Beyond the Hype: Finally Measuring the Real ROI of Your AI Agents

BY: Vishesh Singh | Operations Head

As an Operations leader, my inbox is constantly flooded with the promise of AI. We hear about “transformation” and “efficiency” daily. But for those of us responsible for the P&L and operational strategy, the question isn’t just about deployment—it’s about impact.

We’ve deployed Copilot. We’ve built agents in Microsoft Copilot Studio. But until recently, answering the question “What is the actual return on investment?” has been a mix of guesswork and fragmented data.

That changes with the latest integration between Microsoft Copilot Studio and Viva Insights.

The Blind Spot in AI Adoption

For the last year, many organizations have been in the “experimentation phase.” We built agents to handle IT tickets, HR queries, and sales support. Although anecdotal feedback was positive, we lacked a comprehensive view.

Without hard data, it is impossible to align agent usage with actual business goals. You can’t manage what you can’t measure.

The Solution: Viva Insights for Agents

Microsoft has rolled out a capability that I believe is a game-changer for operational visibility. You can now analyze the business impact of your Copilot Studio agents directly within Viva Insights.

This isn’t just IT monitoring; this is business intelligence. It provides a cross-tenant, aggregated view of value.

Here is what we can finally see clearly:

• Hard ROI (Hours Saved): No more estimating. The report calculates the time saved based on agent interaction, providing a tangible efficiency metric.
• Usage Trends: Are people actually using the agents we built? We can now track adoption curves across the organization.
• Resolution Rates: It’s not enough to chat with an agent; did the agent solve the problem? This metric is critical for quality control.

Why This Matters for Operations Strategy

For an Operations Head, this dashboard is the difference between “hoping” AI works and “knowing” it works.

1. Justify the Spend: We can now draw a direct line between the cost of Copilot licenses/development and the operational hours saved.
2. Identify the Winners: The ability to drill down to specific agents allows us to see which use cases are driving value and which ones need retooling.
3. Strategic Alignment: We can ensure that the agents taking up the most compute are the ones aligned with our Q1/Q2 business objectives.

Getting Started

This feature is designed for organizations that are already scaling. To access these insights, your environment generally needs:

• At least 50 Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses.
• At least one Copilot Studio agent is published in production.

Note: Environment admins have control over this data, and cross-region sharing may need to be enabled depending on your data residency.

The Bottom Line

We are moving past the phase of AI novelty. We are entering the phase of AI accountability. If you are running Copilot agents but aren’t looking at the Viva Insights data, you are flying blind.

It’s time to stop guessing the value of your digital workforce and start measuring it.

Need help configuring your Copilot metrics or making sense of the data? At Square International Technology Consulting, we don’t just implement tech; we ensure it delivers business value.

Let’s discuss your AI strategy. 📞 +971-45897017 | +971-589800163

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