Description
What? Tell Copilot a task you need to do and it will break it down into a series of subtasks, and create a table that you can download as a spreadsheet so you can monitor your progress.
Why? Breaking down tasks into subtasks can make them less daunting and help us more effectively estimate how long things will take.
Instructions
Step 1: Think of a task that you need to complete in the near future, or one that you recently completed (so you can compare what you actually did to Copilot’s suggestions).
Step 2: Go to Copilot (office.com/chat) and sign in with your Coventry account. If you’re already using Copilot, just select the ‘New chat’ button at the top right.
Step 3: Start the conversation by copying and pasting the following prompt into Copilot, then select the ‘Submit’ button (the arrow at the bottom-right):
🤖 Prompt (click to expand, then copy and paste into Copilot)
Your goal is to help me breakdown a complicated task. First ask me what the task is. Wait for my response. Then break the task down into a series of subtasks. Create a table with two columns – task and status. Ask me if I’d like any changes to the subtasks, or if I would like any more columns to be added to the table.
Step 4: Copilot should ask you to describe the task. Type your response into the text box and select ‘Submit’.
Step 5: Tell Copilot if you’d like it to make any changes to the subtasks or the table. If you want to download the table, tell Copilot ‘Create a spreadsheet with the table’. It should produce a link to a .xlsx Excel file. Sometimes this can be a bit buggy – see ‘Can Copilot create spreadsheets?’ in the FAQ for further guidance.
Important: Always check Copilot’s output. Generative AI tools can hallucinate (create plausible but incorrect information).