Copilot business case
The Copilot case tab sets the modelled benefit of Microsoft 365 Copilot against its licence cost, by fit tier, for the whole workforce. It rescores the staff list's rows in the browser, so changes to its assumptions show immediately.
The assumptions on this tab are a working model for exploring the case, so anyone on the engagement can change them, viewers included, and nothing is saved. To keep a set of assumptions, build a rollout plan (which saves its own), or include a saved plan in the Copilot business case export.
Headline figures
| Tile | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Modelled annual benefit | The benefit if every person held a licence (N licences, whole workforce). |
| Annual licence cost | Licences × the monthly price × 12 (at £23.10 a user a month). |
| Return on licence cost | Benefit ÷ licence cost (for example 7.4×), with the net benefit a year. |
| Payback | Months for the benefit to repay the licence cost, for example 2 months. Beyond ten years it reads Over 10 years; if the benefit never covers the cost, No payback. |
Fit tiers
Each role gets a fit tier that reflects how central Word, Outlook, Teams, Excel and PowerPoint are to the role's day:
| Tier | Typical roles | Share of value captured (default) |
|---|---|---|
| High fit | Knowledge and office roles: legal, leadership, consulting, finance, commercial, HR, compliance. | 100% |
| Medium fit | Office work plus heavy line-of-business systems, such as claims or legal case management and finance operations. | 50% |
| Low fit | Phone- or field-based roles, such as adjusters, surveyors, call and case management. | 15% |
| Uncategorised | Roles the taxonomy couldn't place. No benefit modelled. | 0% |
How a role's tier is decided:
- the engagement's industry pack lists (for example, the banking pack marks compliance and risk roles as high fit);
- for roles classified to a US SOC occupation (by AI, the cache, the pack or an override), the tier for the occupation's SOC major group;
- for rule-classified roles, the reference data's high, low and no-benefit role lists;
- otherwise the default tier (Medium fit, as shipped).
The tier lists and labels are reference data.
The benefit model
For each person:
benefit = employer cost × value base × productivity realised × fit share
| Assumption | Default | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Licence price (£ per user per month) | £23.10 | We use the client's quote where there is one. Microsoft's UK list price for Microsoft 365 Copilot (enterprise), paid yearly, excluding VAT, checked 2 October 2026. |
| Productivity realised | 20% | The share of the value base that converts to realisable value (2% to 50%). |
| Value base | Augmentation headroom | Only work AI accelerates but doesn't replace — the cautious default. That is augmentation − automation. The alternative, Full augmentation, uses the whole augmentation share (the deployment-deck model). |
| Share of value Copilot captures, by fit tier | 100% / 50% / 15% | Sliders for high, medium and low fit, under a fold-out of that name. |
Reset returns every assumption to the reference data defaults.
Where the benefit sits, by fit tier
A bar per tier and a table by Fit tier with Licences, Average augmentation, Benefit per licence, Benefit and Net (benefit less licence cost). High-fit roles usually carry most of the value per licence.
If we only buy N licences
If we only buy N licences, where do they land? Set a Licence budget (500 by default). Licences fill the roles with the highest benefit per licence first. The result shows Licences allocated, Benefit captured, Share of total benefit and Net benefit, and a table of each Role (priority order) with its Fit, Licences, Per licence, Captured and Running total.
This is a quick single-number view. For wave-by-wave plans by tenant, net of existing licence holders, use the Rollout plan tab.
Methodology and sources
The last card lists the provenance of every Copilot figure: the licence price and fit shares are assumptions; fit tiers are classified by disclosed rules; ROI, net benefit and payback are derived.
In deliverables
- Exports → Copilot business case: an HTML report with the fit tiers, benefit against licence cost and where licences land first, optionally with a saved rollout plan's waves by tenant. See Exports.
- Rollout plan → Deployment deck: a PowerPoint for the chosen plan.