Part 2: The Next 5 Things Every BC Functional Consultant Should Know in AL

This is the long-awaited second part in my “AL for BC Functional Consultants” series. Are you a functional consultant who was able to make simple changes in NAV C/SIDE, but struggle to do the same in Visual Studio Code and AL? I am one of you and I have lived through this exact pain. My goal is to help you do more for your clients, and more importantly, help you do it the right way so that both your clients and your development team are happy. Join me to learn 5 more important things in AL - and as always, all code examples will be available for you through GitHub.

I have done the “5 Things Every BC Functional Consultant Should Know in AL” at previous Directions EMEA, Directions North America, Community Summit and DOK NORDIC conferences. This is the next session in that series and shows functional consultants how to do some more advanced things in AL.
While it would be great to have both sessions accepted, each session is fully independent and the audience will get great value even if they just one of the two sessions in the series.

Power Automate and Business Central: The Pro Level Stuff

If you're attending this session, we're assuming you know how to make basic Power Automate flows and use the common Business Central triggers and actions. Let's roll up our sleeves and tackle the harder stuff like executing bound actions (procedures), working with images and attachments, leveraging adaptive cards in Teams and more. Prepare to use Actions and Connectors you haven't used before, and roll up your sleeves to even write some AL code (not too much, though).

This is a 300-level class, for audiences who have a basic foundation and skills in Power Automate.

The Definitive Zero-to-Hero Copilot Studio Workshop For Business Central Professionals (version 2.0)

Are you feeling lonely without a Copilot of your own? Is everyone around you making their own Agents except you? Have you seen a lot of demos on building Agents but nothing that you can actually put to use in your business?
Would you want to build an Agent that your team would actually WANT to use? One that uses all the newest features in Copilot Studio leveraging the very best of Generative AI?
Together, we will build Agent BeeCee, your new trusty copilot and sidekick. Every Batman needs a Robin, and every Business Central professional needs an Agent BeeCee.

Agent BeeCee can:

• Answer your how-to questions about Business Central and its functionality based on knowledge sources you specify (Web, Files, SharePoint)
• Display, sort and filter lists of Items, Customers, Vendors, etc. (or your custom table) from Business Central
• Reason over your inquiries and give you insights about data from Items, Customers, Vendors, etc.
• Create a new record in Business Central such as an Item, Customer, or Vendor
• Send business-ready e-mails on your behalf with just a prompt, including information from Business Central such as a Sales Invoice or a Quote (yes, it will use your BC report layouts!)
• Show and answer questions about your calendar and schedule
• Create a new calendar event
• Autonomously reason over an e-mail from a customer and respond to their request such as a list of unpaid invoices with due dates
• Autonomously respond to requests based on an organization’s operational policies
• Get the status of a package being delivered by UPS
• Tell the weather
• And thanks to the built-in LLM it can also tell you dad jokes or show you how to make an origami duck!

Skills you will learn:
• Build Agents with Copilot Studio
• Create Topics
• Create Actions (built-in Connectors, custom Power Automate Flows and more)
• Create Triggers to make your Agent autonomous
• Use Instructions and Descriptions to make your Copilot Agent smarter
• Use Dynamic Chaining to make your Agent efficient and increase user satisfaction levels
• Work with Adaptive Cards
• Work with AI Builder and Prompts
• Work with HTTP GET Method to pull data from a public service
• Deploy your Agent in Teams, a website or even inside Copilot for Microsoft 365 so you can access them inside Copilot BizChat or from Word, Excel, etc.
• Securing your Agents with authentication

Want to work with custom data? I’ll also show you how to build and deploy custom API pages in Business Central

We will primarily work with the native Connectors in Copilot Studio’s Actions, as well as Power Automate Flows. We will also cover an example with Dataverse.

Copilot Agents with BC data: Should you use Action Connectors, Power Automate Flows or Dataverse?

Welcome to the first of its kind deep dive session on the different ways you can connect Business Central data into Copilot Studio-built Agents. We will cover each of the three approaches: Connectors (Actions), Power Automate Flows, and Dataverse, and go into the pros and cons of each path. We will also cover best practices, authentication and security, as well as limitations of Copilot Studio when working with BC data, and cover how you can make your own Autonomous Agents similar to BC's Sales Order Agents to automate business processes.

Build your own AI Agent connected to Business Central (no PhD or Coding needed!)

All anyone talks about these days is AI, Agents, GPT and Copilot. What if you could build your own copilot / agent connected to Business Central data to help make life easier for your customers or co-workers? You can, without writing a single line of AL code or getting a PhD in AI! Come to my session to see how it's done with the magic of Copilot Studio and leave inspired. The session is great for Consultants, but I'm confident Developers will also find this valuable.

Agents Unleashed: Mastering Declarative & Custom Agents in Copilot Studio

Dive into the world of intelligent automation in our hands-on session where we'll build four agents from scratch in Copilot Studio - a declarative agent with the Copilot Studio Agent Builder, a declarative built inside Copilot Studio, a declarative agent built in Visual Studio Code, and a custom-engine Agent built with Copilot Studio that can be deployed anywhere. Explore the unique capabilities, design philosophies, and practical applications of each approach as we compare and contrast their strengths. Attend this session and gain actionable insights to choose the right agent strategy for your next project and transform your AI Agent game.

Copilot Studio Zero to Hero: Build Copilot Agents connected to Business Central (No PhD needed!)

News Flash: You don't need to be an AL developer to build AI Agents (custom copilots) connected to Business Central data!

In this workshop, I will take you from beginner to proficient in one day. All you need to bring is a laptop and an appetite for learning.

You will learn how to create an Agent from scratch, experience how Instructions and Descriptions influence GenAI driven agents, work with different types of knowledge sources (Files, Websites, SharePoint, Dataverse, Bing Custom Search), create Actions and Power Automate Flows to work with Business Central, use Triggers for autonomous behavior, create Topics to orchestrate conversations, track performance and behavior with telemetry, and deploy your Agent to Teams, a website or within Copilot for Microsoft 365. For non-BC developers, I will also teach how you can quickly and easily create and publish custom APIs to interact with Business Central data.

Start your AI journey with this workshop and you will be the office hero when you return from this event!

This is a short workshop format (ideal run time 105 minutes to 4 hours).

Build Your Own AI-driven Power Automate Expense Management tool for Business Central in 45 Minutes!

Let's bring together the magic of Power Automate, AI Builder and Business Central as I build a fully functional Expense Management solution live in just 45 minutes! I'll bring the receipts too. This is one session you won't want to miss! For those of you who've never been to one of my sessions, I not only do / show things, I explain why I'm doing what I'm doing so you can do it too!

Future of Writing: Examining the Ethical Implications of AI Content Creation

Generative AI is here and it can do a lot of things for you, including writing. It'll never have writers block and it'll write anything - or about anything - you ask it to. But should you? You'll hear strong opinions from both sides of aisle. AI tool makers tout its abilities and the productivity benefits, while schools, universities and publications shun its use. What should you do? Let's examine the ethical implications of using AI for content creation together as I help you navigate through this new and uncharted territory.

3 AI Copilot features in Business Central You Need to Start Using Today!

AI is all about making your life easier. If you're looking for three AI features built right into Business Central that will save you stress and time today, look no further than the Bank Reconciliation Copilot, the AI Cash Flow Forecast, and the Copilot Created Analysis lists. Let me show you how they work and how you can incorporate them into your regular routines.

Copilot vs. ChatGPT: What's the difference and Which tool should You Use?

First there was Open AI's ChatGPT. Then there was Copilot. You've probably heard that Copilot is also built on the latest GPT model. So they should just work the same, right? They don't. If you've ever wondered about the differences, strengths and weaknesses of each tool and wanted to decide which tool YOU (or your company should use), THIS is the session you don't want to miss. I've been using ChatGPT for over a year and Copilot since its launch and I'm hear to share the good, the bad and the ugly lessons from the school of hard knocks.

Copilot Studio: Build your own Copilot connected to Business Central (no PhD needed!)

All anyone talks about these days is AI, GPT and Copilot. What if you could build your own copilot connected to Business Central data to help make life easier for your customers or co-workers? You can, without writing a single line of AL code or getting a PhD in AI! Come to my session to see how it's done with the magic of Power Automate, and leave inspired. The session is great for Consultants, but I'm confident Developers will also find this valuable.

This content is tailored to fit a 45 to 90 minute session.

Building an Agent? Should you go with Copilot Studio, Azure OpenAI Service, or Custom GPT?

There are dozens of AI tools out there. Even within the Microsoft ecosystem, you've got three: Microsoft's own Copilot Studio and Azure OpenAI Service, and the heavily-funded-by-Microsoft service that has become a household name ubiquitous with AI: ChatGPT. Which tool or platform should you use to build your organization's chatbot(s)? Join my session to demystify the strengths and weaknesses of each tool, its intended audience, and the costs involved.

Data Readiness or Death: 5 Things You Must Do BEFORE Deploying Copilot for Microsoft 365

Deploying Copilot for Microsoft 365 is quick. VERY quick. Buy license, assign license. If you have a tech-savvy team, you may not even need any organized training to start seeing value from your investment. If you proceed without proper planning, you may win the day, but you will likely lose your hair, your sanity and maybe your job in the days, weeks and months that follow. Let me help you with the 5 key prep steps you must take before flipping the Copilot switch - these tips will not just save your job, but could earn you a reputation as a person with vision and strategic skills. Who knows, maybe a promotion could soon follow too!

Source Code Management (SCM) for Dummies. And Smart developers who haven't started using it yet.

If your idea of source code management (SCM) is adding inline comments, I have news for you. That’s not really SCM. It may have been the common way to do it for some, but there is a better, more effective way of doing it in Visual Studio Code. I will teach you in a way that is simple and straight-forward so that you can put it to use right away on your projects. Where you are a single developer or work in a team of developers, it will make your life easier and it will save you and your customers a lot of time, tears, and money over the long run. This will be especially useful for Dynamics NAV developers who are now developing for Dynamics 365 Business Central.

BC Telemetry: Accurate, Data driven performance insights.

For years, you've trusted your eyes, your gut, and maybe even the voices in your head to tell you when Business Central (or NAV) wasn't performing the way it should. Now there's a better way. Simple to deploy, easy to read, and accurate to boot. Join my session for a quick walkthrough of deployment and configuration, and guidance on how to make sense of the telemetry data coming from your Business Central tenant.

Power BI factboxes in your BC Lists - Relevant KPIs at your fingertips!

Imagine how much time you could save if you could see KPIs for a Customer, Vendor, Item, or Job record as soon as you select it on a list page in BC. Imagine no more, because it can be done and I'll show you how. How to create the right sized report, what visuals work best, how to include more information on supporting report pages, and most importantly, how to mount them to a factbox in BC and get it filtering on the selected record.

Flushing: Implementing Good Manufacturing Hygiene in Business Central

When you are implementing Manufacturing (Production Management) in Business Central are you helping them maximize efficiency and lower costs today? Effective configuration of Flushing Methods can go a long way in helping businesses realize greater profitability and shorten production times. In this session, I start with the basics and build up to best practices that you can put to use on your next implementation!

5 KPIs to measure the performance of your Dynamics 365 practice

If you are a Dynamics 365 practice leader, a business manager or owner, this is a must-attend session. There's an old saying that you can only improve what you can measure. I will show you five KPIs to gauge individual and team-level performance of your ERP/CRM practice with details on how you can calculate each KPI. Once you implement these metrics within your organization, you will be able to spot your team's strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities for improvement and increased profitability. The insights will help you identify trends and canaries in the coalmine so you can do what good leaders do: stay ahead of the curve!

BC Partner Readiness in this Era of Constant Change

It seems like every few months, Microsoft changes one more thing about how you as a Partner administer and help your Business Central customers. Whether it is security best practices, managing notifications on app compatibility, accessing a BC environment as a delegated administrator, or even changing an environment's experience from Essentials to Premium, change is the only constant. Come to this session to learn about all of these changes so you and your BC team are adequately prepared to provide the best service to your customers.

Connecting Business Central On-Premises to Power BI: Step by Step

When you’re using BC online, connecting to Power BI is a breeze. On-Premises? Not so much. The devil is in the details, and it can stump even the best BC or BI consultant. I will show you step-by-painful-step how to prepare your Business Central environment to connect not just to Power BI Desktop and the service. Welcome to the world of SSL certificates, FQDNs and more.

Business Central online vs. On-Premises: Telling the Twins Apart

Users may not be able to tell the differences between the Online and On-Premises version of Business Central, but can you? While it is essentially the same product, it is far from identical. You, as the BC Partner and Consultant, have to guide them towards making the right decision for their business, and it starts with knowing what is different about each version and how it impacts your customer. With each new release, the differences change – whether it is in the application area, the platform, or the licensing. Make sure you are armed with the most current knowledge and not just something you heard from a friend or read on the internet. This session is updated with the latest information to reflect all the changes made through Business Central 2022 Release Wave 2.

Demo to Win. What Do Prospects Really Want from you in a Presale Demo?

A common mistake that organizations make is tasking the consultant with the deepest product knowledge to perform demos for new prospective clients. Demonstrating knowledge of the product is only one part of the equation. How well you understand the prospect's business needs, the motivating factors driving the purchasing decision, understanding the audience in the room - these can be far more critical. Between 2008 and 2018, I have led hundreds of presale efforts and demonstrations for prospective clients across organizations of different sizes and focus, and both as a VAR and an ISV. I am trained in the ways of Bob Riefstahl's "Demonstrating to Win" philosophy and enlightened by Matt Dixon's "The Challenger Sale", and I have seen firsthand how the lessons from these have impacted our presale success rate. Join my session to learn how you too can improve your odds of winning by focusing on the things that matter most to your prospect.

Hiring Young Talent? Here are 10 Things You Must Do to Succeed: Lessons from the Field

In 2019, we at DSWi embarked on an aggressive growth plan, with recruitment being one of the cornerstones of our strategy. More specifically, recruiting talent straight from local colleges and universities and mentoring them to grow into productive employees and superstar consultants. It was a rough start, but we are now beginning to reap the rewards of this initiative. In this session, I will start with WHY we see this as a cornerstone for growth and success, and then share 10 tips you that we've learned from our successes and our failures. If you're looking to hire young, this is a must-attend session.

How Efficient is Your Business Central Practice? And how do you even measure it?

As the old saying goes, "you can improve only what you can measure." Your team and company spends all of its time improving business processes and performance for your clients, but have you implemented any KPIs to measure your Business Central Practice's performance? Whether you are a small practice of 5 people or a large practice of 50, join my session to learn 5 effective ways to measure and track the health of your practice. Whether you are the practice leader of your BC team, or a business manager / owner, this will put you in a better position to make both tactical and strategic decisions regarding your team such as whether you are overstaffed or understaffed, do you need to increase your billing rate, how much more work your team can take on without adding headcount. There are just a few examples. You won't want to miss this session!

Power BI Cookbook: 5 Recipes for the Business Central Consultant

Are you a BC Consultant / Business Analyst who is great at creating reports in BC or Excel, but struggling to get the most of Power BI? In this session, I will teach you how to use Columns, Measures, and the Power Query Editor to get the outcomes you need to meet your customers’ needs. This session will follow a cookbook style approach and show you 5 practical recipes that you can apply to help you with any Power BI report you create from now on!

5 Things Every BC Functional Consultant Should Know in AL

Are you a functional consultant who was able to make simple changes in NAV C/SIDE, but struggle to do the same in Visual Studio Code and AL? I am one of you and I have lived through this exact pain. In this workshop, you will learn the basics that AL boot camps and workshops targeted at developers do not teach you. You will learn how to download and set up your environment to create extensions, work with fields, tables, pages, add actions to the ribbon, create processing reports and how to avoid common mistakes. And you will also get some helpful theory on the basics before we start the exercises!

This session can be done in different length formats, as a workshop, a 90 minute session, or a 45 minute session.
I also have a sequel to this session. While it would be great to have both sessions accepted, each session is fully independent and the audience will get great value even if they just one of the two sessions in the series.

5 Best Practices for Data Migration

When it's time to move from your old ERP or accounting system to Microsoft Dynamics 365, don't be a digital hoarder. Contrary to popular belief, you do not need every last byte of historical data from your old system to work effectively. Join us as we go over best practices for data migration so you can be strategic and save your organization a lot of time, effort and money!

Session Objectives
1. Which areas of historical data should you migrate during an implementation?
2. How much historical data should you migrate?
3. At what point(s) in the implementation should you migrate historical data?
4. What happens to the data that didn't make the cut?

It’s a Date! How to make sense of all the dates on Sales (and Purchase) Orders in Business Central

Ever wonder how a Posting Date is different from an Order Date or a Document Date? And how does Business Central calculate a Promised Delivery Date? And how do all of these dates flow on Sales and Purchase documents? Come to this session and I’ll help you make sense of it all. The concepts and information you’ll learn here will also come in handy when you’re trying to understand how date calculations work in Business Central’s MRP and Order Promising functionality.

This session applies both to Business Central as well as NAV (Navision).

Creating Power Automate flows for Business Central that actually matter!

Ever searched YouTube for "Power Automate flows"? There are 100s of videos, maybe more! Try searching for "Power Automate flows for Business Central" and you'll find about a dozen. And most of them focus on the simple demo examples of Workflow approval or create flows using out-of-the-box BC API pages. Great for some demo magic, but it doesn't get you very far when you need to create flows for the real world. Here's where I can help. I'll teach you how to use data from your custom tables and pages, and call bound actions to run code in Business Central from your Power Automate flow. And best of all, it's not really that hard once you learn how it's done. No fluff, no kool-aid, just real talk and real examples.

This session can be presented in a 45-60 minute format, or as a 4-8 hour hands-on-lab / workshop format.

Business Central for Manufacturers: Strengths and Weaknesses (No Kool-Aid)

Is Business Central a viable solution for Manufacturers out-of-the-box? Of course, it is! Sometimes it's the perfect fit. Except for when it isn't. Do your homework so you know where Business Central is strong, where the weaknesses lie, which gaps you can bridge the gaps with AppSource, and how it compares to its SaaS competitors like NetSuite, Acumatica and Intacct. I spent nearly a decade of my career in presales and have seen almost every kind of manufacturer. I've won many deals and lost many, and I'll share lessons from my experience so you can be prepared and increase your win rate!

What's better than a pinky promise? Order Promising in Business Central

Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is full of under-utilized features and Order Promising is right at the top of that list. If you want your sales team to make commitments that you can keep and build greater credibility with your customers, you need to implement order promising ASAP. Powered by lead times, handling times, shipping and delivery times, and your shop calendar, Business Central can paint a very accurate picture of order fulfilment. Sticking a finger in the air and shaking the crystal ball is no way to run a business, and manually calculating dates on the back of a napkin is so 1994. Let me show how to take control of your destiny and increase your sales department's efficiency.

This session is a part of my "Business Central's Best Kept Secrets" series.

Everything you need to know about selling Copilot to your customers today!

On January 15, 2024, Microsoft finally announced the commercial availability and pricing for Copilot, Copilot Pro, and Copilot for M365. Do you know which SKU is right for your customers? What are the prerequisites? Will it work with their existing Office 365 licenses? How can you - or your customers - extend Copilot functionality? And what does this mean for other SKUs like Teams Premium that also offer AI functionality? If you're planning to sell Copilot to your customers and prospects, this is a must-attend session. Learn the details beyond the marketing talk, then sell with confidence!

Everything You Need to Know about Deploying Copilot for Your Business Today!

On January 15, 2024, Microsoft finally announced the commercial availability and pricing for Copilot, Copilot Pro, and Copilot for M365. Do you know which SKU is right for your business? What are the prerequisites? Will it work with your existing Office 365 licenses? How can you extend Copilot functionality? Is your data ready for AI? How secure is your data? Who will use Copilot in your business and how will they benefit? What type of ground rules should be setting regarding AI use for best outcomes?

Should You Invest In AI For Your Business? And What Does That Even Mean?

Not since the early days of the Internet have we witnessed such excitement about a new technology. Everybody is talking AI and you probably have someone - an advisor, a colleague, a boss, a peer, or even your family - is in your ear everyday telling you that you need it. But what does getting AI for your business even mean? Will it be a wise investment? Will it help your team or have them running for the mountains? Let me demystify the AI opportunity for you and help you decide IF you should invest in AI, and HOW you should go about it.

Build Smarter Copilots: 5 Better Bot Best Practices in Copilot Studio

When someone asks how good your custom Copilot is, do you answer "50% of the time, it works all the time?" Does it know a lot but answer very little? Are you wasting too many precious message credits in each conversation? Is GenAI either doing too much or too little? Anyone can build a Copilot, but it takes experience and some best practices to make Copilots that users will keep coming back to.

Sales Order Agents: The Copilot for Business Central that will change how you do business!

Business Central is loaded with Copilots to make your life easier. From bank reconciliation to late payment prediction, from Copilot for Finance to in-app chat, and even a toolkit to build your own copilots. But everything changed on October 21, 2024 when Microsoft announced the Sales Order Agent for Business Central. This experience will help your order takers work faster, improve accuracy, raise customer satisfaction levels, and wow you every step of the way. If you haven't experienced it yet, this is the session you don't want to miss!

Business Central is loaded with Copilots to make your life easier. From bank reconciliation to late payment prediction, from Copilot for Finance to in-app chat, and even a toolkit to build your own copilots. At Directions North America this spring, Microsoft unveiled the Sales Order Agent for Business Central. This experience put autonomous AI agents to work, cutting down time and improving accuracy of order taking, raise customer satisfaction levels, and wow you every step of the way. Best of all, you will still have oversight and control to ensure nothing happens without human approval. If you haven't experienced it yet, this is the session you don't want to miss. Here's where this session gets even better. You'll also get a quick walkthrough of how you too can make your own AI agents to get things done faster!

Deploying Copilot Studio built Agents Org-Wide: Step-by-Step walkthrough and lifecycle management

Congratulations! You've built and tested your Agent in Copilot Studio and are ready to publish it for your organization's users. There's more to it than just hitting the Publish button, especially if you want to properly manage the lifecycle of your Agent as an app. You will undoubtedly be making fixes to the Agent, adding new functionality and more, and you need to be able to streamline the process of rolling out new versions. And then there's the matter of security and who the Agent will be available to. In this session, you will get a step-by-step walkthrough of this process with attention to details.

A Practical Guide to GenAI Tools for Maximizing Workplace Productivity

AI won't replace you; people who are skilled in the use of AI tools will. In 2025, you are risk of falling behind if you are still unaware of key AI concepts and tools. Whether it's developing an understanding of the different types of AI, how different models work, or identifying the right AI tools to help unlock productivity and solve your customers' problem, the time is now. Once you master the concepts, then you can start the process of up-skilling and becoming proficient on the AI tools that are right for you. Your journey starts here with session - a crash-course on the landscape of AI today and the practical tools that you can use to unleash a better, more productive version of yourself.

Unlock the Secrets to Understanding and Controlling Your Copilot Studio Agent Costs

Building an Agent with Copilot Studio costs nothing. The costs begin once you deploy it. And running your agent could cost you as little as zero and and as much as thousands of dollars each month. Done right, an agent can save your organization a ton of time and money. Done poorly, you could be sinking money down the drain. Let me teach you how to properly assess the cost of running an agent, determine if it makes good business sense, and most importantly, how to optimize your agents to get the most value for your investment.

Understand how Copilot Studio Agents are costed
Calculate the costs associated with executing various tasks in Copilot Studio
Learn how to reduce and optimize the cost of running your Copilot Studio Agent

Let's Live-Build an AI-Powered Autonomous BC Support Desk: Put AI to Work for You

How much time would your organization save if it could leverage AI to handle incoming support requests AND triage / provide first level support for your customers? With Autonomous Agents, this is no longer a dream for tomorrow but a reality today. We will leverage Copilot Studio's autonomous agent capabilities and combine it with some AL vibe coding to showcase how to build a ready-to-use AI powered BC support desk. This is a live-live build session. No screenshots, no recorded videos, no cop-outs.