How to speak to AI?

I don't know about you, but taking notes while I'm also presenting, or facilitating, or just trying to keep up with a fast conversation, is genuinely hard. So, I've happily handed that job to Copilot. It listens, it transcribes, it writes the recap. Lovely. 

And this is worth getting good at for more than meeting notes. Speaking to AI is fast becoming the way we actually use it. We already command and prompt it with our voice, and that's only going to grow. Typing isn't going anywhere, but more and more, we'll just talk to our tools. So the skill of speaking so a machine understands you isn't a niche meeting trick. It's becoming an everyday one. 

But there's a catch, and it's a big one. 

Copilot doesn't actually sit in your meeting. It reads the transcript. That's a short sentence with huge consequences, so  the transcript is the source of truth now, not the meeting. If the transcript is vague, the recap is vague. If it says "inaudible" or guesses the wrong word, every decision and action item built on top of it is wrong too. 

The real question isn't "how do I prompt Copilot for a good summary?" It's this: how do I speak so the transcript is worth summarising in the first place? 

So, what actually works? 

• TL,DR

  Copilot doesn't sit in your meeting, it reads the transcript. So the transcript is the source of truth, not the conversation. Speak with that in mind:

  • Speak up, stay near the mic. Mumbles become "inaudible", and the AI summarises the wrong thing.

  • Say reactions out loud. A nod doesn't reach the transcript. "Sari's nodding, Anna's shaking her head" does.

  • Name the topic first. "Let's talk about the Q3 timeline," then talk. That line becomes the searchable handle.

  • Name people every time. "Maria's handling the Copilot in SharePoint launch campaign," not "she's handling it."

  • Say the word "decision". It's the strongest signal Copilot looks for.

  • End with a spoken recap. The last minute is what gets retrieved later. Use it.

  • The test: if a colleague joining at minute 22 could follow you, so can the AI.

  • Then proofread. A better draft, not a finished one. That part's still yours.

Speak up, and stay near the microphone

This one is almost too obvious, and that's exactly why people skip it. Mumbled words become "inaudible". Half-heard names become the wrong name. And Copilot will confidently summarise the wrong name without double-checking. 

You don't need a radio voice. You just need to be heard. Stay close to the mic, speak clearly, and remember the AI is listening through the transcript, not through the room. 

A note for my fellow Finns (and quiet people everywhere)

If you know any Finnish people, you may have noticed that we can be very… silent. In a meeting that can mean anything from completely agreeing with everything to being utterly shocked about the matter at hand. That's just how we are. 

But that's exactly why this matters: nodding or shaking your head does not carry over to the transcript. The AI never sees it. 

That’s why the person leading the meeting or the topic has to say it out loud. "Sari and Maria are nodding in agreement, Anna is shaking her head in disbelief." Or something similar. It might feel ridiculous for the people in the room, I know. But it's gold for the AI writing the recap. 

Name the topic before you discuss it

Same rule as headings on a page or the title of a chapter in a book. Before you get into something, say what it is about. Don’t start with "okay, so, about that thing from last week…" instead "Let's talk about the Q3 launch timeline." Then talk. 

Why? Because Copilot retrieves your meeting in chunks later, and that opening sentence becomes the handle it grabs. "Let's talk about the Q3 launch timeline" is findable. "That thing from last week" is not. 

Name people and projects every time you switch context

When the topic shifts, restate who and what. Every time. 

Not "she's handling it." Say "Maria's handling the Copilot in SharePoint launch campaign." It feels repetitive in the room, I know. But the transcript gets chopped into pieces, and a piece with no names in it is an orphan. Nobody, human or AI, can tell who "she" is six weeks later. 

And there's a happy side effect. Say someone's name and you instantly pull whoever's zoned out back to the ground. Nothing snaps a drifting brain back like hearing its own name. 

My trick: treat every topic switch as if a new person just walked into the meeting. Who are they, what are we deciding, what's it about. Say it out loud. 

Say the word "decision"

When you actually decide something, mark it. Out loud. "Decision: we go with the name Copilot in SharePoint, because AI in SharePoint causes way too much confusion." 

Two good things happen. Copilot's recap picks it up reliably, because "decision" is one of the strongest signals it looks for. And the colleague who zoned out for thirty seconds knows exactly what just got agreed. 

Decisions are the highest-value thing in any meeting, and somehow the easiest to lose. Don't let yours dissolve into the chatter. 

Spend the last minute on a spoken summary

This is the one people rarely do, and it's my favourite. 

The last minute of your meeting is what Copilot retrieves when someone asks "what happened in the X meeting?" later. Use that minute on purpose. "To recap: we decided X. Maria owns the next step. We meet again Thursday." Three sentences, fifteen seconds, and the meeting is findable forever. Or at least for the 60 or 120 days that the meeting notes are stored in OneDrive, but that's a different blog post. 

If you do nothing else from this list, do this one. Or mention the nodding. Can’t decide which one!  

The one test that beats all the rules

If a colleague joined your meeting at minute 22 and could still follow along, who's involved, what's being decided, what the topic is, then Copilot can follow too. If that person would be lost, so is the AI. 

That's it. That's the whole thing. Whenever you catch yourself slipping into shorthand and pronouns and "you know what I mean", run that mental check. 

And then, proofread

One more, because I can't help myself. AI notes take a lot of the pressure off writing everything down during the meeting. They don't remove your responsibility to read the recap afterwards and fix what's wrong. That part is yours, no matter which tool you use. Speaking clearly gets you a much better draft. It doesn't get you a finished one. 

So, speak for the transcript, not just for the room. Name your topics, name your people, say "decision" when you mean it, and give it a clean recap before you hang up. Do that, and the AI summary goes from "roughly what happened" to "actually useful."

We're going to be talking to AI more and more. So we might as well get good at being understood.