Exercise 1, Task 2: Use Copilot’s Researcher agent to identify external trends and proof points
As Boulder Innovations prepares to introduce AuroraHub to employees and leadership, executive stakeholders want reassurance that the platform—and the way it’s being positioned—reflects current realities outside the organization. Leaders are especially interested in how other large enterprises are approaching internal communication, employee engagement, change adoption, and transparency, particularly in industries with distributed or hybrid workforces.
As the Communications Manager, it’s your responsibility to bring credible, external perspective into the conversation. Rather than relying solely on internal assumptions or anecdotal evidence, you need to identify relevant industry trends, best practices, and emerging expectations that support the strategic direction of AuroraHub. This information includes understanding how organizations are using modern communication hubs to improve alignment, how they measure communication effectiveness, and how they design messages that resonate across roles and locations.
To efficiently accomplish this goal, you decide to use Copilot’s Researcher agent. It acts as an AI research assistant, helping you quickly gather and synthesize information from a wide range of sources—distilling complex trends into insights that are directly applicable to Boulder Innovations’ internal communications strategy. The insights you uncover should reinforce your executive brief, ensure the messaging is grounded in reality, and give leadership confidence that AuroraHub aligns with broader enterprise communication trends.
Perform the following steps to complete this task:
In your Microsoft Edge browser, go to the Microsoft 365 home page and in the list of agents in the navigation pane, select the Researcher agent.
Enter a prompt indicating that Boulder Innovations is launching AuroraHub, an internal communications hub where Boulder employees can access sustainability updates, operational alerts, best‑practice guidance, and leadership messages—all in formats optimized for mobile access and shift-based work. Ask the agent to research the following six external trends that are shaping how organizations design and use internal communication hubs and messaging:
- Safety communication practices for energy/utility field teams
- Regulatory reporting/ESG (for example, green house gasses and safety incidents)
- Change adoption in shift-based workforces
- Mobile access and low-bandwidth considerations
- Crisis/incident communication patterns,
- Employee sentiment drivers in the energy sector
Review the agent’s request and enter Go ahead in the prompt to initiate the research.
While Researcher is working away, let’s conduct a little experiment to see how Researcher’s research and analysis compares to that of Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat. Open a new tab in your browser, go the Microsoft 365 home page, and in the Copilot Chat window, select the Web option and enter the exact same prompt that you entered for the Researcher agent.
While Researcher is still working, review the results provided by Copilot Chat. Within seconds, it should return a summarized response for each of the six trends, with a minimal number of bullet points per trend.
Now, return to the browser tab with the Researcher agent. It typically takes Researcher several minutes to return its results, but the extra time is worth it when you’re looking for deep, analytical output. When Researcher displays its results, compare the level of in-depth analysis that it performed to the output provided by Copilot Chat. Both AI assistants often arrive at similar themes, but the depth, structure, sourcing behavior, and usefulness for strategy work are noticeably different.
Researcher:
- Produces deeper, more analytical output
- Breaks topics into clear subtopics, trends, or dimensions
- Emphasizes why something matters, not just "what it is"
- Often includes patterns, implications, and comparisons
- Ideal for validating decisions and preparing executive content
Copilot Chat:
- Produces a lighter, more surface‑level synthesis
- Focuses on summarizing or explaining concepts
- Less likely to probe second‑order impact or implications unless prompted
- Well suited for explanation, brainstorming, and rapid iteration
Knowing which Copilot experience to use helps Communications professionals work more efficiently and produce stronger outcomes.
In this exercise, you’re looking for that in-depth analysis provided by the Researcher agent. To avoid confusion, close the browser tab containing the Copilot Chat session and return to the browser tab containing the Researcher agent.
At the end of the Researcher’s results, it usually provides the option to convert the results into different outputs, such as Word, PowerPoint, PDF, and Infographic. Select the Word option.
Doing so opens another browser tab containing Word for the web. Researcher’s results should be displayed in a Word document, which is automatically saved to your OneDrive (see the file name above the menu bar). Go ahead and close this browser tab.
Back in the Researcher agent, ask it to score each trend’s relevance (High/Med/Low) and flag compliance-sensitive topics.
Review the results. Now ask the agent to create a one‑page synthesis with a “What this means for AuroraHub” section.
If the agent provides a suggested tab to turn this one-page synthesis into a PDF summary, then select and submit the prompt. If this suggested prompt doesn’t appear, then manually enter this request.
The agent should display a link to download the PDF summary. Select the link, and once it finishes downloading, open the file. The PDF should display in a browser tab. Review the summary and then close the tab.
Store the PDF Summary file in your OneNote as you plan to use it in Task 4 when you ask Copilot in PowerPoint to create an executive-level presentation.