(This column originally appeared in Forbes)
Many of my clients — small and mid-sized businesses — are looking to use AI. But most are confused as to where to start. Should they build an application? Buy an existing application? Sign up for ChatGPT or Claude?
Sure, those strategies may apply. But if you’re looking to truly leverage AI in your business to me the best place to start is with what you already own: your office platform. You likely pay for either Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace. And admit it — you’re probably only using less than 20 percent of their features.
Microsoft’s AI tool is Copilot. Google’s is Gemini. Microsoft has been struggling to grow the use of Copilot. Google’s plan is to put Gemini in the middle of everything. Both companies have a path and I predict both will succeed with their massive customer base. If you’re running a business, you’re safe to lean in to either. So here’s how to use them right now to start leveraging AI.
PowerPoint and Slides.
Both Copilot and Gemini will allow you to upload files and documents and then use AI to automatically create presentations. Once created you give it natural language instructions for adding, modifying and sprucing up your slides. These AI tools can then make — and implement — suggestions for improving your messaging. It’s like having a Powerpoint/Slides expert sitting at a desk taking your commands. Your employees are spending hours doing this. Learning these tools will cut that time significantly.
Teams/Meet.
By now most know that these online meeting tools will take notes, summarize and then provide a full transcript of conversations. But one overlooked feature is translation. Suppose you’re meeting with a foreign supplier, customer or partner? Or you’re interviewing an employee for a job that requires fluency in another language? Both Teams and Meet now use AI to provide real-time translations of conversations so that language is no longer an obstacle. Leaning into these AI tools will allow you to expand your network and improve communications with your community, regardless of what language is being spoken.
OneDrive/Google Drive.
These file and document repositories can now be connected to most of the popular AI Assistant platforms like ChatGPT, Claude and others. If you prefer, you can get connectivity to your data out-of-the-box using Copilot and Gemini. Used the right way, all of these platforms can allow users to search, extract, summarize and export data from files into spreadsheets and word documents. For example, try to select a bunch of PDF resumes in a folder and ask any of these chatbots to provide a list of candidates including contact info and experience and export that list to a spreadsheet and you’ll have an example of how using this AI functionality can save you significant time.
Outlook/Gmail (and Word/Docs).
I guess I have to include this very obvious AI feature. Yes, both Gemini and Microsoft 365 will create, revise and upgrade your emails and documents so that you are better and more effectively communicating with people in your professional environment. We’ve all tried these features and most of my clients like them. Some lean on them moreso than others. I don’t use these capabilities as much but I respect that some people find them very helpful.
Excel/Sheets.
Both spreadsheets now have natural language interfaces through Copilot and Gemini that allow users to create macros, formulas, charts, graphs and perform other functions with a spreadsheet that would have previously required hours of training. Copilot and Gemini can also be asked to analyze the contents of a spreadsheet and give insights. Both AI tools can “clean up” badly formatted or missing data. Its agents can be taught to perform cleanup tasks inside of a spreadsheet automatically. For Excel/Sheets power users, these AI tools will significantly improve their abilities and allow them to do more in the same period of time.
Integrations.
Microsoft has Power Automate and Google has Apps Scripts. These are both marketplaces with tools that allow users to create (or use existing) applications to perform specific tasks or solve problems. The list of available applications is huge. Copilot and Gemini can be configured to trigger these applications so that automatic automation and workflows happen behind the scenes, leveraging these applications and the data they’re using. This is more of a power-user application so if you’ve got someone in-house with technical capabilities this is worth allowing them to spend some of their time learning.
A common (and reasonable) question I get from clients is: we hear of the slop and hallucinations that AI produces so do these things actually work? I can answer most definitely yes. I’ve worked with these functions and, for the most part, they can be relied on to help your workers be more effective.
Over the next few years, agents will mature enough to be relied upon to perform tasks that our employees are doing, effectively freeing them up to do more profitable work for our companies. But what do we do in the meantime?
My advice, this year, is to focus on your office platforms. You already own them. Make it a priority to focus on the AI tools that are included with these products. Hire a Microsoft or Google consultant. Spend money. Get trained. More importantly — get your employees trained. Because they’re terrified about AI taking their jobs. And once they see how these features can make them more productive they’ll be in a much better place. And your company will be more productive…and profitable.
