Use the AI built into your work apps

What you will learn

• What the AI built into your email, document and meeting apps can work on, and why that matters
• Four jobs: summarise a thread, draft a reply, list decisions and owners from a meeting, turn notes into a first draft
• How to check each result before anyone else sees it

The idea

Many work apps now have AI built in, as a button or side panel in your email, documents or meeting app. Examples are Microsoft Copilot in Outlook, Word and Teams, and Gemini in Gmail and Docs. Whether you have it, and which parts, depends on your company's plan and settings: IT can tell you.

Unlike a chatbot in another browser tab, the AI inside a work app can work on what is already there: the open thread, the document, the meeting transcript and, in some apps, your other mail and files. On a work account, it usually works under your company's permissions: it uses what your account is already allowed to open, and nothing more.

That is why it is useful, and why the rules from Before you use AI at work still apply. Use the work account your company approved. Being able to open a file does not mean its contents belong in a summary you forward to others.

It still needs checking. A summary can present a suggestion as agreed, which is a hallucination: output that does not match the material it was given. It can also miss the last reply that changed the plan. For each job, say what you want back, tell it not to guess, and check the result against the source.

Example

Tom, an office manager, comes back on Monday to 23 emails about moving the office. In the AI panel of his email app, on his work account, he asks:

Summarise this thread in two lists: decisions made, and open questions.
For each item, name who said it and the date of the message.
If something was decided and later changed, give only the latest version.

Tom checks each item against the emails. One "decision", a new parking plan, was only a suggestion nobody confirmed, so he moves it to the open questions. Then he asks for a reply:

Draft a reply to everyone on this thread from my points below,
in the tone of my earlier messages here. Add nothing else.
- The movers are booked for 14 November
- I need the key list from facilities by Friday
- The parking plan is still open; I will propose one on Wednesday

He changes two phrases that do not sound like him and sends it. After a meeting, he asks the meeting app's AI for decisions and owners from the transcript, with "not stated" where nobody took a task, and checks them against his notes. Then, in a new document, he turns his rough notes into a first draft of the move plan and fills in two dates it left open.

Practice now

1. On your work account, find the AI button or side panel in your email app. If there is none, ask IT whether it is switched on for you.
2. In a long thread you were part of, ask for decisions and open questions. Check each item against the messages.
3. Write three bullet points and ask for a reply in your tone. Edit it and send it yourself.
4. If your meeting app keeps a transcript, ask for decisions and owners. Compare them with your notes.
5. In a new document, ask for a first draft from rough notes. Fill in anything it marked as missing.

At the end you should have four checked results: a summary, a reply you sent, decisions with owners, and a first draft.

Copy this template

Use only [this thread / this transcript / my notes below].
If something is not there, write "not stated" instead of guessing.
Pick the part you need:

1. Thread: list decisions made and open questions, each with who said
   it and the date. If a decision changed later, give the latest one.

2. Reply: draft a reply to [person or group] from my points, in the
   tone of my earlier messages, under [number] words. Add nothing else.
   - [point]
   - [point]

3. Meeting: list the decisions, then the tasks, each with an owner and
   a due date.

4. First draft: turn my notes into a [type of document] for
   [audience], with headings. Mark anything missing as "to add".

Notes:
[paste rough notes, if any]

Check the output

• Is every decision in the summary agreed in the thread, not only suggested?
• Did the summary include the latest messages, where plans often change?
• Is every owner someone who actually took the task?
• Does the reply say only what your points said, in words you would use?
• Did the first draft add facts, figures or dates that were not in your notes?

Common mistakes

• Forwarding a summary of a thread you have not read. It can drop the reply that changed the plan. Read the last few messages yourself.
• Assuming it only sees the open email. In some apps it can use other mail and files you can open. Ask it which ones it used.
• Thinking built in means allowed for everything. Your company decides which features are on and what they may be used for. If you are unsure, ask.
• Accepting the owners the AI picked. It may give a task to whoever mentioned it, not to the person who agreed to do it.