You'll understand why Microsoft Copilot is the council's approved AI tool for now and what that means in practice, recognise the information that must never go into an AI tool, write a clear Copilot prompt and know why it works, and set up a Word document with heading styles and a table of contents so Copilot can help you with it.
Where this training sits: the council's AI direction
The council is putting an AI governance policy in place, and this training is the practical side of it. The short version for everyday work is simple: for now, the one approved AI tool is Microsoft Copilot inside Microsoft 365, and these sessions are about using it well and safely.
The reason the council names an approved tool matters. When you use Copilot inside the council's Microsoft 365, your work stays inside the council's own Microsoft environment; it is not handed to an outside company to keep. The free consumer tools, the public versions of ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini, sit outside that boundary. Once council information is pasted into one of them, you cannot take it back. That is why the council is building an approved-tools list and asking staff to reach for Copilot rather than whatever they happen to find online.
Good things to use Copilot for
- Drafting and redrafting documents, notices and emails; it gives you a first version in seconds.
- Summarising a long document into plain-language points.
- Turning rough meeting notes into a first set of minutes and action items.
- Getting a first outline for a presentation or report so you are not staring at a blank screen.
Keep out of any AI tool
- Personal information about staff or community members; names with contact details, addresses, health or financial details.
- Anything confidential or commercial-in-confidence.
- Culturally sensitive or community information.
- Any decision that affects a person; Copilot can help you prepare the work, but a person makes the decision, and Copilot's output is never the official record on its own.
The one habit that carries all of this: read and correct whatever Copilot gives you before it counts. It is a fast first-drafter, not the final word.
The national law is still taking shape, and it is worth knowing roughly where it is heading. There is a short presentation on the site that covers the current picture in plain terms.
Australia's AI Laws: What's ComingPresentation · opens in a new windowCopilot is the tool the council has chosen for this work. So what is it?
What Copilot actually is
Copilot is Microsoft's AI assistant, built into the apps you already use: Word, Outlook, Teams, Excel and PowerPoint. You ask it for something in plain English, and it drafts, rewrites, summarises or explains, right there in the document or the email you are working on.
Underneath, Copilot works by predicting text a piece at a time, from patterns it has learned across an enormous amount of writing. That is what makes it such a good first-drafter, and it is also why it can sound completely confident and still be wrong. It is not looking up a fact in a filing cabinet; it is producing something that reads well. The rule that never changes: you read what it gives you, and you are the one responsible for it.
How AI Predicts the Next WordOpens in a new windowWhat stays out of AI tools
Before anyone puts council information into Copilot, it is worth being clear about what counts as personal or sensitive. Personal information is anything that identifies a person; a name together with contact details, an address, a date of birth, health or financial details, or anything about an identifiable community member. Alongside that sits confidential council information and culturally sensitive community information. The council's Code of Conduct already treats all of this as confidential, and using an AI tool does not change that obligation.
The quick test before you type: would you be comfortable if this appeared outside the council? If the answer is no, take the identifying details out first. The prompt examples further down show how to do that in practice, using first names or a role instead of full details.
A few short, hands-on tools back this up. Work through them to keep your accounts and the council's information safe.
Password SecurityOpens in a new window MFA & Account Security slide deckOpens in a new window Wi-Fi SettingsOpens in a new window Spot the ScamOpens in a new windowFive prompts to try in Copilot
A good prompt does four things: it tells Copilot who you are and who the writing is for, gives it the context it needs, shows it what a good answer looks like, and keeps identifying details out. Here are five you can copy straight into a Copilot chat and adapt to your own work. The note under each one explains why it works.
Prompt 1 · a staff notice
You are writing for Roper Gulf Regional Council staff. Draft a short, friendly notice that the office will close at 1pm this Friday for a power upgrade, tell people who to contact for urgent matters, and say when it reopens. Keep it to four sentences in plain English.
Why it works: it says who the writing is for and the tone to use, gives the specific facts the notice needs, and sets the length. The urgent contact is given as a role rather than a person's name, so no personal details go in.
Prompt 2 · turn the course outline into a sign-up message
Reduce the course outline below into something much shorter, then write a quick, friendly message I can circulate to my team so they sign up. Say plainly what the course covers across the weeks, keep it warm, and keep it under 150 words. Here is the outline:
Roper Gulf Regional Council Digital and AI Literacy online course (2026). A practical course helping staff use Microsoft Copilot and the wider Microsoft 365 toolset with confidence, safety and good judgement; built for a workforce spread across the region and much of it working remotely, and meeting people at the level they are actually at, from first steps with digital tools through to folding AI into daily work.
Week 1 · Digital and AI Literacy, Information Security, and Getting Started with Copilot and Word. What Copilot and generative AI is and where it is unreliable; recognising personal and sensitive information and why it stays out of AI tools; RGRC information security and acceptable use; Copilot in Word to draft and refine; heading styles and consistent layout; Copilot in PowerPoint to outline slides, and the orientation deck brief.
Week 2 · Microsoft Teams: Meetings, Presenting, and Minute Writing. Joining and running a Teams meeting; sharing screen and the core controls; scheduling and chairing; Teams Premium recording, transcript and recap; turning a transcript into minutes and action items; consent to be recorded, with care for sensitive meetings.
Week 3 · Homework Week (no live session). Finalise a working orientation deck for your own role and location; practise the first two weeks' skills independently, and note any questions for the next session.
Week 4 · Microsoft 365 in Practice: Presenting, File Sharing, and Copilot for Email. Present your deck live in a Teams meeting; share and collaborate on files across the Microsoft cloud; apply security permissions when sharing; use Copilot to draft and refine emails and link documents; revisit the Teams Premium features.
Week 5 · Microsoft Excel with Copilot. Enter, sort and filter data; basic formulas; format cells including dates; use Copilot in Excel to explain functions and suggest formulas while you learn the tool.
Week 6 · Wrap Up and Questions. Bring the skills together and identify where you will use them; resolve outstanding questions about the tools and RGRC's expectations; a short demonstration of generative AI image creation.
Why it works: Copilot compresses far more accurately when it has the whole source in front of it, so the full outline goes in; the prompt sets who the message is for, its purpose and its length. This is pretty generic course information; nothing in it is someone's personal details, or confidential to a person or a community, so there is nothing to take out first. It is also a neat demonstration of turning a long document into a short, usable message.
Prompt 3 · improve the tone of an email
Rewrite the message below so it is clear, polite and easy to read, in Australian English. Keep it professional and warm, and keep it under 120 words. Here is roughly what I want to say: hi [name], was really good to finally meet you when you were up our way. followin on from our chat im keen to get moving on some ai and online security training for our staff, sort of like what youve been runnin down in alice springs. most of our mob are spread right across the region and alot of them work remote, so i was thinkin we run it online over a few weeks so everyone can join in from wherever they are. woudl be great to hear what worked well with your rollout and if theres anything we can share. can prob jump on a teams call next week to sort out some dates. cheers [name]
Why it works: it hands Copilot a rough, dashed-off note to tidy rather than asking it to invent from nothing; the typos and shorthand are exactly the kind of thing it fixes, while you set the tone, the language and the length. The names are left as placeholders, so nothing personal goes in.
Prompt 4 · turn rough notes into minutes
Turn the rough meeting notes below into tidy minutes, with a short summary and a list of action items showing who is doing what. Use first names or roles only. Flag anything that reads like a decision so I can check it. Here are the notes: [paste your notes]
Why it works: it sets the output shape, a summary plus actions with owners, cleanses identifiers up front by asking for first names or roles only, and asks Copilot to flag decisions so you verify them. AI-written minutes are a draft, never the record until a person has checked them.
Prompt 5 · a first outline for a presentation
You are helping me plan a short orientation presentation about my team at Roper Gulf Regional Council, useful for a new starter or a visitor. Draft an outline of about eight slides covering: our building and how to get around, safety and who to call, who is who in the team, where we fit in the council, and what our area does. Give each slide a title and three short bullet points, in plain English.
Why it works: it sets the purpose and the audience, lists exactly what to cover so the outline is genuinely useful, and asks for a clear structure of titles and bullets you can build straight from. This is your head start for the project further down; no names or community details are needed for an outline.
Word: clean documents Copilot can actually use
Word has two kinds of users. The first writes by making the current line bold, or bigger, or centred, until the page looks right. The second writes by applying heading styles and trusts Word to make it look right. For a one-page letter, either is fine. For anything longer, the second is the only approach that does not turn into a mess, and it is also what lets Copilot help you.
Styles are named labels, not just formatting. "Heading 1" is not simply big bold text; it tells Word that the line is a top-level heading. Apply Heading 2 to a sub-heading, Normal to body text. The payoff comes later: change a style once and every heading of that kind updates across the whole document, instead of you re-formatting each one by hand.
Once your headings are real headings, two things become free. The navigation pane (View, Navigation Pane) shows your document's structure down the side, so you can jump around and even drag whole sections to reorder them. And a table of contents (References, Table of Contents) builds itself from those headings and updates when they change; no typing, no broken page numbers.
This is also what makes a document a good input for Copilot. When the structure is explicit, Copilot can see what is a heading and what is body text, so its summaries and rewrites are far better. A well-structured document is a good input to an AI; a messy one is a coin flip.
Find the Styles gallery
On the Home ribbon, the row of named boxes: Normal, Heading 1, Heading 2, and so on. Click a paragraph, click the style. Done.
Apply as you write
Type a heading, then press Ctrl+Alt+1 for Heading 1, or Ctrl+Alt+2 for Heading 2. A small habit with a large payoff.
Modify once, it propagates
Right-click a style, Modify, change the font or colour. Every paragraph of that style updates instantly across the document.
Let the contents page build itself
References, Table of Contents, pick a style. Word builds it from your headings; click Update whenever they change.
Your project: the orientation presentation
Across the coming weeks you will build one practical thing: a short, professional orientation presentation about your team and your worksite. It is designed to be reusable; the same deck should work whether you are introducing your area to a new starter on their first day, or to a visitor such as a Minister or the Chief Minister.
It gives a clear snapshot of your building and worksite location, the essential safety points for the office, your role and the team around you, the basic structure of that team, and where your area fits in the council and what it does. You will set it up now with a Copilot outline (Prompt 5 above is your head start), build it over the homework week, and present it later in the course.
Keep it safe: no personal details or community information goes into Copilot; use first names or job titles only, and use your own photos of the building and worksite.
Recap, and what is coming
Today set the ground to stand on: why Copilot is the council's approved tool, what stays out of any AI tool, what Copilot is and how to prompt it well, and how to set up a Word document it can help you with. Next time we move into Microsoft Teams: joining and running meetings, and turning a transcript into usable minutes.