Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast

By Ben Stegink, Scott HoagNews Technology Education How To Tech News

Favorites
28
Followers
Typical duration
41 min
per episode

Based on Podcast App listening data

Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast episodes

September 11, 2025Episode 410 – Joy and Jay take over and talk Change Management
**
Welcome to Episode 410 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast where hosts Jay Leask and Joy Apple are joined by special guest Ben Stegink for a discussion recorded live from the North American Cloud and Collaboration Summit in Branson. In this episode we focus on how organizations must adapt their change management approaches for the Microsoft 365 cloud environment.We discuss the fundamental shift from traditional IT operations, where organizations controlled software update timing, to cloud-based services with continuous updates outside of their control. Jay and Joy emphasize that successful modern IT requires cross-functional teams where IT partners closely with business units, communications, and training departments rather than operating in isolation. We then talk about the need for a shift in governance models to empower business users while requiring IT to balance user control with necessary oversight.Key themes include the importance of ongoing communication and adoption strategies, using tools like Viva Engage communities for peer-to-peer support, and adopting a “yes, and” approach to business requests rather than defaulting to “no.” The episode emphasizes treating technology deployment as an ongoing service relationship rather than a one-time project, which is essential for success in the rapidly evolving cloud environment.
Show Notes
Joy Apple
Joy is a Microsoft MVP and Director of Success and Enablement at Orchestry. With years of experience as an information technologist, I’m dedicated to helping organizations implement technology with a purpose-driven, “human-first” approach, ensuring tools like Microsoft 365 empower people to do their best work.
Teaching and knowledge-sharing are at the heart of what I do. Whether it’s through volunteering in the Microsoft Community, speaking at events, or writing as the “Joy of SharePoint,” I’m passionate about helping others unlock their potential with modern workplace solutions.
Im also a cohost of the Guardians of M365 Governance podcast, where I explore the challenges and rewards of governance, and a columnist for She is Tulsa, a quarterly magazine celebrating impactful stories from my local community.
Outside of work, you’ll often find me enjoying live music or discovering new spots in Tulsa, Oklahoma, combining my love of connection and creativity wherever I go.
Jay Leask
Jay is a Principal Technical Architect at the Washington DC Microsoft Innovation Hub specializing in Modern Work. Jay facilitates discussions on modern IT practices, using 20 years of IT experience to engage customers in solutions design with a focus on increased the value and decreased risk within collaboration investments. His focus over the last 15 years has been on public sector organizations including state, local, and Federal government, as well as education institutions.
Links
Joy Apple on LinkedIn
Connect with Jay
Microsoft 365 Change Guide
Stay on top of changes in Microsoft 365
Microsoft 365 Roadmap
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource** for your organization? Let us know!
33 min
August 28, 2025Episode 409 – Preparing for Copilot- Securing Your Microsoft 365 Data and Beyond
Welcome to Episode 409 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. In this episode, Ben and Scott explore the configuration decisions tenant administrators face when preparing their Microsoft 365 environment for Copilot deployment. They dive into the key questions every IT professional should be asking: How do you identify and remediate oversharing in SharePoint sites before Copilot can access that content? What governance controls should be in place to prevent sensitive data from being discoverable through organization-wide search? The hosts examine practical tools for identifying high-risk sites and content, how to control which sites appear in Copilot results, and other configuration options that allow you to optimize how Copilot processes organizational content.
Show Notes
Data, Privacy, and Security for Microsoft 365 Copilot
Apply principles of Zero Trust to Microsoft 365 Copilot
Get started with data explorer
Data access governance reports for SharePoint sites
Semantic indexing for Microsoft 365 Copilot
Restrict discovery of SharePoint sites and content
A glimpse into the future of file sharing in Microsoft 365
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
40 min
August 14, 2025Episode 408 – Model Context Protocol (MCP) Part 2: Getting the Most Out of MCP Servers
Welcome to Episode 408 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. Part two of our exploration into Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers continues our hands-on discussion about finding, implementing, and getting the most out of MCP servers in your daily workflows.
Show Notes
Silicon Valley: Gilfoyle Made A Bot (Season 6 Episode 1 Clip) | HBO
Lokka
What is the Azure MCP Server (Preview)?
Microsoft Learn Docs MCP Server overview
Notion MCP
Introducing Slack MCP Support
Model Context Protocol servers
Docker MCP Catalog
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
37 min
July 31, 2025Episode 407 – Model Context Protocol (MCP) Part 1: The USB Port of AI Communications
Welcome to Episode 407 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. In this episode, we dive deep into the Model Context Protocol (MCP) – a game-changing specification that’s extending the capabilities of Large Language Models (LLMs) and creating exciting new possibilities for IT professionals working with Microsoft Azure and Microsoft 365.
MCP represents a significant shift toward more extensible and domain-specific AI interactions. Instead of being limited to pre-trained knowledge, you can now connect your AI tools directly to live data sources, APIs, and services that matter to your specific role and organization.
Whether you’re managing Azure infrastructure, creating content, or developing solutions, MCP provides a framework to make your AI interactions more powerful and contextually relevant to your daily workflows.
Show Notes
Introducing the Model Context Protocol
Understanding MCP server concepts
Understanding MCP client concepts
A list of applications that support MCP integrations
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
31 min
July 17, 2025Episode 406 – Agents of Insight: Copilot in Action and Sentinel on the Move
Welcome to Episode 406 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. In this episode, Ben and Scott discuss their recent experiences and thoughts on Microsoft’s Copilot features and agents, specifically focusing on the Researcher and Analyst agents. They share practical applications and benefits of these tools, such as using Researcher for meeting preparations and Analyst for exploring data, summarizing data, and even coming up with python script to use with data. Additionally, they cover the upcoming migration of Microsoft Sentinel to the Defender portal, discussing its implications and potential future changes for other security tools. The episode ends with a teaser about an upcoming discussion on MCPs for AI!
Show Notes
Introducing Researcher and Analyst in Microsoft 365 Copilot
Introducing Deep Research in Azure AI Foundry Agent Service
Get started with Researcher in Microsoft 365 Copilot
Researcher agent in Microsoft 365 Copilot
Analyst agent in Microsoft 365 Copilot
Get started with Analyst in Microsoft 365 Copilot
New reasoning agents: Researcher and Analyst in Microsoft 365 Copilot
Planning your move to Microsoft Defender portal for all Microsoft Sentinel customers
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
37 min
July 03, 2025Episode 405 – Loop, Loop Workspaces, Loop Pages, Copilot Pages, Copilot Notebooks, Copilot Notebooks in OneNote Notebooks
Welcome to Episode 405 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. In this episode, Ben and Scott tackle the increasingly complex world of Microsoft’s notebook ecosystem, exploring the new Copilot notebooks feature and how it relates to existing tools like OneNote and Loop. They break down the confusing landscape where “a notebook is not a notebook unless a notebook is a notebook in the right place.”
Show Notes
Overview of Copilot Pages and Copilot Notebooks storage | Microsoft Learn
Overview of Copilot Pages, Copilot Notebooks, and Loop workspaces permissions
Overview of Loop storage | Microsoft Learn
Copilot Pages, OneNote, Loop…where should I store my notes and tasks?
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
27 min
June 20, 2025Episode 404: The Microsoft 365 Landing Page Shake-Up
Welcome to Episode 404 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. In this episode, Ben and Scott discuss the latest change Microsoft has rolled out to the Microsoft 365 user experience, redirecting users from the familiar portal.office.com to a new Copilot-centric landing page. This shift has caught many IT professionals off guard, rendering existing training documentation obsolete and creating user confusion across organizations.
Show Notes
WTF is happening with office.com?
New Microsoft 365 Home Page
How to Use the NEW Microsoft 365 Copilot Experience!
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
38 min
June 05, 2025Episode 403 – Catching up on all the news from Microsoft Build 2025
Welcome to Episode 403 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast where Ben and Scott catch up on some of their favorite announcements and news from Microsoft Build 2025.
Show Notes
Introducing Microsoft 365 Copilot Tuning
New Microsoft 365 Copilot Tuning | Create fine-tuned models to write like you do
Behind the Curtain: A white-collar bloodbath
Announcing Microsoft Entra Agent ID: Secure and manage your AI agents
Enterprise-grade controls for AI apps and agents built with Azure AI Foundry and Copilot Studio
Quickstart: View enterprise applications
BRK195: Inside Azure innovations with Mark Russinovich
Microsoft Build 2025 – BOOK OF NEWS
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
40 min
May 22, 2025Episode 402 – Declarative Agents with Andrew Connell
Welcome to Episode 402 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. In today’s episode, we’re thrilled to have Andrew Connell (AC) joining us once again. If you’ve been with us for a while, you’ll recognize AC as a repeat guest and one of the early voices who encouraged us to launch this podcast. In this episode, we’re diving deep into the world of Microsoft Copilot agents from a bit of a developer’s perspective . We expand on insights from Episode 400 and helping us understand some additional intricacies of how Copilot works under the hood. We’ll break down the different billing models and some limitations in what they provide and why having at least one $30 license is key to unlocking the semantic index. We’ll also explore how Copilot uses semantic indexing to ground responses in your organization’s data, and how it respects user permissions through access control lists. But it’s not all smooth sailing—AC also walks us through some of the current limitations, like missing metadata and large file indexing. He also shares a potential workaround using Azure AI Search for those needing more comprehensive coverage. Finally, we this weeks Microsoft Build Conference and tease a potential future episode where ACw will return to talk about custom Copilot development.
Andrew Connell
LinkedIn
YouTube
BlueSky
Newsletter: The Full Stack Dev’s Microsoft 365 Playbook
Podcast: Code. Deploy. Go Live. – codedeploygo.live
Code. Deploy. Go Live on YouTube
Show Notes
Episode 400 – Microsoft 365 Copilot Declarative Agents and Copilot Studio Agent Builder
Create Copilot agents in Microsoft 365 Business Chat and Teams
Grounding an agent to specific public websites
Semantic indexing for Microsoft 365 Copilot
Data, Privacy, and Security for Microsoft 365 Copilot
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource** for your organization? Let us know!
34 min
May 08, 2025Episode 401 – Zero Trust in Microsoft 365
Welcome to Episode 401 of the Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast. In this episode, Ben Stegink and Scott Hoag dive into the intricacies of implementing Zero Trust principles within Microsoft 365 environments. They explore the foundational aspects of Zero Trust, starting with identity management and the importance of Entra ID. They also cover:
Identity Management: The critical role of identity in Zero Trust, including MFA, password policies, and least privilege access.
Endpoint Security: Strategies for verifying and managing devices, including compliance checks and the balance between corporate and BYOD devices.
Networking: The complexities of securing network traffic in a SaaS environment, including conditional access policies and the emerging Global Secure Access feature.
Application Management: The role of Defender for Cloud in monitoring shadow IT and ensuring data security across various applications.
Data Protection: Techniques for safeguarding sensitive information, including DLP policies and the upcoming network-level DLP capabilities.
Join us as we unpack these topics and provide practical insights for enhancing your organization’s security posture with Zero Trust.
Show Notes
Zero Trust deployment for technology pillars
Securing identity with Zero Trust
Secure endpoints with Zero Trust
Secure endpoints with Zero Trust
Secure applications with Zero Trust
Secure data with Zero Trust
Microsoft Zero Trust Assessment
About the sponsors
Would you like to become the irreplaceable Microsoft 365 resource for your organization? Let us know!
40 min