| Title | UK Govt Study: Copilot AI Saved Workers 26 Minutes a Day | |
| Date | Sunday June 08, @08:12AM | |
| Author | hubie | |
| Topic | ||
| from the finish-early-and-go-to-the-pub dept. | ||
Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
The United Kingdom's Government Digital Service (GDS) has found that giving civil service employees access to Microsoft 365 Copilot saved them an average 26 minutes per day on office tasks.
Microsoft 365 Copilot provides generative AI assistance with various Microsoft Office applications like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams. It allows workers to accomplish some tasks through a natural language chat interface instead of mouse movements and menu clicks.
UK Technology Secretary Peter Kyle discussed the results of the study in a presentation at SWSX London.
"Whether it’s helping draft documents, preparing lesson plans, or cutting down on routine admin, AI tools are saving civil servants time every day. That means we can focus more on delivering faster, more personalised support where it really counts," said Kyle in a statement
The GDS ran a trial of Microsoft M365 Copilot with 20,000 government employees from September 30, 2024, through December 31, 2024.
Based on self-reported data, the resulting study [PDF] showed fairly consistent time savings across professions and organizational ranks, though precise tool use and benefits varied.
"Over 70 percent of users agreed that M365 Copilot reduced time spent searching for information, performing mundane tasks, and increased time spent on more strategic activities," the report says.
"Perceived concerns with security and the handling of sensitive data led to reduced benefits in a minority of cases. Limitations were observed when dealing with complex, nuanced, or data-heavy aspects of work."
The report claims if the reported time savings were replicated across a full working year, "users could save 13 days."
[...] The study didn't investigate whether the workers used this extra time to do more work, take extra time for lunch, or head off to the pub early. "Due to experimental constraints it was not possible to identify how time saved was spent," the report says.
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printed from SoylentNews, UK Govt Study: Copilot AI Saved Workers 26 Minutes a Day on 2025-06-25 08:31:52