Microsoft announced Copilot Wave 3 on 9 March, and this is the most significant update to its AI assistant since it first launched in Microsoft 365.
The headline shift is this: Copilot is no longer just a tool you prompt for a single output. It can now handle multi-step tasks across your apps autonomously, working through a sequence of actions while you stay in control of the decisions.
If you use Microsoft 365 (Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Teams) some of these changes are already rolling out to you.
What’s actually new
The biggest addition for day-to-day EA work is the Project Manager Agent, currently in preview and rolling out worldwide in April.
It handles AI-assisted project tracking and task management. Think of it as an AI coordinator that understands a project’s structure and history, tracks progress and flags what needs attention. Rather than manually maintaining task lists and chasing status updates, you can delegate that layer of coordination to Copilot.
In Outlook, Copilot can now flag all unread emails from a specific sender, archive threads by project and set up automatic replies using natural language – no digging through settings needed. For EAs managing high-volume inboxes on behalf of executives, the practical time saving here is real.
Word and PowerPoint have both become more agentic too. In Word, Copilot now edits documents directly in the main chat experience rather than needing you to switch modes. In PowerPoint, it can build or refine a full presentation through conversation, pulling from files, emails and meetings – and applying brand kit templates automatically.
There’s also a new Gmail and Google Calendar integration, meaning Copilot can now search and reference both Microsoft and Google accounts from a single interface. For anyone who works across both platforms, that removes a layer of app-switching.
The broader shift
Wave 3 marks a change in what Copilot is designed to do. Earlier versions were built around single prompts and single outputs – you asked, it answered.
The new version is built around execution over time. You assign a task, Copilot breaks it into steps, works through them and surfaces the output – with the ability to review, steer or stop it at any point.
Microsoft prices Copilot as an add-on to Microsoft 365 Business Standard. If your organisation already has Copilot licences, the Wave 3 features are rolling out now. If it doesn’t, this update makes a stronger case for the investment than previous versions did.
Worth knowing
The Steuart Snooks piece running on the site next week is a good read alongside this one. His argument is that AI tools can help you move faster through email but the underlying triage habits still need to be yours. Both things are true.
