How to secure stakeholder buy-in for Copilot 

According to Gartner’s 2025 Microsoft 365 Copilot Survey, there are 3 barriers to widespread adoption:

• Security: 71% of organisations say governance issues prevent their rollout, because they fear oversharing and/or data loss from inadvertent information exposure.
• Lack of skills: 51% of organisations struggle with GenAI workforce skills gaps, which is creating fear over compliance obligations.
• Cost: at $30 per user per month, M365 Copilot can be a sizable investment, so there needs to be a clear business case with demonstrable ROI.

Let’s consider each barrier further to determine the best way to secure stakeholder buy-in to mature your AI strategy.

Addressing Copilot concerns

Security: M365 Copilot is protected by your internal policies and Microsoft’s built-in security.

Unlike ChatGPT, which is trained on publicly available data, M365 Copilot is integrated into your existing M365 environment, so uses your data within your existing security controls. Additionally, it comes with safeguards in place to further protect your information

• Data residency: data processing happens in accordance with Microsoft’s data residency commitments
• Visibility and auditing: every prompt and response is logged in Microsoft Purview and Azure Monitor, which supports customisable retention and alerts to policy non-compliance
• Network isolation: ExpressRoute or VPN network paths prevent M365 Copilot traffic from reaching the public internet

Lack of skills: M365 Copilot is designed for all users, regardless of their technical ability.

M365 Copilot integrates with your existing Office applications, which people already use every day. This familiarity also earns instant buy-in, because the tool is not perceived as ‘new tech’ that people need to upskill in. And by automating small, routine, predictable tasks, M365 Copilot demonstrates ‘quick wins’ that build a groundswell of excitement for the tool. For example, in one user study:

• 85% said Copilot helps them get to a good first draft faster
• 4x faster to catch up on a missed meeting
• 64% said it helps them spend less time processing email

Of course, it always helps to have the back up of a partner, and who better than Microsoft’s #1 Copilot Partner in the UK (and #2 in Europe) for FY25?!

To date, we’ve supported 70,000+ users across organisations and 24 NHS Trusts, to embrace all that M365 Copilot has to offer. From integrating the new tool within their existing architecture to avoid mass disruption, to protecting existing investments, and training to help you get the most from M365 Copilot, our team is always on hand and ready to help when you need us.

Cost: a single report can provide sufficient ROI to justify your investment.

According to Forrester in its report titled, “The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft 365 Copilot”, organisations can expect a payback period of 10-months. But how does that theory work out in practice?

After adopting M365 Copilot, West Yorkshire Fire & Rescue Service said, “We’ve had people say they were spending 4-weeks generating a report – now it takes just a few hours.”

In the UK, an operations manager can expect to be paid £67,500 per year (equal to £1,298 per week, £32 per hour).

Let’s imagine we ask an operations manager to create a single report. Previously, the time taken to create that report would cost £5,192. With M635 Copilot, that same report now takes just 4 hours and costs £130 – an impressive saving of £5,062 (more than enough to justify the $30 license).

But what if the operations manager is producing this report on a quarterly basis?

In this scenario, Copilot is going to save £20,256 per year (equal to 624 hours!).

And what if this quarterly management report is produced by all 6 core functions in the business?

Well, in this scenario, Copilot is collectively saving the business £121,493 – as well as giving these individuals 3,744 hours back to spend on more valuable, strategic work. This small change to create a single report has the potential to deliver a massive impact to the business.

Building the business case for Copilot 

When you’re looking to secure stakeholder buy-in for M365 Copilot, it’s not enough to simply address concerns and point towards an impressive ROI figure. You need to provide a compelling reason for your stakeholders invest, one that aligns to their current thinking.

The following steps outline what to include when putting a persuasive business case for M365 Copilot forward:

Step 1: perform a gap analysis
Start by taking a long hard look at your business and ask yourself: “What’s causing us the biggest pain right now?” For example, it could be staff retention, business resilience, or unhappy customers.

Then think about how this ties back to your overall strategic objectives. For example, problems with staff retention could prevent you becoming ‘a great place to work’. Problems with business resilience could affect your competitive edge. Problems with unhappy customers will impact your ability to grow sales by 10%.

Next, review Copilot’s capabilities to gain a solid baseline understanding of the benefits the tool has to offer. As we saw above in our ROI calculation, often, the smallest changes can have the biggest impact. Knowing where and how M365 Copilot can make a difference is crucial.

Step 2: identify priority use cases

Think about small, iterative changes. For example:

• Staff retention: if collating data and writing reports is making staff unhappy, you could task M365 Copilot with generating a first draft for them to simply check and edit.
• Business resilience: if long product development sprints are slowing your time-to-market, you could task M365 Copilot with identifying bottlenecks or writing support documentation.
• Unhappy customers: if customers are frustrated with your communication, you could task M365 Copilot with producing an account summary for the team and drafting email follow-ups.

Be sure to talk to different functions – or better still, delegate responsibility to them, so they feel ownership of the tool. Different roles will have different requirements, and you’ll be surprised at the impactful use cases they find that you’d never have thought of.

And be sure to prioritise. You can’t do everything on day 1, so think about where the ‘quick wins’ are. You can showcase these use cases as success stories to build excitement around M365 Copilot. Look for opportunities for cross-team learning to rollout use cases. And identify longer-term initiatives that could take more time/effort to get up and running.

Step 3: Quantify your ROI

ROI can come in two forms:

• Tangible: ROI is quantitative, which makes it easier to say, “We spent $2,160 on licenses and saved £121,493, which means an ROI of about 97%.” Numbers make it a lot easier to build a strong business case because they are absolute and can be evidenced.
• Non-tangible: ROI is qualitative, which means it’s harder to prove in numbers but delivers a good feeling. For example, customers who are happy they can call and have the person know everything about their account. The peace of mind you get from simply knowing you’re good on compliance. And for West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service, M365 Copilot helps to support staff with dyslexia.

Step 4: Include your required resources

Successful M365 Copilot adoption requires more than a license. You need an AI strategy, implementation plan – potentially partner support. Here, understanding your readiness for M365 Copilot is essential because it sets you up for success. Rather than hit issues along the way, you need be sure to lay good foundations on which to build your AI-powered business.

At Phoenix, we have over 30 years’ experience of software licensing and transformational infrastructure solutions, coupled with the insight and innovation of our delivery consultants. We’ve done it all before, which means we’re perfectly placed to advise customers on every aspect of their strategy from concept, design, and deployment through to software licence management, security, cost optimisation, and compliance.