Microsoft 365 Analyst: It’s Not Just for Excel

Analyst Agent in Microsoft 365 Copilot is all to do with Excel spreadsheets and complex data, right?

Well no. Analyst can actually accept a whole different range of file types including Word, images, PDF, and text. And you can really get creative with the type of data analysis and reasoning you need.

Take this example. You're a wedding planner, and the bride and groom has sent you two separate Word documents, one with their guests' table assignments, and another with their meal preferences and dietary restrictions from their RSVP. It would be great to get this in one well-structured spreadsheet, but when you're an event planner you have to work with what you're given.

This is a great task for Analyst: "Using Guest_Table_Assignments.docx and Guest_Food_Choices.docx create the following summary information: Total number of each food choice. Total number of each dietary restriction. Number of each food choice on each table. List of dietary restrictions by table with meal choices appended in parentheses for each listed dietary restriction."

And before you know it and having saved potentially hours of work poring over the information, you have a list neat list of information to send to your caterer.

Analyst isn't just for complex data analysis; it's for any data that makes your day complicated where a little bit of extra reasoning is needed to get a good answer.

First posted on Linkedin on 07/11/2025 -> Click here to view post