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This episode explores how Microsoft Planner is evolving into a practical, AI-assisted project management tool for modern teams. Cindy Lewis explains how Planner fits into daily work through Microsoft Teams, how AI agents support planning, reporting, and risk assessment, and why small usability improvements matter. The discussion also covers Copilot, Dataverse, Power BI, and the shift from automation to agent-style AI that actively helps manage work. 

🎙 Full Show Notes
https://www.microsoftinnovationpodcast.com/828 

👉 What you’ll learn     

• How Microsoft Planner fits into modern, collaborative project management 
• Where AI adds value in planning, reporting, and risk management 
• Differences between Planner basic and premium plans and why they are merging 
• How Copilot supports everyday productivity beyond automation 
• Why data, feedback, and adoption timing matter for real-world AI impact 

✅ Highlights     

• “Everybody starts with a plan, whether or not you’re trained in project management.” 
• “The future is collaboration and artificial intelligence, not desktop-only tools.” 
• “We need to be able to ask a question of my plan and get the answer back.” 
• “AI is doing a really nice status report that used to take hours of work.” 
• “The average person doesn’t even know enough to know what it could do.” 
• “They’ve made it so you can’t make the most common project management mistakes.” 
• “Power BI is the winner if you want resource capacity across portfolios.” 
• “Most companies are not ready, even though the future is already here.” 
• “A lot of what people call AI is really automation.” 
• “It’s the little annoying things that Microsoft is fixing that people don’t notice.” 

🧰 Mentioned     

• Microsoft Planner: https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-365/planner  
• Microsoft Teams: https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-teams  
• Microsoft Project: https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-365/project/project-management  
• Microsoft To Do: https://to-do.microsoft.com 
• Microsoft Copilot: https://www.copilot.com  
• Planner Agent: https://support.microsoft.com/office/access-planner-agent-86bf60a1-239d-4c37-b7b6-9a4111e1cc02 
• Microsoft MVP YouTube Series - How to Become a Microsoft MVP - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzf0yupPbVkqdRJDPVE4PtTlm6quDhiu7 

✅ Keywords      
microsoft planner, project management, ai agents, copilot, microsoft teams, dataverse, power bi, task management, productivity, automation, collaboration, planning

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Thanks for listening 🚀 - Mark Smith