Meet Microsoft Copilot — what it is and who makes it

The concept

Microsoft Copilot is a assistant built into Windows, Word, Excel, Outlook and Teams made by Microsoft. The models behind it are OpenAI models served inside the Microsoft 365 apps, with a free web chat and a work version tied to your organisation. None of that matters on its own — what matters is that you know what kind of worker you have hired. At working inside the document you already have open, on the files your organisation already stores is the job you hand it. Outside the Microsoft apps, where it is one more chat window competing on equal terms is the job you keep.

Most people come to a course like this expecting a list of magic words. There is no such list. What there is, is a tool that produces edits and drafts that land inside Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint rather than in a separate window, and produces it at a speed no human matches — which means the skill is not in writing the prompt, it is in knowing what a good answer looks like so you can tell the difference.

Here is the first thing to try, worded the way you will word things for the rest of the course:

Read the answer twice. The first read is for the content; the second is for the shape — did it answer the question you asked, or the question it found easiest? That second read is the habit this whole course is built on.

Here is a rough paragraph for a college project report: [paste]. Rewrite it for a non-technical reader in under 150 words, then list what you changed and why. Do not add any fact I did not write.