COPILOT WEEKLY
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6-minute read
3 QUICK WINS · 2 WORKFLOWS · 1 POWER PLAY
👋 Hello, Hello. A reader wrote in: "How can I create an agent to help me with my work as a nurse?" Start smaller than an agent. Open a Copilot Notebook, load your unit's protocols and checklists (never patient information), and ask it questions between patients instead of digging through binders. One setup, then a second opinion all shift long. Tell us whether that fits your day, and we can go deeper next week.
This issue came almost entirely from your replies, so thank you. Keep them coming. 👀
IN 5 MINUTES, BE THE ONE IN THE OFFICE WHO KNOWS COPILOT:
Turn a 40-message thread into calendar reminders.
Stop asking three times for the format you wanted.
On-brand slides without hunting for the template.
Let Excel update the sheet itself.
Make the follow-up chase run every Monday, unattended.
Teach Copilot how your brain works, in one file.
3 Quick wins, for anyone just starting
1. 📥 Turn your inbox into calendar reminders
Somewhere in your inbox are three deadlines and one decision, buried in threads you haven't finished reading. You can have Copilot read them for you and put the dates on your calendar, from either Copilot Cowork or the Copilot button inside Outlook.
Open Copilot Cowork
Ask: "Read my emails from this week and list every action item and deadline, with who owns each."
Then: "Add a 30-minute reminder to my calendar the day before each of those deadlines, titled with the task."
Check the dates it picked. Approve.
The tip: You can even schedule this as a task to run as frequently as needed. So that your calendar is always up-to-date.
The deadline was in message 23. Now it is on Thursday.
2. 📐 Get the format right on the first try
A reader wrote in: "I always have to ask 3 times for Copilot to respect the format." You're not the only one, so here are three quick fixes, easiest first.
Put the format last. Paste your content first, then add the format at the very end, like "as a table with columns Task, Owner, Due." If the format is the last thing Copilot reads, it's less likely to get lost.
Show it an example. Paste one sample of what you want the answer to look like. Copilot copies an example more reliably than it follows a description.
Say it once, for good. Tell Copilot: "Remember: whenever I ask for a summary, give me bullet points, five max, no intro." Copilot Memory saves preferences you state plainly like this, so you won't have to repeat it in every chat.
Use this shape: What you need → who it's for → the content → the format, last and specific.
Ask once. That was the whole request.
3. 🎨 On-brand slides, whatever you're starting with
A comment on one of our videos: "I can't make Copilot create branded slides." You can, and there are three ways to do it depending on what you have.
Your template is in OneDrive. Type / and the file name in your prompt. Copilot reads that deck and builds the new one in the same style.
It's on your computer. Upload the PPT file into the Copilot chat. Copilot takes the branding from that file and makes your slides match.
You don't have a deck at all. Upload anything that shows your brand instead: a screenshot, your logo, a one-pager. Copilot picks up the colors, fonts and overall look from it.
@copilotsamaritan Things you didn't know you can do with Copilot (part 34) 3 ways to get Copilot to build ON-BRAND slides for you: 1️⃣ Template already in O... See more
Your company has a Brand kit? PowerPoint → Copilot pane → + → Select brand → pick the kit. Your logos, colors and fonts are applied automatically.
The template lives in the kit now. Not in Dave's downloads folder.
Which one are you trying first?
2 Workflows, built from your questions
1. 📊 Just ask Excel to do it
If there's a spreadsheet task you've assumed AI can't handle, try it first. I had a folder full of CSV files that needed to go into one sheet, so I explained the job to Copilot in Excel. And it pulled everything in, already formatted, in no time. Then I asked it to update the sheet whenever I add a new file, and it set that up too.
Try this: Open the sheet → Copilot → "Combine all the CSV files in this folder into this sheet, and update it when I add new ones."
It shows the plan first. Read it. Then let the intern loose.
2. 📬 Let Copilot Cowork chase the replies
You sent the email and got no answer, and now it's on you to remember to follow up. Hand that job to Copilot Cowork instead. Tell it which emails to watch and when to nudge, and it finds the ones nobody answered and writes the follow-ups for you.
The prompt: Copilot Cowork →
"Check the emails I sent in the last 14 days. Find the ones where I asked for something and got no reply, skipping FYIs and newsletters. For any older than 5 business days, draft a polite follow-up. Show me the drafts before sending, and do this every Monday morning."
You stop chasing people. Copilot does it for you.
1 Power play
🧩 Make Copilot's writing sound like you, not like AI
You can spot AI writing from a mile away. It uses the same words every time: "compelling," "seamless," "craftsmanship." Humanizer is a free, viral set of instructions on GitHub, originally made for Claude, that rewrites AI text so it reads like a person wrote it. It works in Copilot too, and you can set it up once as your own agent.
Grab the instructions. Open the Humanizer repo on GitHub and copy the full prompt.
Create an agent. In the Copilot sidebar, select Create agent and name it something like Humanizer.
Work around the 8,000-character limit. The prompt is too long to paste into the instructions box. Paste it into a Word doc instead, then upload that doc to the agent's Knowledge. In the instructions box: "Rewrite any text I give you using the rules in the attached document."
Use it. Paste in any AI draft and the agent will humanize your text.
The catch: It fixes how your writing sounds, not what it says. Check the facts yourself, and don't count on it to fool AI detectors.
Your readers will notice the writing, not the AI.
🎤 Ask us anything. Show us what you built.
A Copilot question you can't crack, a prompt that won't land, a feature you keep seeing but don't quite get: reply to this email. This week's nurse question, the format complaint and the Excel ask all came from replies, and they became the issue. Your questions decide what we cover next.
Built something with Copilot? A workflow, a prompt stack, a skill file that saves you an hour a week? Reply and tell us. The whole point of this list is people sharing what they're shipping so everyone learns together.
Don't forget to rate today's post
That's your Copilot 3-2-1 for the week. Reply with the first rule you'd put in your skill file.
Kushank and team
Copilot Samaritan · Copilot Weekly is a PracticalyAI newsletter · practicaly.ai/copilot
