Business teams have long known that traditional extended planning and analysis (xP&A) can be time-consuming, especially for those seeking insights without IT support. But thanks to technologies like ChatGPT and Copilot for Power BI, businesses now have the opportunity to leverage conversational and generative AI to access new insights and analyze data faster and more accurately than ever before.
Microsoft 365 users have benefited from several new features and enhancements during the past couple of years, including the introduction of Microsoft Fabric and the addition of AI capabilities throughout the product suite. Now, they can leverage AI for Power BI to get even more out of their data. Learn more about how AI is disrupting business planning and how organizations can combine tools like Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT with Acterys’ xP&A capabilities for lightning-fast analysis.
While both ChatGPT and Copilot use AI to improve the user experience, their core functionalities cater to distinct needs. Let’s take a look at the differences between them.
ChatGPT, developed by OpenAI, is a conversational generative AI platform designed to simulate human-like interactions. The chatbot can handle topic-based queries and other tasks because it was trained on enormous data sets of publicly available information.
Unlike Copilot, which is part of the Microsoft ecosystem, ChatGPT was developed first as a publicly available, general-use tool with an easy-to-use API. ChatGPT’s versatility makes it a valuable tool for developers and businesses looking to add conversational AI capabilities to their services without being tethered to a particular suite of tools.
Microsoft Copilot in Power BI, meanwhile, does much more than generate text. As one of the newest features of Power BI, it serves as an intelligent digital assistant that improves productivity and streamlines business tasks and applications.
You can think of ChatGPT as a chatbot that was trained on tons of external data, while Copilot combines the Microsoft 365 suite with secure access to your own data. Copilot can perform tasks based on the context it gathers from your documents, emails, and schedules from Microsoft Graph, which is what the company refers to as “the gateway to data and intelligence in Microsoft 365.” This integration enables you to add context to your work by providing Copilot with information about user relationships, activities, and organizational data.
In Power BI, Copilot can help you analyze complex datasets and generate comprehensive reports and visualizations by interpreting the underlying data. Because Copilot is a Microsoft tool, Microsoft 365 users can use it in a variety of ways without changing environments.
Finance teams are still exploring AI’s potential for transforming financial planning methods to be more dynamic, efficient, and accurate. Here are some of the ways ChatGPT and Copilot can help.
ChatGPT can answer a range of planning, budgeting, and forecasting (PBF) questions using natural language. For example, you can use AI for demand and supply forecasting questions, or you can ask for help creating a detailed financial plan, including sales and budget forecasts for the upcoming fiscal year.
When used with Acterys, Copilot can tap into your business data and provide quick answers to questions such as:
Copilot contributes to these types of queries by integrating deeply with your business data and Microsoft 365 apps. Copilot answers direct questions, proactively suggests insights, and helps create comprehensive financial plans — all within tools like Power BI and Excel.
ChatGPT and Copilot can offer a solid foundation for basic financial questions. For more specialized inquiries, especially those specific to your company’s financial situation, you can integrate these tools with internal business data. From there, the AI can offer suggestions on budgeting, planning, and market tendencies. Use these tools to anticipate market shifts, quickly adapt to changing conditions, and make informed decisions with confidence.
One note: AI tools aren’t infallible, and they can deliver inaccurate or incomplete answers. Validating the accuracy of their responses is crucial, especially when using these responses for critical business decisions.
ChatGPT and Copilot can improve financial decision-making by offering prescriptive actions that go beyond simple responses to prompts. These AI tools can perform advanced “what-if” analyses, allowing users to explore the effects of a range of potential decisions.
For example, by inputting hypothetical changes in your budget or market conditions, these tools can generate multiple detailed outcomes and suggest actions that could lead to optimal results. This capability helps businesses proactively manage risks and operate more effectively in dynamic environments.
AI tools inside Power BI can transform how businesses approach data analytics and planning. Let’s look at how you can leverage AI to streamline your reporting, forecasting, and budgeting.
If you’re wondering how to use ChatGPT in Power BI, the answer is simple. Acterys has created a Power BI Visual that integrates ChatGPT with Power BI for streamlined planning and analytics. As an all-in-one xP&A platform, Acterys allows you to conduct reporting, planning, and analytics in familiar environments like Power BI and Excel.
With built-in AI features, Acterys makes planning easier by providing immediate insights into numerous aspects of your finances. By incorporating ChatGPT into this already robust planning solution, you gain access to new possibilities, along with real-time recommendations and insights.
Microsoft has integrated Copilot for Microsoft Fabric users who activate the feature. While Copilot for Microsoft Fabric is in public preview mode, it’s been made generally available.
Copilot in Power BI can be interacted with in several ways, the most straightforward being through the Copilot pane, where users can ask Copilot to create report pages or summarize existing pages. The summary feature can be helpful even for users who lack the permissions for editing reports.
Microsoft continues to iterate on this offering, so expect the Copilot for Power BI experience to become more robust and easier to use over time.
With the Acterys Power BI visual and Copilot built into Power BI, you can explore and analyze your data in a whole new way. These tools enable you to dig deeper, find answers faster, and refine your budgets, forecasts, and strategies based on AI-powered insights. Here are just a few of the actions finance teams can take:
Copilot can summarize data trends directly on your report pages, offering a quick overview you can adjust with data filters and slicers. This feature is particularly useful in meetings or other presentations where key insights need to be communicated clearly and promptly.
Finance teams can use ChatGPT and Copilot to help build custom reports. For example, you can create a high-level prompt, such as “create a report analyzing year-over-year growth.” Copilot will suggest report structures, select relevant data visualizations, and even draft the entire report page.
To further refine your data exploration, Copilot can generate synonyms for terms used in your queries. This makes it easier for users to find what they need without knowing the exact terminology used in the data model.
For example, if your data model uses “revenue,” Copilot could suggest synonyms like “income” or “sales,” ensuring that queries using these terms still return the desired data. Users can also add synonyms for Q&A based on Copilot’s suggestions.
For more technical users, Copilot can help with writing and customizing data analysis expressions (DAX) queries. By typing a prompt describing the desired analysis, Copilot can generate a suitable DAX query that you can further refine and execute. This feature is invaluable for creating custom calculations and data models that reflect specific business logic.
Users can also ask Copilot to explain DAX queries or concepts once they enable the DAX query view.
AI tools like ChatGPT and Copilot for Power BI are already transforming business planning and analysis. They can streamline complex data interactions, answer prompts using natural language, and provide insights that help businesses make better decisions amid changing market conditions.
Looking ahead, ChatGPT and Copilot will only continue to evolve, offering even more sophisticated ways to manage business data, uncover insights, and plan for the future. Finance teams need to start using these technologies today, as they’ll become increasingly integral to crafting detailed, data-driven business strategies and financial plans.
Acterys can help your organization prepare for the future of planning with AI. We ensure that every piece of data is instantly accessible and actionable by establishing a single source of truth. With unique write-back capabilities, Acterys also empowers real-time feedback loops, allowing businesses to adjust their strategies quickly.
Ready to take the next step toward AI-powered planning and analytics? Sign up for a free trial today.
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