Exercise 1, Task 2: Use Copilot in Word to summarize a vendor contract

As an Associate Counsel at Boulder Innovations, you’re tasked with reviewing a new supplier agreement for a potential partnership with VanArsdel, Ltd. The plan is for VanArsdel to supply materials for Boulder’s new toy line of remote-controlled cars. The contract is lengthy, and while you need to ensure all the key terms align with Boulder Innovations’ business objectives, there’s a tight deadline to summarize the document for senior management. You must distill the most important details of the agreement—such as terms related to payment, termination, liability, and governing law—into a clear, concise summary that internal stakeholders can quickly review.

To streamline this process, you plan to use Copilot in Word to automatically generate a summary of the contract, flag any potential red flags or unusual clauses, and provide suggestions for improving unclear sections. Copilot can help you focus on critical areas like indemnity clauses and termination terms, allowing you to identify any risks or areas for clarification. By using Copilot’s suggestions and formatting tools, you can create a clear summary that you can share with other departments and leadership, ensuring Boulder management makes informed decisions before moving forward with the vendor.

Using Copilot in Word

Copilot in Word can work in either Allow editing mode or Chat only mode. Understanding this distinction is important, because it affects whether Copilot can automatically apply changes to your document or just provide suggestions for you to use.

When Allow editing is selected, Copilot acts as an in-document author and editor. You can ask Copilot to create a document from scratch, rewrite sections, add summaries, or refine language—and it can apply those changes directly to the document, typically with your confirmation. In this experience, Copilot behaves like a collaborative writing partner that can both generate and revise content without requiring manual copy and paste. This is commonly the experience when prompting Copilot from within a Word document, such as using the drafting prompt above a blank document or the prompt field in the Copilot pane.

When Chat only is selected, Copilot responds in the Copilot pane without changing the document. It can still research topics, summarize information, and draft text, but it does not modify the document directly. Instead, responses remain in the Copilot pane, where you can review them and decide what, if anything, should be added to the document. This approach is useful when you want Copilot to act as a research assistant or idea generator while maintaining full control over the content that gets inserted into your document.

This task uses the Allow editing functionality.

Perform the following steps to complete this task:

  1. Select the following link to open a copy of the Boulder-VanArsdel Supplier Agreement file. Select the Download button at the top of the screen to download the file to your computer, and then store the file in your OneDrive folder.

  2. In your web browser, go to the Microsoft Copilot home page, select the App Launcher (grid icon), select More Apps, and then select Word from the Apps menu.

  3. In Word for the web, create a blank document.

  4. In the bottom-right corner of the Word document, select the Copilot icon to open the Copilot pane. Verify the pane opens in edit mode. The heading should read Let’s edit your document. Below the heading, confirm that the mode selector is set to Allow editing (so Copilot can edit your document directly). If it shows Chat only, select the drop-down and then select Allow editing.

  5. In the prompt field that appears in the Copilot pane, attach the Boulder-VanArsdel Supplier Agreement document that you downloaded in Step 1.

  6. In the Copilot pane, ask Copilot to create an executive summary document based on the attached Boulder-VanArsdel Supplier Agreement. The summary should include the following sections: term/renewal, termination, payment terms, liability/indemnity, data handling (privacy, retention, breach notification), governing law, and dispute resolution. The summary should also include a “Red Flags & Deviations” section in red font. This section should highlight any unusual clauses or red flags in the Indemnity and Termination sections. The final section in the document should be a short “Key Risks & Deviations” section. The document should be titled “VanArsdel Supplier Agreement – Executive Summary.”

  7. Review the results. You’re concerned with the language related to Termination, since it isn’t as clear as you would like. Ask Copilot to clarify the section on Termination of the supplier agreement, and any termination-related items in the “Red Flags & Deviations” section.

  8. Review the results. You now want Copilot to focus on the contract’s payment terms. Ask Copilot to add a section in the Executive Summary that compares the payment terms in the supplier agreement with standard industry practices. Highlight any deviations in this new section.

  9. Review the results. You now want Copilot to visualize responsibilities between Boulder Innovations and VanArsdel. You feel that a visualization can be useful for stakeholders during the contract management process. Ask Copilot to create a section at the end of the Executive Summary document that provides a breakdown of responsibilities. It should include a table that summarizes the obligations of Boulder Innovations and VanArsdel, Ltd., including deadlines or conditions (columns: Obligation, Party, Trigger, Timeframe, Risk).

  10. You can’t think of any other items to include in the Executive Summary. However, you’re concerned that it might be missing something that a C-suite audience would want to see. Ask Copilot to suggest any other changes that an executive audience would be interested in. Review the suggestions and ask Copilot to include any items in the document that are of interest to you. Select Done to apply the changes to the document.