From Assistance to Action

If you’ve been using Microsoft 365 Copilot, you’ve probably noticed something shift. Email gets drafted faster. Meeting notes appear without you scrambling. Spreadsheet analysis that used to take 20 minutes now takes two.

That’s AI as an assistant. It helps you work faster, but you’re still in control. You ask, it responds, you take the next step.

The natural next question: Can AI do more than assist? Can it handle entire workflows on its own?

That’s what AI agents are built to do. And in Dynamics 365, they’re already handling some of the most repetitive, time-consuming work teams face every day.

What AI Agents Actually Are

The Difference Between Copilot and Agents

The line between Copilot and agents isn’t always obvious at first, but the distinction matters.

Copilot in Microsoft 365 assists. You ask, it responds, you take action. It drafts an email, but you hit send. It summarizes a meeting, but you decide what to do with the information. It analyzes a spreadsheet, but you interpret the results and make the call.

If you’re still evaluating where Copilot creates value across operations and leadership roles, we recently outlined how the same tool delivers very different results depending on who’s using it.

Agents act. They complete workflows from start to finish, often without you involved at all. In practice, that means fewer handoffs, less manual entry, and fewer things falling through the cracks.

The key difference is autonomy.

Copilot waits for your prompt. Agents are triggered by events: a receipt arrives, an order comes in, a bank transaction posts, and they take it from there.

A Simple Way to Think About Copilot and Agents

Think of Copilot like a really smart assistant who answers questions and drafts content when you ask.

Think of an agent like a team member who owns a specific process. They see the work come in, know what needs to happen, handle the steps, and loop you in only when a decision is needed.

You don’t manage every step. You manage by exception.

What Agents Do in Dynamics 365

AI agents automate end-to-end workflows inside business applications like Dynamics 365 Business Central and Dynamics 365 Sales.

Common examples include:

• Processing expense reports — receipts get uploaded, policy checks run, routing happens, and approvals queue up automatically
• Handling sales orders — order entry, inventory checks, pricing rules, and fulfillment prep happen in the background
• Reconciling bank transactions — statement data imports, transactions match to posted entries, exceptions surface for review

Agents work in the background, using triggers and rules you define. They surface exceptions when something needs human judgment. The rest? They handle it.

This shift, from AI that assists to AI that acts, is part of a broader change in how organizations are structuring work. Microsoft calls this the Frontier Firm model: AI handles repeatable workflows, while people focus on judgment, strategy, and relationships. It’s already taking shape in forward-thinking companies, and the pattern is becoming clear. The question isn’t whether this will happen. It’s how soon your team starts building comfort with it.

How AI Agents Actually Work

Agents aren’t magic, and they’re not making decisions on their own. They’re following logic — logic you define or that’s built into the out-of-the-box agent. Understanding how they work makes them feel less abstract and more manageable.

What Triggers an AI Agent?

Agents don’t wait for you to ask. They respond to triggers, or events, that kick off the workflow.

A trigger is simply something that happens in your system:

• An employee uploads a receipt → Expense agent starts
• A customer submits an order → Sales Order agent starts
• A bank statement imports → Bank Reconciliation agent starts

You define what triggers matter. Not every transaction needs to kick off an agent, just the ones that fit the pattern you’re automating.

How Agent Workflows Function in Dynamics 365

Once triggered, the agent follows a workflow, or a series of steps it’s designed to complete.

Here’s an example using the Expense agent in Business Central:

1. A receipt image arrives (uploaded via phone, email, or portal)
2. The agent extracts key details: vendor name, amount, date, expense category
3. It matches the expense to company policy (per diem limits, approval thresholds, category rules)
4. It checks for exceptions: Is the amount over the limit? Is this a duplicate receipt? Is the vendor unusual?
5. It routes the expense to the appropriate approver based on amount and department, or flags it for manual review if something doesn’t match

The agent handles all the repetitive steps, like data entry, lookups, policy checks, and routing decisions. It doesn’t guess. It follows the logic you’ve set up.

Why Human-in-the-Loop Validation Matters

Agents are designed to be human-led, AI-operated. They handle the routine. People handle the judgment. This isn’t a limitation. It’s by design. Examples of when humans step in:

• An expense is flagged as unusual → a manager reviews and decides whether to approve or reject
• A sales order includes custom pricing → someone evaluates whether to honor the request
• A bank transaction doesn’t match cleanly → an accountant investigates and resolves it

Agents reduce manual work, but they don’t remove accountability or control. You’re still in charge. You’re just spending time on decisions instead of data entry.

That distinction matters. Teams that adopt agents successfully aren’t looking to remove people from workflows. They’re looking to remove the parts of workflows that don’t require people. So the team can focus on what does.

Common AI Agents in Dynamics 365

Microsoft provides out-of-the-box agents for common workflows in Dynamics 365. These aren’t custom development projects. They’re ready to configure and deploy, with room to adjust as you learn what works.

Here’s what the most common agents actually do.

How the Expense Agent Works in Business Central

Expense processing is one of the most relatable workflows teams deal with, and one of the most repetitive.

How it works today (without an agent):

An employee submits a receipt, often via email or a portal. Someone manually enters the data into the system: vendor, amount, date, category. The expense gets routed based on amount, department, or policy. A manager reviews and approves it. Accounting posts the transaction.

There’s a lot of back-and-forth, a lot of data entry, and a lot of waiting.

How the Expense Agent changes this:

The employee uploads a receipt image from their phone, email, or anywhere else. The agent extracts the vendor, amount, date, and category automatically. It matches the expense to company policy: checking per diem limits, approval thresholds, and category rules. It routes the expense to the right approver based on amount and department. If something’s off, like a duplicate receipt, an amount over the limit, missing information, it flags the exception.

The manager sees only what needs attention. Not every receipt. Just the ones that require a decision.

Why this matters:

Employees spend less time on admin. Finance teams aren’t buried in data entry. Approvals happen faster because the groundwork is already done. Exceptions surface clearly instead of hiding in spreadsheets or email threads.

Real-world impact:

Many teams see meaningful reductions in expense processing time once the agent is running consistently, often because approvals move faster and manual entry disappears. The time saved isn’t just about speed; It’s about shifting effort away from repetitive tasks and toward decisions that actually need judgment.

Want to see the Expense agent in action? We’re hosting a live demo in March where we’ll walk through real workflows in Business Central. More details coming soon.

Sales Order Agent for Dynamics 365

The Sales Order agent handles the repetitive parts of order entry and fulfillment preparation.

How the Sales Order Agent changes this workflow:

A customer submits an order via email, web form, or portal. The agent extracts line items, pricing, and ship-to information. It checks inventory availability. It applies pricing rules automatically or flags custom pricing for review. It preps the order for fulfillment or routes it to a sales rep if an exception exists.

The result: less manual data entry, faster order processing, and pricing exceptions that surface early instead of causing delays downstream.

Bank Reconciliation Agent in Business Central

Bank reconciliation is one of those workflows that’s essential but tedious. The Bank Rec agent automates the matching and exception-flagging process.

Here’s how the Bank Reconciliation Agent works:

Bank statement data imports into Business Central. The agent matches transactions to posted entries, like invoices, payments, or receipts. It flags unmatched items for review. It suggests likely matches based on amount, date, and vendor patterns.

Accounting teams spend less time on routine matching and more time resolving the true exceptions, that is the transactions that genuinely need investigation.

When AI Agents Make Sense (and When They Don’t)

Agents aren’t the right fit for every workflow. Understanding when they help and when they don’t makes the decision clearer.

Agents Work Best When:

• The workflow is repetitive — the same steps happen over and over, just with different data
• The volume is high enough to justify automation — dozens or hundreds of transactions per month, not occasional outliers
• The rules are clear — you can define what “normal” looks like and what counts as an exception
• People are spending time on data entry and routing, not creative problem-solving or strategic thinking

Agents Aren’t the Right Fit When:

• The workflow changes frequently or isn’t well-defined yet
• Volume is too low to make automation worthwhile
• Every case requires unique judgment. Agents don’t replace thinking; they handle the routine so you can focus on the exceptions

If you’re evaluating where agents can realistically reduce friction without overcomplicating your system, we recently outlined practical AI scenarios inside Business Central that teams are deploying today.

Where Most Teams Start with Agents

Expense processing is often the first agent teams deploy. The volume is high, the rules are clear, and the relief is immediate.

Once comfortable, many teams expand to Sales Order processing or Bank Reconciliation. The pattern is consistent: start with one workflow, learn how agents behave, see what works, then scale to others.

You don’t need to automate everything at once. You need to start somewhere that makes sense.

What Makes Dynamics 365 Agents Different

There are plenty of automation tools available. What makes agents in Dynamics 365 worth paying attention to?

AI Agents Built Into Your ERP and CRM

Agents live inside Business Central and D365 Sales. They’re not a separate platform you need to manage. There’s no data syncing between systems, no duplicate workflows, no additional infrastructure to maintain.

They use the same security, access controls, and workflows already in place. This reduces complexity and risk compared to bolting on third-party automation tools that sit outside your core systems.

Out-of-the-Box Agents vs Custom Development

Microsoft provides pre-built agents for common workflows like Expense, Sales Order, and Bank Reconciliation. These aren’t custom development projects. They’re ready to configure and deploy.

You can still customize if needed, but most teams start with the out-of-the-box version and adjust over time as they learn what works.

Agents Designed for Human-Led Operations

Agents aren’t trying to replace people. They’re designed to work alongside them.

Exception handling, approval workflows, and audit trails are built in. This aligns with how most organizations actually want to adopt AI: cautiously, with control, and with confidence that people remain accountable for outcomes.

What “Getting Started” with Agents Looks Like

Getting started with agents doesn’t require a big rollout or a transformation project.

Most teams follow a similar pattern:

1. Pick one workflow — often Expense, because the volume is high and the rules are clear
2. Define the rules and triggers — what’s normal, what’s an exception, what needs routing
3. Run the agent alongside existing processes for 30-60 days to see how it behaves
4. Adjust based on what you learn — refine triggers, tweak exception handling, clarify routing rules
5. Expand to other workflows once you’re confident the first one is working well

You don’t need perfect data to start. We covered that in Why Waiting for Perfect Data Means Never Starting with AI. You don’t need to redesign your entire operation. You need curiosity, a willingness to experiment, and a workflow that’s repetitive enough to benefit from automation.

The teams seeing value from agents aren’t the ones who waited for everything to be perfect. They’re the ones who started where they were and let capability build over time.

Why This Matters Now

AI agents aren’t a distant future concept. They’re already running in organizations like yours: handling expense processing, sales orders, bank reconciliation, and more. The teams adopting them now aren’t doing it because they have more resources or better data.

They’re doing it because they recognize that work is changing. Repetitive workflows are being automated, freeing teams to focus on decisions, strategy, and relationships the areas of work that require human judgment.

The question isn’t whether agents will become part of how work gets done. It’s how soon your team starts building comfort with them.

If you’ve already seen value from Copilot in Microsoft 365, agents are the natural next step. They follow the same principle: AI handles the repetitive parts so you can focus on what matters, but they take it further.

And if you’re still evaluating where to start, agents in Dynamics 365 offer a clear, concrete way to see what AI can do when it moves from assistance to action.

Explore How These Agents Work in Practice

• Expense Agent in Business Central: A Deep Dive — coming soon
• Sales Order Agent in Dynamics 365 Sales — coming soon
• Bank Reconciliation Agent: How It Works — coming soon

Interested in what agents could do for your workflows? Contact us to talk through where agents might fit — no pressure, just a conversation about what makes sense for your team.