Smart Skills Monthly - November 26

Smart Skills Academy's monthly download on Excel, Word, PowerPoint & Copilot - what's new, what's changed, and what's worth trying.

A NOTE FROM GEMMA

“This month Copilot has been busy with the jobs nobody enjoys - tidying messy data, citing its sources and keeping your slides on-brand. Here's your quick, practical round-up of what's new in Excel, Word, PowerPoint and Copilot, plus one tip you can put to use today.”

- Gemma, Smart Skills Academy

EXCEL UPDATE

Let Copilot Tidy Your Data

We've all been there: a spreadsheet exported from another system, full of extra spaces, mixed-up dates, duplicates and blank rows. Copilot's new Clean Data feature scans your data, flags the problems it finds, explains each one in plain English and suggests a fix. You decide which changes to accept.

It's a real time-saver, but it doesn't replace your judgement. Check what it's changing before you accept, especially in data you'll report on. The feature started rolling out in October to people with a Microsoft 365 Copilot licence, so look for it in the Copilot pane.

WORD UPDATE

Copilot Shows Its Sources

When Copilot drafts or answers something in Word, it can now tell you where the information came from. Citations link to web pages or to your own work content, such as files in OneDrive or SharePoint, emails and meeting notes, so you can check them in one click.

This is a big step for trust, but a citation isn't a guarantee. Copilot can still point to an old draft or misread a source, so check any figures, dates and names before you share. Microsoft says it's rolling out now, but it may not have reached you yet. In the meantime, you can simply ask Copilot to “add citations to this draft”.

POWERPOINT UPDATE

On-Brand Slides Every Time

How many decks have you seen with the wrong font, an old logo or a colour that's almost right? Copilot in PowerPoint can now follow your organisation's own rules. A brand manager uploads “skills” to the Brand Kit, setting out how presentations should be built: layout, structure, tone and style. Everyone with Copilot in PowerPoint can then use them to create decks that look and sound like your organisation from the start.

There's one catch: someone has to set it up first. If your slides could do with more consistency, ask your comms or brand team whether a Brand Kit is in place.

COPILOT CORNER

Your Copilot Pages Are Moving

If you use Copilot Pages to save and build on Copilot's answers, or Copilot Notebooks to gather project notes, here's a useful heads-up. New Pages and Notebooks will now save into your OneDrive, next to your Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. That makes them easier to find, share and manage, and your organisation's usual retention and security rules will apply to them too.

Existing Pages stay where they are. You don't need to do anything, as the change is rolling out between mid-October and late November.

QUICK TIP OF THE MONTH

Press Ctrl+Shift+L to switch filters on or off in Excel instantly. No more hunting through the Data tab, and it works perfectly alongside this month's Clean Data feature.