Copilot Podcast: Microsoft’s Beth Burrell on Copilot, Customer Success, AI Skills
In episode 4 of the “Copilot Podcast,” host Aaron Back speaks with Beth Burrell, Senior Global Black Belt Technical Specialist, Sales and Customer Adoption Leader, Microsoft. The two discuss Microsoft Copilot, critical artificial intelligence (AI) skills, customer success, and the impact of Copilot for Dynamics 365 Customer Service.
This episode is sponsored by Community Summit North America, the largest independent gathering of the Microsoft Business Applications ecosystem, taking place Oct. 13-17, 2024, in San Antonio, Texas. Register today to connect with thousands of users across the Microsoft business applications ecosystem at the for user, by user event.
Highlights
01:01 — Aaron references the AI Summit Preconference which took place on Oct. 16, 2023, leading up Community Summit North America. Beth was a speaker during the event and highlighted the distinction between customer success and customer service. Aaron asks her to elaborate on this notion.
“Customer service is helping out your customers and giving them support. Customer success is delighting your customers, making them happy with the service they’re getting.”
02:10 — Microsoft Copilot emerged on the scene in 2023 and has had quite an impact on the Microsoft Business Applications stack. Aaron asks Beth how Copilot fits within the context of Dynamics 365 Customer Service or any other customer-related app.
“Copilot for Dynamics 365 Customer Service is really enhancing two things, right? The agent productivity and then improving customer satisfaction or customer success,” explains Beth.
05:18 — Noting the impacts of Copilot for Dynamics 365 Customer Service, Beth adds that users receive real-time assistance, shortening the time of a customer service call. Agent-handled Tim (AHT) assists with agent actions, responds to questions quicker, or drafts a chat response, for example. Beth notes another feature that she enjoys — the ability for Copilot to generate summaries, or case summaries, specifically, based on customer conversations.
09:15 — Another benefit of Copilot for Dynamics 365 Customer Service is its ability to analyze sentiments. Throughout the transcript, Copilot will indicate various sentiments expressed by the customer, preventing (human) agents from having to listen through entire phone transcripts.
“This way, the customer doesn’t have to speak to the manager. The manager is already there,” notes Beth.
11:05 — With the rise of AI and AI-powered tools, there is a need for new AI skills. Aaron notes the three main roles affected:
- Business Users
- Managers
- IT Professionals
He asks Beth what about the top three skills she would recommend these professionals have.
12:33 — For business users, Beth recommends that they learn and “play with” the tools available to them to determine what works best for their needs. She notes that AI skills and AI learning have increased by 60% year over year. It’s critical that business users “know how to format it to make sure it’s representing you as a business user.”
15:00 — If users are using AI tools and simply “regurgitating what they say,” it may not be the best tool for them. Therefore, it’s important for decision-makers or managers to understand the tools they are using and how the analytics work to gauge whether or not the tool is effective in itself.
18:32 — For IT professionals, the AI skills they should have are “all over the board.” From developing to coding, IT professionals definitely have to know how to use the tools that are given to them, explains Beth. Similarly, she notes the importance for these personas to understand machine learning (ML).
21:56 — In closing, Beth notes the impact of Microsoft Copilot. Customer Service Copilot has been implemented across 10s of thousands of agents, 92 contact centers, 120 countries, and one billion customers in 46 different languages. These users save, on average, 2.5 minutes of their handling time. Additionally, they’ve increased their self-help by 32%, first-call resolution increased by 25%, and CSAT scores went up by 12%.
Copilot and AI will continue to increase agent productivity over time. These tools aren’t replacing human jobs — they are making them easier.
