Do I need both Gmail and Outlook connected?

No. Connect whichever you use for mail, and the matching calendar. The workflow needs one mail source and one calendar, not all four.

Can the brief arrive automatically instead of me asking?

On platforms with scheduled tasks or agents, yes. Everywhere else, a saved prompt you run with your first coffee takes ten seconds.

AI Use Cases

Quick winBusiness + PersonalSaves 30 to 60 minutes per day

Personalised morning brief

Start every day with an AI review of your mailbox, calendar and to-do list: what needs attention today and what is coming up next.

The problem

The first hour of the day disappears into triage: scanning the inbox, checking the calendar, remembering what was promised to whom. The important thing is usually buried under the merely recent.

The workflow

1
Connect your tools
Add your mail connector (Gmail or Outlook), your calendar (Google Calendar or Outlook Calendar) and optionally Notion for your to-do list.
2
Describe your brief
Tell the AI what you care about: urgent emails, meetings needing prep, deadlines in the next few days, promises falling due.
3
Ask for the brief
Each morning, ask for the brief. The AI reads overnight email, today and the days ahead in your calendar, and your open tasks.
4
Act from one place
Work from the brief: it links each item back to the email, event or task it came from.

Start here

Once your connectors are set up, this prompt kicks the whole workflow off. Adjust the details to match your business.

Paste this into your AI tool

Give me my morning brief. Check my email for anything urgent or waiting on me from the last 24 hours, my calendar for today and the next three days (flag anything that needs preparation), and my open tasks. Lead with the three things that most need my attention today, then everything else in priority order, linking each item back to the email, event or task it came from.

The outcome

One readable brief that replaces the first hour of inbox and calendar archaeology.

Time saved: 30 to 60 minutes per day

What it needs

The connectors this workflow uses, and how it runs on each AI platform.

Connectors

Gmail optional Outlook optional Google Calendar optional Outlook Calendar optional Notion optional

Works on

Last verified 18 October 2026

Copilot (free)	Not possible	The consumer app cannot add custom MCP servers.
Copilot Pro	Not possible	Drafted, to verify.
Microsoft 365 Copilot	Build required	Via declarative agents; MCP tool calls consume Copilot Credits.
Copilot Studio agents	Build required	Needs a Copilot Studio licence.
Claude Free	Works natively	Limited to 1 custom connector.
Claude Pro/Max	Works natively
Claude Team/Enterprise	Admin setup needed	Owners add custom connectors.
Claude Code	Works natively
Gemini Enterprise	Admin setup needed	Custom MCP blocked by default org policy; not on Business edition.

Who it's for

Retail & eCommerce Professional Services Public Sector Healthcare & Life Sciences Charities & Non-profit Manufacturing & Logistics Technology & Software Education Personal/Household Leadership Personal

Variations

Development/Engineering

Developers: add the GitHub connector and include pull requests waiting on your review, issues assigned to you and CI failures in the brief.

Retail & eCommerce

Retail operations: add the Shopify connector and include overnight orders, low-stock alerts and fulfilment exceptions in the brief.

The reusable skill

The reusable recipe: connect the sources where your day already lives, write down once what "important" means to you, then ask the same question every morning. The brief improves as you correct it, because your corrections become part of the instruction.