Community Summit Delivers Education Across Business App User Groups

Community Summit NA 2024 education sessions opened today, with learning opportunities for the 5,000-plus attendees across user groups:

Business Central/NAV
Dynamics 365 CE/CRM
Dynamics 365 F&O/AX
Dynamics GP
Microsoft Copilot
Power Platform

This report provides highlights and takeaways from the sessions our team sat it on today.

Business Central/NAV

This morning’s breakout session, “Business Central Life Hacks: Tips and Tricks for EVERY User! 2024 Edition,” led by Shawn Dorward, Vice President at sa.global and 6x Microsoft MVP, and first-time session speaker Shirley Grimes, accounting supervisor and project manager at Gulf Coast Panama Jack, provided attendees with tips and tricks to enhance their Microsoft Business Central experience

They covered everything from navigation shortcuts to advanced reporting features. They explained how even seemingly small adjustments, such as personalizing screens, can improve accuracy and efficiency. “Take the time, dedicate it to personalizing your screens. It’s going to save you time,” Grimes noted.

Dorward discussed the impact of Copilot in BC. “My truth is that I absolutely love it . . . I’m still working 40 to 50 hours a week, but I’m doing a whole lot more, higher value things, and it’s a lot less stress.”

Three key takeaways from the session included:

Utilize exclude tasks to avoid unnecessary data entry and speed up processes
Use wildcards in data filtering to refine searches, exclude specific criteria, and identify empty fields for more effective reporting
The transformative potential of Copilots in automating and optimizing daily tasks

Dynamics 365 CE/CRM

Christopher Smith hosted a session titled CRM Shouldn’t Suck: Avoiding CRM Pitfalls Using Strategies for Success. During this session, Smith shared reasons why CRM systems often have high failure rates and detailed ways to overcome those common pitfalls. With each point of the presentation, attendees were nodding their heads in understanding, as they could relate to the challenges mentioned. Some pitfalls and solutions that Smith shared include:

Having too many spreadsheets can be a major issue. Bringing it all together into CRM creates a single source of truth for the business.
Because CRM systems are so complex with several touch points, a lack of leadership can result in failed CRM outcomes. Leaders must understand what CRM does for the business and apply it accordingly throughout the business.
In terms of ROI, CRM goes beyond sales and marketing. Smith said. “It’s your best execution engine – execution on your key initiatives.” By aligning CRM with key initiatives and throughout the business, businesses can experience greater ROI.

Smith advised attendees on how to “un-suck” their CRM. Because “data is the foundation,” he emphasized, it’s important to minimize data entry and train CRM users on data entry protocols and governance to ensure accuracy across the system. He also drove the point that CRM must be aligned with the strategic goals and core processes of the business for the best outcomes.

Dynamics 365 F&O/AX

The “Dynamics 365 F&O Excel Add-in Master Class,” led by Justin Carter, Vice President, Technology, Caf2Code, Microsoft MVP, and Devin Kitterman, Senior Solution Architect at Illumina Technology Solutions, offered invaluable knowledge into optimizing data management through the Excel add-in in their packed afternoon session. The session was designed for both end users and experienced consultants, focusing on practical applications and user-friendly tools.

Key Takeaways:

Entity-Level Security: “You can actually select certain things in here and actually set them to be read only for your template versus editable,” Carter said, emphasizing the importance of security. Ensure proper entity-level security and read-only settings are configured for Excel templates to protect critical data.
Enhanced Excel Integration for Data Management: Participants learned how to manipulate and upload data efficiently using Excel, with support for multiple data sources and custom workflows, improving flexibility in data management processes.
Custom Templates: Participants discovered how to build custom templates tailored to their specific needs, allowing for improved data manipulation and reporting.

Dynamics GP

In the session “What’s New in Dynamics GP for Human Resources and Payroll Features,” Microsoft’s Terry Heley, who is a senior escalation engineer, gave a detailed rundown of new features in the October 2024 release, which is version 18.7.

Highlights included: Vendor class rolldown, reprint EFT payment register, payroll 1099-R social security number masking (which applies to employees receiving pensions), and new templates including multicurrency blank form. A full list of features is shown below:

Microsoft Copilot

In the “Transforming Customer Service: A Deep Dive into Copilot Capabilities,” Microsoft detailed current and planned features in what the company calls Copilot in Service – that’s the Copilot that is native to Dynamics 365 (and distinguished from Copilot for Service, which works with thirdy-party CRM systems. The vast majority of sessions attendees use Dynamics 365 so they would be candidates for Copilot in Service.

Three primary functions currently available in Copilot in Service include: ask a question, write an email, and summarization. The copilot also comes equipped with a dashboard that gives managers a view into case resolution, email response times, and more.

A new feature that’s in public preview is plugins to enable straightforward importing of data from third-party systems. “Plugins are one of the more powerful customizations that you can set up currently in public preview. For the customer service, they’re very valuable when you want to pull information from either other places in Dataverse or potentially third-party data sources…the goal here is to try to enable that single pane of glass experience,” said Nathan Johnson, solution architect at Microsoft.

Common sources of third party data will be Salesforce, ServiceNow, and Zendesk systems.

Power Platform

Luc Labelle, CEO at Kabesa Solutions, hosted a session covering 10 New Features in Power Automate Everyone Should Know. In this session, Labelle emphasized innovative ways to leverage Power Automate and elevate automation efforts through live demonstrations and giving step-by-step instructions on how to use these new elements. The features he reviewed included those recently released, those currently in preview mode, and upcoming releases. A couple key features that Labelle covered:

Copilot integration for cloud flows: With Copilot integrated within Power Automate, users can prompt the AI assistant to create flows. This feature will also enable users to quickly review their flows, search within flows, and execute actions and triggers.
Power Automate flows in Excel: This feature improves Excel’s Automate button with templates – although it’s primarily accessible with Excel Online. Users can build entire flows in Excel as it pulls from Automate cloud flow templates.
Automation Center: “This is a cool tool in terms of measuring,” Labelle said. This feature serves as a reporting tool, providing recommendations and displaying the activity on flows.

Each of these tools will ultimately save Power Platform users time and increase productivity.

— Maya Rock and Sara Cordova contributed to this report.