Building Agents in Copilot Studio

This course provides intermediate Microsoft 365 users with the knowledge and practical skills to plan, design, build, test, and manage effective Copilot Agents in Copilot Studio. The primary goal is to seamlessly integrate AI-powered assistants into existing workflows to increase overall productivity within the organization. While the training targets intermediate users, some experience with Generative AI tools and prompt engineering is a desired starting point. To actually create Agents, a paid Copilot license or Copilot Business license is required. Upon completion of the training, the participant will be able to present a fully functional Copilot Agent, such as an Onboarding Assistant, as a final result.

Who is this training for?

The training is aimed at professionals in any role who want to increase productivity within the Microsoft 365 environment through AI agents. The training is ideal for anyone who works daily with M365 and wants to apply automation:

• Account Managers and Sales Professionals: For quickly generating customer information, quotes, or automating follow-up tasks, leading to higher efficiency in the sales process.
• Marketers and Communications Specialists: Those who want to accelerate content creation, gather market intelligence, or deploy an agent to answer frequently asked questions about campaigns or products.
• Project Managers and Administrative Staff: Professionals who want to streamline repetitive tasks, such as preparing project reports, organizing documentation, or automatically providing internal HR information.

What you will learn

You will learn the complete process of building a Copilot Agent: from the initial planning and design to the actual construction and configuration in Copilot Studio. The training focuses on acquiring practical skills to successfully test, publish, monitor, and manage the agents within the organization's lifecycle.

Topics:

• The fundamentals, the concept of a Copilot Agent, and how it differs from standard Copilot features.
• Strategically planning and designing an effective agent, including the use of topics, variables, and strong starter prompts.
• The hands-on building of your first agent in Copilot Studio and configuring the key components.
• Connecting knowledge sources, navigating the interfaces of Copilot Studio and SharePoint, and applying compliance considerations.
• The importance of testing, preparing a validation checklist, and best practices for managing and monitoring agents.

Course Content

Module 0: Get Set Up – Access, Licensing & Readiness

This chapter ensures a smooth start to the training by laying the necessary technical foundation. Participants check if they have the correct licenses, sign in to the appropriate Microsoft 365 environment, and identify the required admin permissions. Finally, they gain access to Microsoft Copilot Studio to explore the interface.

Module 1: Setting the Stage – Introduction to Agents

This module introduces the participant to the world of Copilot Agents and defines what an agent is compared to the built-in Copilot features. You will learn the fundamental AI concepts such as Generative AI and Natural Language Understanding (NLU) that enable the agents. Additionally, the benefits of internal and external agents are explained, and the high-level steps for building an agent are summarized.

Module 2: Planning & Designing Effective Agents

This section focuses on strategic design, where you define the goals, users, and scope of the Copilot Agent. You will learn about effective agent characteristics, design guidelines, and the use of topics, variables, and entities for the agent's logic. Participants write strong starter prompts using best practices and configure the core components such as name, description, and icon.

Module 3: Build Your First Agent in Copilot Studio

This is the practical build section: participants navigate the interfaces of Copilot Studio and SharePoint to configure an agent. Key steps include writing effective agent instructions and connecting various knowledge sources to enrich the answers. Privacy, compliance, and security considerations during setup are also covered.

Module 4: Testing, Publishing & Managing Agents

The focus here is on the agent's lifecycle after the build, starting with the importance of structured testing and validation. You will learn how to edit agents based on feedback and how to apply best practices for managing and monitoring performance. Finally, the processes of exporting, importing, deleting, and publishing agents are addressed.