This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.
We’re excited to announce a new AI-powered Skills in Viva service that will help organizations understand workforce skills and gaps, and deliver personalized skills-based experiences throughout Microsoft 365 and Viva applications for employees, business leaders, and HR.
This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.
We are excited and honored that Gartner has recognized Microsoft as a Leader in their 2023 Magic Quadrant™ for Cloud ERP for Product-Centric Enterprises.* This evaluation of Microsoft was based on specific criteria that analyzed our overall Completeness of Vision and Ability to Execute. This is the third year in a row that we’ve been recognized as a Leader.
Agile enterprise resource planning (ERP) system for new ways of working
The way we do business has fundamentally changed. New business models are disrupting the way companies sell products and services, blurring industry lines and transforming customer experiences. ERP systems need to evolve from mere systems of transaction to systems of reasoning, offering their users prescriptive actions that they can take in their functional areas to accelerate growth.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 has already been helping thousands of organizations optimize finance and supply chains to create a connected enterprise by infusing automation and analytics powered by AI into the various ERP processes. Now, with Dynamics 365 Copilot in our ERP portfolio included in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 Project Operations, we can enable every person in every organization to be more productive, collaborative, and deliver high-performance results.
For instance, with Copilot, organizations can supercharge productivity of procurement professionals and collections agents. Procurement professionals can efficiently handle purchase order changes at scale and assess the impact of changes downstream to production and distribution before making the right decision. Copilot enables quick collaboration with internal and external stakeholders that brings relevant information into Outlook and Microsoft Teams using natural language to meet customer and partner needs.
Collections managers with quick access to credit and payment history can prioritize and personalize customer communication and increase successful collection rates while proactively keeping customers in good standing. With Copilot, project managers can rapidly create new project plans for new engagements in minutes, automate status reports, identify risks, and suggest mitigation plans on a continuous basis, saving a significant amount of time, preventing project delays and budget overruns.
At Microsoft, we are fully committed to revolutionizing the future of ERP systems by harnessing the power of intelligent, composable technologies. The ERP portfolio from Dynamics 365, powered by generative AI technology, has the ability to speed time to insight, intelligently automate processes, and foster productivity ensuring that organizations can stay ahead of their competition in an increasingly complex business landscape.
Cloud-native ERP systems on a composable platform
One of the key strengths of Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management and Dynamics 365 Finance is their extensibility. The ERP portfolio is built on a composable platform, making it easy to extend the solution with Microsoft Power Platform, providing low-code tools like Microsoft Power Apps and Microsoft Power Automate.
Where ERP customizations were once a heavy, time-consuming task, these tools empower businesses to customize their solutions and build apps with a modern user experience so that they can adapt to their bespoke industry specific needs and end users can work the way they want. Furthermore, companies and users can leverage prebuilt customizations and industry-specialized solutions from our ISV partner network to help speed development even further.
One of our customers, Nestlé, chose Dynamics 365 as the preferred platform for agile and speedy business system requests for mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activities. Nestlé needed business applications that would provide flexibility to adapt to different business models across geographies that could be reused multiple times. The company needed rich out-of-the-box features that could be extended with low-code/no-code capabilities. With Dynamics 365, Nestlé was able to create reusable strategies and blueprints for migrating business data and operations that would enable faster and more efficient acquisitions and divestitures easily with limited disruptions to customers and employees. This also helped them adhere to compliance, security, and data privacy regulations effectively. In just four short months after the project kicked off, Nestlé went live with Dynamics 365 Finance, Supply Chain Management, and Commerce.
AIM for the future with Microsoft today
In conclusion, running a business on Dynamics 365 offers numerous benefits for organizations. From seamless integration and enhanced productivity to real-time analysis and smart decision-making capabilities, Dynamics 365 empowers businesses to thrive in today’s dynamic market. Microsoft is committed to empowering customers to take advantage of AI capabilities in every line of business.
Organizations relying on on-premises applications will struggle to compete with peers embracing these AI-powered technologies in the cloud. It is paramount for companies to migrate their critical business processes to the cloud now. That is why we introduced AIM (Accelerate, Innovate, Move) earlier. AIM offers organizations a tailored path to move critical processes to the cloud with confidence. It provides qualified customers with access to a dedicated team of migration advisors, expert assessments, investment offers, tools, and migration support.
Magic Quadrant reports are a culmination of rigorous, fact-based research in specific markets, providing a wide-angle view of the relative positions of the providers in markets where growth is high and provider differentiation is distinct. Providers are positioned into four quadrants: Leaders, Challengers, Visionaries, and Niche Players. The research enables you to get the most from market analysis in alignment with your unique business and technology needs. View a complimentary copy of the Magic Quadrant report to learn more.
*Gartner is a registered trademark and service mark and Magic Quadrant is a registered trademark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and are used herein with permission. All rights reserved. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
**This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document. The Gartner document is available upon request from Microsoft.
Source: Gartner, “Magic Quadrant for Cloud ERP for Product-Centric Enterprises,” Greg Leiter, Robert Anderson, Dixie John, Tomas Kienast, David Penny, September 26, 2023.
This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.
Introducing the first AI copilot experience for Dynamics 365 Commerce
For Merchandisers tasked with managing large product catalogs, the creation of high-quality “enriched” marketing content for their digital commerce channels can be a daunting and labor-intensive process. Especially if the Merchandiser is untrained in the creation of marketing copy. Yet it is incredibly important to have “enriched” content at the product level, where it can increase customer engagement, improve customer understanding, and drive natural search engine ranking, which all lead to higher conversion rates.
It is for this reason that Dynamics 365 Commerce is thrilled to announce the preview of ‘Commerce Copilot’, which provides a fast and efficient way of authoring product enrichment content for your B2B and B2C digital commerce websites.
Use Commerce Copilot to jump-start the creative process by first selecting a tone, configured by you, that aligns to your brand, like “adventurous”, “luxurious” or “bold”. Then select an audience choice from choices managed by you, like “sports enthusiast” or “college graduate”. Copilot will then use these prompts to craft compelling and engaging content that makes use of your existing product information like name, description, attributes, price and more!
You can further augment your newly enriched content with key product highlights or tune it to be optimized for search engines. But you always remain in control and have the ability to review and modify any content before it is published!
The Commerce Copilot for enriched product content is now available as a public preview for digital commerce customers based in United States. Additional market availability will be enabled soon.
This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.
AI is ready to support work—the question is: What will your business do with it?
Join us at the Microsoft Business Applications Launch Event on October 25 and explore how to create an AI-powered business that helps people and teams be more productive, solve problems quickly, and focus more energy on building revenue.
This will mark our tenth Business Applications Launch Event—a milestone in our commitment to business app innovation, our customers, and our partners. But we’re just getting started. To see what’s next—and what it means for your organization—you’ll hear directly from Microsoft leaders about their vision for AI, customer service, enterprise resource planning (ERP), and low-code solutions.
The latest AI in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales that provides relevant recommendations, summarizes data, retrieves information, and performs actions within the flow of work.
Advanced Copilot capabilities in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Service that streamline agents’ workspaces, let them see transcripts of live chats and voice calls in their inboxes, and allow them to respond to customers quickly with the right information.
New Microsoft Sales Copilot features that help compose emails, update customer relationship management (CRM) records, recap meetings, and offer real-time tips to help sales teams close more deals.
Enhanced automation in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance to help handle accounts payable and bank statements, complex tax scenarios, and e-invoicing requirements in more markets.
New Copilot features in Dynamics 365 Customer Insights to help marketers quickly create memorable customer experiences using whole new levels of personalization for emails, images, and layouts.
Plus, learn about updates for Microsoft Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Commerce, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 Human Resources—all ready to help your employees be more productive, build customer loyalty, and drive meaningful growth. You’ll also hear from Charles Lamanna, Microsoft Corporate Vice President of Business Applications and Platforms, about what’s driving innovation today. Then catch some of the newest AI capabilities in action, with demos led by the people behind the 2023 release wave 2, offering expert guidance on how these updates will help you:
Improve insights, save time, and fuel creativity with the latest AI-powered solutions.
Empower your employees to focus on revenue-generating work and avoid repetitive tasks with automation.
Connect people, data, and processes across your organization using modern, AI-enhanced collaboration tools.
Insights on putting AI to work for you
The Business Applications Launch Event is more than our chance to showcase hundreds of new features and updates. It’s also a great opportunity for you to learn expert tips on how to apply these new technologies to some of your business’ biggest challenges. And if you have questions about new features, the role of AI at work, the evolution of copilots, or what’s ahead for business apps, get them answered by experts—we’ll be hosting a live Q&A chat at the end of the event, so be sure to stick around.
It’s been inspiring to see all the new features that the Dynamics 365 team has been working on, and we’re looking forward to celebrating 10 events’ worth of advancing business applications ahead.
This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.
This post was co-authored by Lax Gopisetty, Vice President, Global Practice Head, Microsoft Business Applications & Digital Workplace Services, Infosys Ltd.
In an age defined by single-click purchases, instant deliveries, and personalized experiences, customer expectations continue to rise, and frontline technicians are expected to meet these ever-changing demands. When customers face a problem, they want it fixed fast and right the first time. For many organizations, customer experience is both a challenge and an opportunity to differentiate from the competition.
It is no longer acceptable for technicians to operate on disparate technologies that individually are good enough to execute work orders, manage assets, and dispatch resources with real-time support. Timely resolution is key in field service, and arming frontline technicians with intuitive solutions that combine workflow automation, scheduling algorithms, and mobility can significantly enhance the customer experience. Tools that empower field technicians with timely inputs to focus on their core responsibilities and enable processes to track each work order closure, along with billing, are now becoming existential.
For example, solutions that unlock efficiencies for telecommunications providers with field service automation, empower medical device service technicians with improved downtime, maintain safe and highly automated facility management operations, and manage smart elevator service with Internet of Things (IoT)-driven field service are all recipes for greater customer satisfaction.
Dynamics 365 Field Service
Transform your service operations and deliver exceptional service.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service integration supports positive customer experiences
Dynamics 365 Field Service integrates with Outlook, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft Viva Connections so that frontline workers and managers can create, view, and manage work orders within Outlook and Teams. This integration enhances collaboration between dispatchers, frontline technicians, and managers by enabling work order data to sync automatically between Dynamics 365 and Microsoft 365. Additionally, frontline technicians can quickly start their day with access to key workday information at a glance, with work orders visible as Tasks from the Viva Connections homepage in Teams. Dynamics 365 and Microsoft 365 empower technicians with the right information to resolve issues the first time, which adds a great deal to creating a positive customer experience.
For example, a leading energy supplier based out of the UK partnered with Infosys to establish itself as a leader in the energy-as-a-service market by offering best-in-class customer experience. The connected field service-based solution unified the capabilities of Dynamics 365 and Microsoft 365 to unlock a leaner and flexible business model that also enabled future scalability to ensure:
Better workforce management through flexible scheduling, route optimization, and quota management.
Field job execution via remote supervision, site awareness/recording, and offline mode.
Customer intimacy powered by service history management, technician visibility, voice of customer, and closed loop tracking.
Superior job outcomes powered by higher first-time resolution rates and reduced job aborts.
Connected field service helped redefine the leading energy supplier’s customer engagement model with a seamless work order management process. From streamlining work order creation, scheduling the best suited frontline technician, receiving remote expert assistance, and integrating asset management, Dynamics 365 enabled the customer to transform their field operations. Additional engagement highlights include:
Seamless migration from more than 20 legacy disparate business apps onto Dynamics 365.
Implemented core business functionalities with over 75 percent out-of-the-box feature fitment.
Six phased incremental rollouts to enable more than 1,500 field technicians and more than 600 internal users.
On track to reduce overall cost of IT operations by over 25 percent.
The leaner, AI-powered, and truly automated business, has unleashed novel revenue streams with infinite potential for the client:
Growth segment
Value delivered
Smart new connections
Manage the smart new connections—such as customer management (property developers), lead management, opportunity management, quote management, billing, consolidated billing, and disputes.
Smart field connections
Provide onsite service for smart field connections—work order management, skills management, scheduling management, capacity management, and resource management.
Electric vehicles (e-mobility)
Manage electric vehicle (EV) meter installation services—to manage the sales processes for business-to-business (B2B) customers, including installation.
This UK-based leading energy supplier is now well-positioned to drive its future growth. The organization is supported by a skilled and engaged workforce that works seamlessly with connected and leaner processes that together offer a sustainable competitive advantage.
Standardizing and automating processes through connected field service
Field Service continues to break ground into unexplored industries. Capabilities like GPS and routing, which enable timely visits and quicker resolution, are saving the day for thousands of field service professionals. They are now able to summarize completed tasks with inline Microsoft Power Apps component framework (PCF) capability.
Field service solutions must always be driven by an organization’s unique priorities, pain points, and process nuances. Partners like Infosys are co-innovating with clients to address these challenges with Microsoft Power Platform and its extensibility components. They are enabling nontechnical business users to build applications that cater to their unique requirements without the aid of IT experts.
The emergence of AI-embedded innovations like Copilot in Dynamics 365 Field Service will enhance service further. From creating work orders with the right information and assigning them to the right technicians, to equipping technicians with sufficient support to successfully complete jobs, Copilot will help streamline critical frontline tasks. These advanced functionalities will help companies genuinely standardize and automate field service processes.
Organizations competing in a market with high turnover are using mixed reality-based Microsoft Dynamics 365 Guides for remote support and collaboration. This results in accelerated training with context and seamless transfer of information, insights, and skills, which help in lowering overall costs.
Technology is key to building a scalable and efficient field service operation. However, a significant portion of success still rides on the technician who is delivering the service. So, it is imperative for service organizations to unify field operations, frontline technicians, and customers with connected digital platforms, to unlock value—because service is no longer a cost center for organizations.
Learn more about Dynamics 365 Field Service
Learn how Dynamics 365 Field Service can help you transform your service operations and deliver exceptional service. And read how Copilot in Dynamics 365 Field Service can accelerate service delivery, boost technician productivity, and streamline work order management with next-generation AI. Watch the video below to see it in action.
This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.
Field Service Mobile is a Dynamics Power Platform Model Driven Application. This offers several advantages to the mobile application, including re-use of forms and views and consistency of user experience while accessing on the web, mobile, or tablet.
The Power Platform also offers significant customization opportunities, both when customizing forms, adding business logic or integrations with other Power Platform capabilities like Power Automate, Canvas, or PCF Controls. These capabilities make the Field Service Mobile application uniquely positioned to streamline your workflows, improve data quality and enhance your user experience.
Customization Best Practices
Customizing the Field Service Mobile application is a balance of enabling an ideal workflow for your business and providing the best possible user experience for your Frontline Workers. This balance must consider data availability of the mobile workforce, along with application performance and the overall user experience.
In this blog post we’ll share some of the key best practices when evaluating and implementing customizations.
Use the default Field Service Mobile app module. The out-of-the-box Field Service Mobile app module has all the basic features and functionality your frontline workers require to get started with Field Service. Custom app modules can be used with the Field Service Mobile application but will not include some of the internal business logic such as Travel Calculations. Another advantage of using the default app module is that it will automatically receive product updates over time, while additional effort would be required to merge the same enhancements into a custom app module.
Avoid using HTML Web Resources. Web Resources have many limitations on a mobile application when working with offline mode. It is highly recommended to use PowerApps Component Framework (PCF) controls, which are a better option for a more consistent cross-platform experience without the same limitations.
Tip: If your situation necessitates the use of custom web resources, use code splitting and check code coverage in a browser to ensure only the minimum amount of code is loaded. Package shared code in their own shared web resource library instead of duplicating in each consuming resource.
Tip: If using Offline mode, be sure to test your customizations on the mobile device in Airplane mode and variable cellular network conditions.
Handle errors properly and present the right message to end users. When implementing customizations, it is very important to handle edge-cases and errors in a way that provides a positive experience for your end users. This is especially true for async calls and network errors, where the Frontline Worker may have different results depending on devices network state.
Use XRM Web APIs instead of XHR/Fetch calls directly to the server. XRM Web ApIs will route correctly to the local offline database or server based on offline configuration and network state of the app.
Making direct server calls from the mobile application is not recommended as they can be unreliable and fail unexpectedly with poor network conditions. By ensuring that all dependencies are in the offline data store by configuring the Mobile Offline profile with the correct data necessary for your user scenarios.
If server calls are necessary, build an appropriate user experience to handle cases when the call may fail, or response is slow to return from the server. Making the network calls trigger based on explicit user actions, with a interface giving visual cues that a network call is happening and a response will be needed, will provide a better experience for the Frontline Worker.
If using onload/onchange/command handlers and fetching data using XRM WebAPis, make sure you test the impact of those calls on application performance while in various network conditions.
Optimized resources for bandwidth. If adding custom JavaScript or images, be sure to optimize files which are downloaded to the device. We recommend to always trim and compress your JavaScript files and using SVG images instead of PNG to save bandwidth.
Declare solution dependencies between commands, web resources, and strings. Dependencies must be used to make a Web Resource available offline. For example, when an entity/form is enabled for offline usage, the JavaScript which is attached to the form for onload/onsave, would also be available offline. For other files such as localization XML files, they need to be added as a dependency to your JavaScript so these XML files will also be available offline. Learn more about web resource dependencies.
Be aware of timing issues or race conditions. This is especially relevant when dealing with async calls. Test by adding network latency and CPU throttling to ensure a positive experience in real-world conditions.
Use Business Rules as first choice over custom client-side JavaScript. Business rules provide a mechanism to implement business logic with some guardrails to avoid some of the complexity that comes with custom JavaScript code. Please be aware there are some limitations with business rules, such as cases when OnChange events are required. It is good to evaluate your business scenarios and choose the best path for your organization.
Tip: If using JavaScript-based business logic, make sure you fetch minimal data and avoid joins/sorting if not needed.
Leverage out of box controls. As much as possible use out of the box controls, such as the Booking Calendar Control, which will be easier to support and receive product enhancements over time.
When enabling offline mode, make sure forms and views are aligned with configuration of the mobile offline profile. The individual configuring the forms and views should work closely with the person who will configure the mobile offline profile to ensure tables which are enabled on views will be available while running in offline mode. Be sure to include error handling if there are instances when an entity will not be available while offline.
Leverage tools to debug customizations. Debugging is important when introducing JavaScript customizations to your experience. Debugging a mobile app has unique challenges versus a web browser. This is especially true with capabilities like Offline mode are enabled on the mobile app. To meet this need, leverage debugging tools shipped with the Android and Windows model driven apps. Detailed steps to debug are found in Power Apps documentation.
Customizing a model driven application can be a powerful way to enhance the user experience and functionality of your solution. However, it also requires careful planning and testing to ensure optimal performance, usability, and compatibility. In this blog post, we have shared some best practices and tips on how to customize your model driven application effectively. We hope you have found this information useful and that you will apply it to your own projects. Thank you for reading and happy customizing!
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