “People are confident, but they score 40 out of 100.”

🧰 Mentioned

• Generative AI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generative_artificial_intelligence
• Process re‑engineering: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_process_reengineering
• McKinsey study on AI and process re‑engineering: https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/quantumblack/our-insights/the-state-of-ai-how-organizations-are-rewiring-to-capture-value
• Section AI literacy report: https://www.sectionai.com/ai/the-ai-proficiency-report

✅Keywords
ai adoption, executive alignment, ai strategy, generative ai, ai literacy, change management, process re-engineering, business transformation, leadership mindset, ai governance, organisational culture, applied ai

Microsoft 365 Copilot Adoption is a Microsoft Press book for leaders and consultants. It shows how to identify high-value use cases, set guardrails, enable champions, and measure impact, so Copilot sticks. Practical frameworks, checklists, and metrics you can use this month. Get the book: https://bit.ly/CopilotAdoption

Support the show

If you want to get in touch with me, you can message me here on Linkedin.

Thanks for listening 🚀 - Mark Smith