From Experiment to Competitive Advantage: How Frontier Firms are Getting Ahead with Copilot

Last year we ran a briefing on using Copilot to get better results in less time. It outlines ways to get started and save yourself 30 minutes a day.  

The briefing referred to Microsoft’s Work Trend Index 2024: a survey of good habits to adopt when getting started with Copilot. 

This quarter has seen the release of Microsoft’s Work Trend Index 2025. It introduces the term “Frontier Firm”, a name for organisations that are not only encouraging individuals’ use of Copilot but are also reshaping teams and work processes around AI tools. In doing so, Frontier Firms are developing a competitive advantage. 

This article provides our summary of the latest Index, provides links to this and last year’s survey, and a link to our webinar should you have missed it or want a refresher. 

The Survey

Work Trend Index 2025 surveys 31,000 workers from 31 countries, as well as AI-startups, academics, economists and scientists. 

If you are not familiar with the term AI Agents, it is useful to know that they are digital assistants capable of perceiving their environment and can independently make decisions and take actions based on a set of objectives, but are still subject to human supervision. 

What is a Frontier Firm?

2025 sees the birth of what it calls Frontier Firms. Organisations that are scaling their use of AI in three distinct phases. Not all AI projects are at the same stage at the same time, but once an area has been identified it goes through these phases: 

1. Human with Assistant: People use AI to work more efficiently and effectively. 
2. Human-agent Teams: Create agents that act as “digital colleagues”, taking on specific tasks with human direction. 
3. Human-led, agent-operated: Humans set the direction and agents then execute business processes and workflows, checking in as needed.

A key concept is that every knowledge worker becomes an “agent boss”, i.e. is a manager of one or more agents. 

Intelligence is a valuable business commodity but it is limited by human time, energy and cost. On average, employees are interrupted every two minutes during the working day, and messaging outside of work increases 15% year-on-year. So, leveraging intelligence at pace, volume and fixed cost carries distinct advantages. AI at scale promises an escape from drudgery and an elevation in capability and intelligence.  

The Frontier Firm Advantage

AI is considered an engine for growth and a way to future-proof business. The five traits of Frontier Firms are: 

1. Organisation-wide AI deployment
2. Advancing your AI maturity
3. Current use of Agents
4. Projected use of Agents
5. Using Agents to realise a return on investment in AI

It is not surprising, given these commercial advantages, that AI agent adoption is lead by managers rather than by employees, who in 2024 were ahead of leaders in AI adoption. Leaders believe AI is a time-saver, thought partner and career accelerator. They are also more likely to identify a return on AI investment and view agent management as part of their role. 

Currently, the workforce is split about seeing AI not just as a tool but as a partner. Some 52% view AI as a command-based tool whilst 46% see it more conversationally - challenging their thinking, a valuable brainstorming resource and sparking creativity. The remaining 2% didn’t know. 

Interestingly, those surveyed said they turned to AI for its unique abilities: 24/7 availability, speed and quality and unlimited ideas. Few people use it to avoid colleagues and human difficulties such as being judged, avoiding conflict or having to share credit with others. 

The survey believes Frontier Firms are at the forefront of democratising access to expertise and intelligence. HR and IT are combining to form new intelligent resources. 

“To work effectively with agents, all employees will need to adopt a thought partner mindset and build related skills: learning to iterate with AI, knowing when to delegate to AI, prompting with context and intent, refining outputs instead of accepting first drafts, spotting weak reasoning or gaps, and knowing when to push back or steer the conversation or plan. The biggest gains will come from rethinking workflows, improving decisions, and elevating the quality of work across the board.”

If you would like to review your use of AI in more detail, here are some useful resources:

• Microsoft’s 2024 Work Trend Index: AI at Work Is Here
  
• Microsoft’s 2025 Work Trend Index: The year the Frontier Firm is born
• The Final Step’s Byte-Size Briefing – Copilot: How to Get Better Results in Less Time