M365 News Roundup for March 2026
Whither E7. Is this a move customers want or one Microsoft is pushing?
Copilot News:
The big news -
Microsoft 365 E7: A New Agent-Centered Subscription Plan Expected Soon
What do you think about this? Does it make sense for most users to move to E7? I’m not sold that it’s going to move the needle. If we consider the potential to price E5 + Copilot at $90/month, but this new e7 is reportedly $99/month, is there value for the average user here?
Microsoft published more information yesterday - There is a lot to digest. https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2026/03/09/introducing-the-first-frontier-suite-built-on-intelligence-trust/
From the blog:
Worth Reading - 4 obstacles impede paid Microsoft 365 Copilot adoption
It just isn’t clear to them that they would need to pay for that when they’re already using Copilot to help them write emails and summarize log documents. They are using AI for free on their work PC, their home PC, everywhere. Microsoft has done a really good job of explaining the difference to people who follow Microsoft blogs, but an extremely poor job of explaining it to the average M365 user.
It doesn’t help that they keep changing what is included in the free version, either.
Speaking of knowing the differences, for security and compliance, this is a good resource - INFO: References for Microsoft 365 Copilot & Copilot Chat Security & Privacy.
Other Copilot things:
How to Deploy Microsoft Copilot Safely Using SharePoint Advanced Management
AB-900, AB-100, AB-730, AB-731: Making Sense of Microsoft’s New Copilot Certifications
Copilot Cowork: A new way of getting work done - what kinds of artifacts will this create that become eDiscovery issues?
Non-Copilot News:
I’ll admit, this upcoming change has me concerned. Not because guest accounts are a huge danger, but because many of us use Conditional Access Policies that will break the ability for users to share files from OneDrive and SharePoint without them. It’s going to be a lift to figure out how to reconfigure those. At least, I think it will. I’m not feeling clear about what I’ve read so far.
Guest Accounts Now Used for SPO External Access to Files
Setting aside the not-so-subtle advertising in this post, this is an eDiscovery challenge for many larger organizations:
Managing Multiple eDiscovery Cases in Purview: Where Things Go Wrong
This is a security feature to be aware of with compromised accounts:
Other Microsoft things:
Microsoft 365 – New SharePoint experience! - I haven’t had it long enough to have an opinion. How about you?
Microsoft introduces new security tool for IT admins managing AI infrastructure
Microsoft delays enterprise Outlook switchover to 2027 - I think we all know that “new” Outlook is not ready for the enterprise. Maybe next year.
That’s what I’ve got for this month. I’m going to be doing some initial testing with Loop components and the new ability to share them externally before the next issue. I’m nervous about whether users will end up sharing Meeting Notes, etc. with external users that used to be internal only. It’s one thing to purposefully copy a Loop link into an external chat, where you mean to share it. It’s quite another to just use the Notes feature in a meeting and not realize that permission changed.
We’ll see if that’s what is happening with it. Loop has always had a tremendous collaborative potential, and that only grows with the ability to share the content externally now. Governance, however, just got a little more complicated, I fear.
Like it always does. ;-)