Step-by-Step Guide to Building Custom Agent Experiences for D365 Finance and Operations

You can build and change agent experiences in D365 Finance and Operations. You use Copilot Studio with easy and advanced tools. These tools help you do things like syncing supplier emails or saving receipts. This makes your work easier each day. Many companies get real benefits from these changes. They make decisions faster and teams work better.

With custom agent experiences, you can make solutions that fit your business needs.

Think about where agent experiences could help your work go faster or give your team better ideas.

Key Takeaways

• Custom agent experiences in D365 Finance and Operations help people make better choices and work faster. They make jobs easier for everyone.

• Before you build agents, check that you have the right access and license. Make sure your team is set up well. This helps the work go smoothly.

• Pick clear use cases and set goals you can measure. This helps agent experiences match what your business needs.

• Use both low-code and pro-code tools to change agent experiences. This makes sure they fit what you need.

• Watch your agents often and update them when needed. This keeps things working well and helps you handle new business needs.

Prerequisites

You must get ready before you build agent experiences in D365 Finance and Operations. These steps help your team work well together.

Access and Licensing

You need a license to use Copilot Studio with D365 Finance and Operations. Microsoft gives you different choices. Pick the one that matches your business size and needs.

Tip: Try the Free Trial if you want to test agent experiences first. If you have a big team, Message Packs help you handle lots of messages.

Copilot Studio Setup

You need to set up Copilot Studio to start making your own solutions. Log in with your Microsoft account. Use the setup wizard to connect Copilot Studio to your D365 Finance and Operations. You must have admin rights to finish setup. Check that your data is safe and ready. You can use templates to help you start faster.

• Log in with your Microsoft account.

• Connect Copilot Studio to your D365 Finance and Operations app.

• Make sure you have admin access.

• Check your data connections and security.

• Look at templates for a quick start.

Team Roles

You need a team with clear jobs to build and manage agent experiences. Each person does a different job.

Note: Giving clear jobs helps your team work faster and not get confused. Each job helps the team from setup to launch.

Plan Agent Experiences

You should make a plan before you build agent experiences in D365 Finance and Operations. Planning helps you fix real problems and reach your goals. Follow these steps to help your team use agent experiences well.

Define Use Cases

First, look at problems your business faces every day. Think about jobs that take too long or have mistakes. Ask your team where they need help. Match each problem with what an agent can do. For example, if checking order status takes hours, you can make an agent that gives updates fast.

Tip: Write down each problem and match it to an agent experience. This helps you see how automation saves time.

Use these questions to help you pick use cases:

• What jobs slow down your team?

• Where do you find mistakes or delays?

• Which jobs need more data or quicker answers?

Set Objectives

You need clear goals for your agent experiences. Goals help you see if your project works and stays on track. Ask people from different departments to share what they need. You can hold meetings or interviews to learn what matters most.

Here is a table to help you set goals with your team:

Note: When you set goals, make sure everyone agrees on what success means. This keeps your agent experiences focused on real needs.

Gather Requirements

You need to collect details about what your agent experiences should do. Use easy ways to gather requirements. Talk to users, check current workflows, and look at data. Make sure you cover both technical and business needs.

Here are some helpful ways:

• Natural Language Processing (NLP) helps your agent understand customer questions.

• Data Retrieval lets your agent get real-time info from D365 Finance and Operations, like order status.

• Contextual Responses make sure your agent gives answers that fit each question.

• Escalation Support sends hard problems to human agents with all needed details.

• Technical Integration connects your agent to D365 Finance and Operations using APIs.

• Agent Development Workflow helps you set up steps for your agent, like matching questions to data fields.

Tip: Write requirements in simple words. Share them with your team and stakeholders so everyone knows what the agent will do.

Use these steps to gather requirements:

1. Talk to users and ask what they need.

2. Check current processes and find gaps.

3. List technical needs, like data sources and security.

4. Make sure requirements match your goals.

Careful planning helps your agent experiences fix real problems and helps your business grow.

Build and Customize

Now you can start making and changing your agent experiences in D365 Finance and Operations. This part helps you set up workflows, add business rules, use custom entities, and make your solutions better with pro-code tools. You can pick low-code or pro-code options to match what your business needs.

Design Workflows

Workflows show how tasks move from one person to another. Good workflows help your agent experiences work well and stay smooth. Try these best practices to make strong workflows:

1. Pick the right assignment types so only the right users do each step.

2. Set rules for finishing steps, like needing one or most people to approve.

3. Make sure people cannot approve their own requests.

4. Set up batch jobs so messages get handled on time.

5. Watch out for loops that never end because they slow things down.

6. Save your workflows as templates so you can use them again.

7. Use child workflows for steps you use a lot to make changes easier.

8. Clear old logs to keep your system fast.

9. Limit how many workflows change the same record at once.

10. Add notes when you change workflows so your team knows what is new.

Tip: Use workflow templates and child workflows to save time and keep things the same each time.

Add Business Logic

Business logic tells your agent what to do in different cases. You can use low-code tools or write code for more control. Here are some common types of business logic you can add:

• Use Natural Language Processing (NLP) so your agent understands user questions.

• Set up data retrieval to get real-time info, like order status or account balance.

• Make contextual responses so your agent gives answers that fit each question.

• Add escalation support to send hard questions to a human agent.

Note: Start with built-in features like AI agents and Copilot features. You can add more logic with Power Platform or Azure AI Services if you need special actions.

Use Custom Entities

Custom entities help you track extra info that normal tables do not have. You can add fields and connect them to your agent experiences. Follow these steps to use custom entities:

1. Add your custom field, like Loyalty Level, to the customer table.

2. Open Visual Studio and find the right entity, such as CustCustomerV3Entity. Make an extension.

3. Drag your new field into the entity’s field list so your agent can use it.

4. Add the custom field to the staging table to stop errors during imports or exports.

5. Refresh the entity list in the Data Management workspace to update your changes.

Tip: Custom entities let your agent experiences use all the data your business needs, not just what comes with the system.

Extend with Pro-Code

Sometimes you need more control or special features. You can use pro-code tools to make your agent experiences better. Here is how low-code and pro-code options compare:

You can use low-code tools like Power Automate for quick changes. If you need more custom features, use pro-code tools in Visual Studio or Azure. Pro-code lets you build special features and make things run faster.

Note: Start with low-code for simple needs. Move to pro-code if you need more control or want to add advanced AI features.

You can also use built-in features to speed up your work. D365 Finance and Operations gives you AI agents, feature management, and Copilot features. You can turn these on in system administration and add more with Power Platform or Azure ML.

Remember: Mix low-code and pro-code options to build agent experiences that fit your business best.

Data Integration

Connect to D365

You need to link your custom agent to D365 Finance and Operations. This lets you use real business data. D365 has many ways to connect. Each way helps you move data in and out. Pick the method that works best for you. Here is a table to help you choose:

Tip: Try D365 Data Entities or OData API for easy tasks. Use custom APIs or Azure Data Lake for harder jobs.

Secure Data Access

You must keep your data safe when agents connect to D365. Follow these steps to protect your business info:

1. Set user roles for each job. Only give access to what people need.

2. Use least privilege. Do not give extra permissions.

3. Turn on multi-factor authentication for all users.

4. Watch user activity with audit logs.

5. Change security rules as your business grows.

6. Teach your team about security best practices.

Note: Checking often and teaching your team helps you find problems early and keep data safe.

Handle Permissions

You control what your custom agent can do by setting permissions. Follow these steps to manage permissions in D365:

1. Make a custom security role by copying an old one.

2. Add new privileges to the custom role if needed.

3. Publish the role to make it active.

4. Give the custom role to users in System Administration.

5. Refresh your browser to see the changes.

Remember: Custom roles help you give the right access to each user. This keeps your system safe and your data protected.

Test Agent Experiences

Testing your agent experiences in D365 Finance and Operations helps you find issues before launch. You make sure everything works as planned and users get the best results.

User Testing

Start by forming a user acceptance testing (UAT) team. Pick people from different departments and roles. Train your team so everyone knows how to use Dynamics 365 and the testing process. Set up a test environment that matches your real system. Give your team test scripts to follow and ask them to write down what they find. Create an easy way for users to share feedback or ask questions. Repeat testing as you fix problems. Update your test scripts based on what you learn.

1. Form a UAT team with users from many roles.

2. Train the team on Dynamics 365 and UAT steps.

3. Set up a test environment like your real one.

4. Run test scripts and record results.

5. Collect feedback and answer questions.

6. Test again after fixing issues.

7. Improve test scripts as you go.

Use different testing methods to check your work:

Tip: Mix different testing methods to cover all parts of your agent experiences.

Deploy

When you finish testing, start your deployment with a small group. Pick one cost center or team to try the new agent first. Adjust your rules and settings based on what you learn. Use test data from the last quarter to practice before going live. Add Power BI reports to see trends and match rates. Train your team with a short workshop so everyone knows how to use the new agent and read logs.

1. Start small with one group.

2. Adjust rules as needed.

3. Use test data for practice runs.

4. Add Power BI for deeper insights.

5. Train your team to use and understand the agent.

Watch for common challenges like low user adoption or missing business changes. Give your team support and show them the benefits of using Dynamics 365.

Monitor and Improve

After deployment, track how your agent performs. Watch key metrics to see what works and what needs fixing.

You should also check response time, transaction throughput, resource use, user activity, and error rates. Use this data to make your agent better over time. Update your agent as your business grows and needs change.

Note: Regular monitoring and updates keep your agent experiences helpful and efficient.

---

You can make your business work better with custom agent experiences in D365 Finance and Operations. Many companies say they get back a lot more money than they spend. Some save between 215% and 346% in return. A few even save $14.7 million in three years. Sales teams save lots of hours every year. Manufacturing teams finish jobs up to 30% faster. Copilot Studio lets you set trigger phrases, automate jobs, and sum up customer data. Projects that use these tools have smoother workflows, lower costs, and better data privacy. Try Copilot Studio, join the D365 community, and look at Microsoft’s guides for more features.

FAQ

How do you start building a custom agent in D365 Finance and Operations?

You open Copilot Studio, connect it to your D365 app, and choose a template or start from scratch. You set up your workflow and add business logic. You test your agent before using it in your business.

---

What skills do you need to customize agent experiences?

You need basic computer skills. You use low-code tools for simple changes. You use pro-code tools like Visual Studio for advanced features. You learn by following Microsoft guides and practicing with templates.

---

Can you use your own data with Copilot agents?

Yes, you connect your agent to D365 Finance and Operations data. You use APIs, data entities, or OData to access business information. You set permissions to keep your data safe.

---

How do you test if your agent works correctly?

You create a test team. You use test scripts and a test environment. You check if the agent does tasks, answers questions, and handles data as expected. You collect feedback and fix any problems.

---

What should you do if you want to add more features later?

You review your business needs. You update your agent in Copilot Studio. You use low-code for quick changes or pro-code for advanced features. You test new features before deploying them.