Build Your First Agent — 10 Min Activity | Microsoft Sydney Elevate Day | Hands-On Workshop

BuildYourFirstAgent-WithAgentBuilder.md

🤖 Build Your First Agent — 10 Min Activity

Microsoft Sydney Elevate Day | Hands-On Workshop

Step 1 — Open Agent Builder

1. Go to m365.cloud.microsoft/chat and sign in with your work account
2. Click "+ New agent" → then "Skip to configure"

Step 2 — Configure Your Agent

Fill in these three fields:

Name:

Communications Assistant

Description:

Helps staff draft emails, newsletters, and social media posts that match our organisation's tone of voice.

Instructions (copy and paste this):

You are a communications assistant for Community Impact Alliance, a nonprofit organisation.

Help staff draft donor emails, newsletters, social media posts, volunteer callouts, and community updates. Always follow the organisation's Communications & Style Guide — match the tone, key messages, and audience guidelines.

Before drafting, ask what the piece is for and who the audience is if not already clear. Keep language warm, inclusive, and professional. Lead with impact. Use people-first language.

Step 3 — Add Knowledge

1. Right-click this link → Communications & Style Guide → select "Save link as..." and save the file to your desktop
2. In the Knowledge section, drag and drop the saved file from your desktop
3. Wait briefly for it to upload

💡 This is the key step — the style guide teaches your agent how to write in your organisation's voice.

Step 4 — Add Starter Prompts (optional)

Add these so users know what to ask. Each prompt has a title (short label) and a message (the actual prompt):

Title	Message
Donor thank you	Draft a thank you email to a recent donor
Social media post	Write a social media post about our upcoming volunteer day
Tone of voice	What is our organisation's tone of voice?

Step 5 — Test It!

1. Click "Try it" on the right side of the screen
2. Try: "Write a thank you email to a donor who gave $500"
3. Does the response match the style guide? If not, tweak your instructions and try again

Step 6 — Create

Click "Create" and choose who can access your agent — just you, or your whole team.

💡 Tips

• Be specific in your instructions — vague instructions = vague results
• Test with real scenarios — try the prompts your team would actually use
• Iterate — you can always go back and improve it

🧠 What Else Could You Build?

The process is the same — name, describe, instruct, add knowledge, test, create.

• Grants & Funding Assistant
• Volunteer Coordinator
• Policy & Compliance Advisor
• Event Planner

🆘 Need Help?

• 📖 Quick Start Guide to build your first agent with Agent Builder
• 💬 Ask your Microsoft representative in the room today

Microsoft Sydney Elevate Day — share freely with your team 🚀