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Work IQ

Work IQ is the intelligence layer that personalizes Microsoft 365 Copilot to you and your organization. It is the "brain" behind Copilot that understands context, relationships, and work patterns, so Copilot and agents can be faster, more accurate, and more secure.

Work IQ is comprised of three tightly integrated layers—data, context, and skills & tools.

Multi-Model Foundation

Microsoft 365 Copilot brings leading models from multiple providers directly into Copilot experiences:

  • Model choice - Copilot chat users can choose foundation models from OpenAI, Anthropic, and other providers
  • Task optimization - Copilot applies the right model for the task at hand
  • Advanced reasoning - Work IQ complements models' advanced reasoning and multi-step capabilities

Data Layer

The foundation of Work IQ is its secure access to and understanding of both structured and unstructured data:

  • Microsoft 365 tenant data - Permission-based content from SharePoint, OneDrive, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook emails, Teams meetings and chats
  • Rich metadata and signals - Patterns of action, activity, collaboration, and communication between users and groups
  • Copilot Connectors - Ingest business data from non-Microsoft systems using hundreds of pre-built connectors or custom connectors
  • Dynamics 365 and Power Apps integration - Reason across productivity data and business data from systems of record in Dataverse

Context Layer

Work IQ expands implicit grounding with an evolving layer of insights that enhance speed and accuracy:

  • Work understanding - Skills, projects, collaboration frequency, critical workflows, and communication velocity
  • Copilot memory - Personalization through custom instructions and saved memories that enable increasingly personal responses
  • Semantic index - Meaning-based retrieval using semantic understanding rather than keyword matching
  • Business understanding - Ontologies and glossaries capturing procedural knowledge from existing business workflows

Skills & Tools

Work IQ includes agentic skills that provide specialized instructions to Copilot and agents:

  • Specialized skills - Instructions optimized for specific tasks like scheduling meetings, retrieving external data, or accessing meeting transcripts
  • Custom toolsets - MCP server tools, agent flows, APIs, and plugins that execute against agentic skill intent
  • Extensibility - Build agents and add skills and tools that work with Work IQ orchestration services

Security, Privacy, and Compliance

Work IQ is designed from the ground up to respect enterprise security requirements:

  • Permission inheritance - Respects existing user permissions, Security Group assignments, and sensitivity labels
  • Data Loss Prevention - Honors DLP policies across all Work IQ operations
  • Regulatory compliance - Compliant with GDPR, EU Data Boundary, and regional legal requirements

Experiences and Extensibility

Work IQ is deeply integrated into Copilot across all surfaces:

  • Copilot Chat - Work toggle activates Work IQ intelligence
  • Microsoft 365 apps - Full Work IQ capabilities in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Teams
  • Dynamics 365 and Power Apps - Work IQ enriched with Dataverse data
  • Work IQ API - RESTful interface for developers to build agents grounded in live work context with enterprise-grade identity and security

Coming soon...

We're currently working on this content. Check back soon for hands-on labs and tutorials covering Work IQ implementation and best practices.