George Mount

Helping orgs modernize Excel for analytics, automation, and AI 🤖 LinkedIn Learning Instructor 🎦 Microsoft MVP 🏆 O’Reilly Author 📚

[George Mount @gjmount]

Take my Copilot in Excel course for FREE, and please share it with someone who could use it!

The full LinkedIn Learning course, "Excel with Copilot: AI-Driven Data Analysis," is unlocked for everyone. No account required.

Over 200,000 learners have joined the course, where I cover practical ways to use Copilot to write and troubleshoot formulas, organize your data, create charts, and explore useful insights.

You can even use it as a formula tutor when you'd like to understand why something works before copying it down 10,000 rows. 🙂

Start learning for free:
https://t.co/ySwhNA9Af1

And please help me spread the word! A repost or a quick message to a colleague makes a real difference.

As a business owner, these shares help my teaching reach people I might never connect with otherwise. I appreciate it so much.

[George Mount @gjmount]

I keep seeing this one and the one about screenshotting a tweet 😅 funny thing is I don't think either of them are 100% accurate. GIFs and screenshots are actually kinda tricky sometimes tbh!

If you do have LinkedIn Learning (available thru many public libraries for free) there are some good social media classes!

[scrappy lil rascal just trying his hardest @speedyspeedboi_]

Sandwich board sign on the curb with ai generated picture of a sandwich board sign on the curb advertising pizza slices

[George Mount @gjmount]

Use connected financial intelligence with Copilot in real financial workflows
https://t.co/LgIXUVNZ03

[George Mount @gjmount]

Digits Introduces Budgets in Digits Pro
https://t.co/VkpSz19xBH

[George Mount @gjmount]

What AI agents can and can’t do in finance
https://t.co/mpPZ0gVSaG

[George Mount @gjmount]

Introducing Claude Whiteboards, Claude Sheets, and Claude Data
https://t.co/AeEFbZoFNY

[George Mount @gjmount]

Been sick for a few days and finally felt good enough yesterday to get a few things done. Think I overdid it, though, because I'm feeling pretty puny today!

At least working for myself means I can rest when I need to. I feel for people whose colds drag on for weeks.

Makes me wonder how much of it is just never getting a chance to rest because life won't let up.

[U.S. Department of the Interior @Interior]

On Veterans Day, we honor the brave women and men who answered the call to serve our nation. Thank you for your service, commitment and sacrifices. 🇺🇸

[George Mount @gjmount]

The times they are a-changin'...
...and I am, let's say, "disappointed but not surprised."

Announcing the retirement of R and Python visuals in Power BI | Microsoft Fabric Community https://t.co/7TGXb3eCnx

[George Mount @gjmount]

If the Copilot training gets great reviews but the monthly report is still a copy-paste marathon two weeks later... what exactly was accomplished?

Before booking training, it helps to get the sponsor, IT and the Excel users talking about the same piece of work: what needs to improve, what tools people can use, and how you'll know the training helped.

My new post walks through those conversations, with two free, fillable PDFs: a one-page sponsor meeting worksheet and a two-page rollout plan.

Bring them to your first planning call so "let's get everyone using Copilot" becomes something your team can actually work toward.

Read the post and download the worksheets: https://t.co/fg9jxQakrb

[George Mount @gjmount]

One of the questions I hear constantly in Excel + AI webinars:

"We don't have paid Copilot licenses. Can we actually do anything with AI in Excel?"

The answer is ... yes! Probably more than you think.

If your organization uses an eligible Microsoft 365 business or enterprise plan, you may already have Copilot Chat available inside Excel without the $30/user/month Copilot add-on.

You can use it to:

- Explain an ugly formula you inherited
- Help draft a formula when you know what you want but aren't sure how to write it
- Ask questions about the workbook you have open
- Upload a file for summarization or analysis
- Think through an analysis before you start building it

But there are some important catches...

The free experience doesn't include broader Microsoft 365 grounding, priority access, or every newer Copilot feature. And for organizations with more than 2,000 Microsoft 365 users, Microsoft changed access to the in-app Copilot Chat experience in 2026, so your licensing situation matters more than you might expect.

The other big question is often data protection. What happens to your data when you use Copilot Chat?

If you're signed in with your work account, Microsoft provides Enterprise Data Protection. Your prompts and responses aren't used to train the underlying models, Microsoft 365 data protection commitments apply, and uploaded files are stored in OneDrive for Business. Microsoft also says you can look for the green shield icon to confirm EDP is active.

That doesn't override your company's own policies around confidential or regulated data, but it does make enterprise Copilot Chat very different from pasting company information into a random consumer AI account.

I wrote up what you can actually do with the included Copilot Chat experience, where the licensing limits are, and what you should know about using it safely at work: https://t.co/9GufabBwkE

[U.S. Department of the Interior @Interior]

Happy 251st birthday to the United States Marine Corps!

The Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington, Virginia, depicts the iconic flag raising at Iwo Jima in 1945 and honors Marines who have given their lives defending our nation since 1775.

[George Mount @gjmount]

I don't have any tattoos, but my laptop does!
(Well, stickers.)

I bought it a little sleeve to cover them for client training sessions, so my laptop now has a business-casual outfit 😂

Better the laptop than me. I'd hate to have to cover up for various occasions. One of the many reasons I've never gotten any tattoos.

[George Mount @gjmount]

University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management launches the AI for Finance program in collaboration with Emeritus.
https://t.co/hhGVL0U98r

[George Mount @gjmount]

The restrictions apply to enterprise users who access Copilot Chat through existing Microsoft 365 subscriptions without separate Copilot licenses, the company said. https://t.co/tNEWSHRYFU

[George Mount @gjmount]

4 areas where companies need AI guardrails | MIT Sloan - https://t.co/HwRVBP8hrM #GoogleAlerts

[George Mount @gjmount]

How CFOs can make AI pay off https://t.co/rJmGUoJXVW via @McKinsey

[George Mount @gjmount]

PwC US to Roll Out Certification on Critical Thinking in AI Era
https://t.co/DEaIbN2mLw

[George Mount @gjmount]

Corporate Finance Institute Launches AI Finance Professional (AIFP™) Certification
https://t.co/ML76XNXl03

[George Mount @gjmount]

If you're experimenting with an AI agent and having it take screenshots for you, I've found that a lot of the native computer-use tools take really low-res screenshots.

Giving it access to Snagit and asking it to use that instead retains the resolution you want.