The City of Antwerp thinks ahead in data and services with Copilot

At the end of 2024, the City of Antwerp conducted a pilot program for Microsoft 365 Copilot, supported by Microsoft and Wortell. Within four months, 350 colleagues set to work to personally experience what this AI tool really delivers. Sven De Wolf, Solutions Manager digital workplace at the City of Antwerp, and Kris Mariën, Service Delivery Manager at Digipolis Antwerp, share their stories and experiences first-hand.

The City of Antwerp employs approximately 8,500 people. The entire City of Antwerp Group, including partners such as IT partner Digipolis, even has 10,000 employees. Digipolis provides first-line IT support for the entire group. The reason for starting with Copilot? "We saw opportunities that we wanted to test within our organization and we were approached by Microsoft. Flanders had started a pilot project and Antwerp, as the largest city, does not want to be left behind," Sven begins. "And most importantly, the added value for our service to the citizen is the reason why we started using Copilot."

The art of thinking ahead

In its own words, the City of Antwerp is aware of IT developments and is approaching this carefully. "But we know that AI is going to be used in the organization anyway, so we'd better provide a framework so that this is done responsibly. The biggest challenge was to do it in a careful way, so that our data would not be scattered here and there. We wanted to provide opportunities for our colleagues to get started with Copilot. If we hadn't done that, colleagues would have found their way to all kinds of AI tools anyway. We are still in the testing phase, so we are bound to use Copilot on use cases that are strictly defined." The use cases were drawn up together with Wortell to try out different applications. Think of: recording meetings, summarizing them and automatically sending out action points. Or: summarizing emails, composing replies to emails and indicating the most important emails. And also interesting: generate preliminary PowerPoint versions from a note, make speaker notes, classify and analyze large datasets, automatically create images, design, create news items and automatically apply corporate identity guidelines to the design and writing style. "We started testing cases like that extensively in the Copilot environment."

Up and running within four months

"We wanted to use this period to draw up a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA). We hope to land on a broader framework in the near future so that we can roll it out in the further organization. That requires a burden of proof." Fortunately, in the last quarter of 2024, many colleagues were eager to get started with Copilot. Within four months, working with Copilot became part of the daily activities: three hundred employees of the city and fifty of Digipolis started working with it. And the burden of proof was clear. "A number of cases have emerged that prove that Copilot is indeed useful in our organization," says Sven. Reports show that people who work with Copilot experience time savings (64%), quality improvement (33%) and more job satisfaction (3%) as the greatest gains. For example, the results show that employees of the City of Antwerp save an average of 96 minutes per week with Copilot. And there are more advantages to mention. "At Digipolis, we are generally more techies than good writers. Copilot helps my colleagues to effectively convert texts that need to be read by users into target group-oriented language," says Kris.

Copilot as an 'eye-opener'

Sven also has positive experiences from practice: "It is a nicer way of working together. If a meeting is called, I have it fully transcribed and I keep asking Copilot until I have a decent report, if that is even necessary. And suppose you need a strategic vision on a certain topic and you have collected different information about it in different locations. One part is in a Teams chat, another part in email traffic, a part defined in Posts. Copilot knows how to turn this into a coherent story and bundle where the information can be found." Sven describes these kinds of applications as an 'eye-opener'. To achieve these results, it is necessary to get the hang of Copilot. And also to experience when it is less convenient. "Based on the questions we received from the early adopters group, a training plan has been provided together with Wortell in which nine webinars have been drawn up. Those webinars gave a general introduction; 'The Art of Prompting' was one of them. There was also a fun webinar set up: how do I open an escape room? That was a good one."

Change your work approach

"It was a very challenging assignment for Wortell. Implementing a completely new product in a short period of time, which was put into hard work by our organization. The challenge for Wortell was to formulate webinars around this, in which the correct governance rules were always included. They certainly succeeded. My enthusiasm was fueled by the approach. There are Wortellers who are very strong in motivating a certain process," concludes Sven. Kris adds: "I am very pleasantly surprised by the cool, enthusiastic approach. Not: a course here, click there. It was really: change your work approach. For many people it has proven successful, others find it difficult to change their habits. This is not due to the approach, but to the enthusiasm that is more present in certain profiles, such as communication managers and colleagues who make reports. We have to give other colleagues more time to get started." The City of Antwerp continues to count on Wortell for support in setting up Copilot. "Until we have fully mastered it ourselves, we will continue to count on the third-line support of Wortell. Questions about new functionalities are first asked to Digipolis and they see if they can pick them up from the management center. If not, the question is put to Wortell to set it up correctly."

The right tools for governments

"Citizens expect the City of Antwerp to work optimally. They pay taxes and don't have the choice, so we as a government are forced to use the right tools. Artificial Intelligence (AI) will continue to exist, so we want to offer it safely. It has seeped into our lives and will not go out. On the contrary, it will only become more prominent in the coming decades." Kris and Sven conclude with tips for other governments considering Copilot:

• Make sure you have an overview of the dates and how this is organized in advance.
• Make colleagues aware of the risks before use. With us, they were only granted a license if they promised to deal with the risks consciously. Some indicated that it was not clear and that they wanted to wait a little longer.
• Take a conscious approach. It is not a piece of technology that makes you say: here it is and it will learn itself. It requires support from your organization and/or external partners.