6.1. Prebuilt Agents and the Workflows They Improve
💡 First Principle: A prebuilt agent is a specialist Microsoft has already trained for one kind of job, so it gives everyone the same expert behavior with no setup. The skill is matching: recognize the shape of the work (research, data analysis, coaching, meeting facilitation) and pick the specialist built for that shape, instead of asking general chat to do everything.
Agents built by Microsoft. Each requires a Microsoft Copilot (formerly Microsoft 365 Copilot) license:
| Agent | What it does |
|---|---|
| Researcher | Multi-step research across the web and your work content, delivered as a source-cited report (2.3.1) |
| Analyst | Data analysis across spreadsheets and other data files: statistics, trends, outliers, charts and tables (2.3.1) |
| Visual Creator | Turns ideas into visual and interactive experiences such as prototypes, videos and visuals |
| Idea Coach | Helps generate and refine ideas with structured guidance |
| Writing Coach | Helps refine tone, grammar and style |
| Prompt Coach | Teaches you how to structure prompts effectively |
| Learning Coach | Helps you master subjects, build skills and create tailored study plans |
| Career Coach | Aimed at students and education institutions |
Agents that live inside other apps. Some Microsoft agents work where the business process happens:
- Facilitator runs Teams meetings: live notes, agenda, timers and tasks. It's covered in 8.1.2.
- Planner Agent is the agent in Microsoft Planner (older material may call it Project Manager). It collaborates in a plan, executes assigned tasks and writes status reports. It requires a license and works in group-based plans.
- Sales agent brings Copilot into seller workflows through an Outlook add-in and a Teams app, but it requires a CRM (Dynamics 365 Sales or Salesforce) that a CRM admin has configured.
- Workflows automates work across Outlook, SharePoint, Teams and Planner from natural language, but it is rolling out through Frontier early access only.
How prebuilt agents reach you. Agents are installed in three ways: Microsoft-installed, admin-installed and user-installed. Researcher and Analyst are the only agents Microsoft installs and pins for licensed users automatically. To find the rest, open the navigation panel, expand Agents, and select All agents to browse the Agent Store, where you can add agents your admin allows. Admins can block Microsoft-installed agents tenant-wide, and users can't unpin Researcher themselves.
Matching scenarios to agents:
| Workflow problem | Agent that improves it |
|---|---|
| "I need a cited briefing that combines our internal files with public market data" | Researcher |
| "I have three spreadsheets and need the trends and outliers explained" | Analyst |
| "Our brainstorms stall after the first few ideas" | Idea Coach |
| "My drafts are accurate, but the tone is off for executives" | Writing Coach |
| "New hires get poor results because they write vague prompts" | Prompt Coach |
| "Our meetings overrun and nobody captures action items" | Facilitator |
| "Status reports for our Planner plan take hours every week" | Planner Agent |
⚠️ Exam Trap: Watch for retired or conditional agents offered as the answer. The Surveys agent was retired in July–August 2026, and Microsoft points users to the integrated Copilot experience in Microsoft Forms instead. The Sales agent does nothing useful without a configured CRM. Workflows is Frontier-only. A choice that looks like a perfect name match can still be wrong because the agent isn't available in the scenario.
Reflection Question: A team lead says, "Our quarterly business reviews take a week because someone has to pull market data, read our sales files and write it up with sources." Which prebuilt agent fits, why is it a better first step than building a custom agent, and what should the team lead still do before presenting the output?
