EBS Analysis: Share agents with other users – Microsoft Copilot Studio

Sharing Microsoft Copilot Studio Agents: Architecture, Security, and Governance

Executive Introduction

Enterprises increasingly rely on conversational AI to automate customer service, internal knowledge retrieval, and process automation. Microsoft Copilot Studio enables rapid creation of agents that can be deployed across Teams, web chat, and other channels. However, the value of an agent is limited if it cannot be accessed or collaborated on by the broader team or organization. The core challenge for IT leaders is to provide secure, governed sharing mechanisms that respect licensing constraints, identity management, and data privacy while enabling productive collaboration among developers, analysts, and business stakeholders. This article dissects the sharing capabilities of Copilot Studio, explains the underlying architecture, outlines implementation steps, and highlights security and operational considerations that are critical for enterprise deployments.

Technical Overview and Architecture

Agent Sharing Mechanisms

Copilot Studio offers three primary ways to share an agent for chat consumption:

• Security groups: An agent can be shared with a security group, allowing all members of that group to interact with the agent without individual invitations.
• Organization-wide sharing: The agent can be made available to everyone in the same Microsoft Entra ID organization. No email invitations are sent; a shareable link must be distributed manually.
• Individual user sharing: Specific users can be granted access by entering their name or email address.

Each method enforces the same fundamental prerequisite: the target user must possess a Microsoft Copilot Studio per‑user license or an active trial. Users without a license cannot chat with the agent, even if they are added to a security group.

Collaborative Authoring Permissions

When the intent is to co‑author an agent, sharing goes beyond read‑only access. Co‑authors must have the Environment Maker Dataverse security role, which includes the ChatBotReaders privilege necessary to run flows and interact with the agent. If a prospective coauthor lacks this role, a System Administrator with the System Administrator Dataverse role can assign the Environment Maker role on their behalf. The assignment process can take up to 10 minutes for Dataverse membership propagation and up to 15 minutes for visibility of a new team in the Copilot Studio for Teams app.

Role‑Based Access and Security Roles

Copilot Studio leverages several predefined security roles to fine‑grained control:

• Analytics Viewer: Grants read‑only access to the agent’s Analytics page, including drill‑downs to conversation transcripts. Users must also have the Bot Transcript Viewer role, which is assigned at the environment level in the Power Platform admin center.
• Agent Viewer: Allows users to view and run evaluation test sets without any ability to modify the agent itself. This role is useful for subject‑matter experts and quality reviewers.
• Environment Maker: Includes the ChatBotReaders privilege, enabling users to execute Power Automate flows embedded in the agent. This role is automatically granted when an agent is shared with users who lack sufficient environment permissions.
• Bot Transcript Viewer: Provides access to session‑level transcript data stored in the Dataverse. By default only administrators hold this role; it can be scoped to specific environments to limit exposure.

These roles are assigned either during the sharing workflow (e.g., selecting a role in the “Share agent” pane) or via the Power Platform admin center for environment‑level management.

Connection and Service Principal Considerations

Agents that connect to external services—such as Azure Databricks Genie—store connection credentials tied to the identity of the user who configured them. Consequently, an agent may function for the creator but fail for other users. To mitigate this, administrators can:

• Configure the connection to use a service principal when the service supports it, thereby decoupling the credential from a specific user.
• Set up environment‑level connections so the agent runs under a shared, non‑user‑specific identity.
• Require individual OAuth authentication for each user when the service demands it, ensuring that each user’s token is used.

These approaches preserve functionality across diverse user identities while maintaining security compliance.

Flows and Power Automate Integration

Agents often embed Power Automate flows for business logic, data retrieval, or external API calls. Sharing an agent does not automatically share its constituent flows. Users without access to a flow can still trigger it via the Test panel, but they cannot edit or publish the flow themselves. To enable full collaboration, flows must be shared explicitly in Power Automate, either by granting the coauthor the Contributor or Owner role on the flow, or by using environment‑level permissions that inherit the agent’s sharing settings.

Implementation Considerations

Prerequisites

Before an agent can be shared, the following conditions must be met:

• The publishing user must hold a Copilot Studio per‑user license or an active trial.
• Authentication must be set to “Authenticate manually” with Microsoft Entra ID as the identity provider.
• “Require users to sign‑in” must be enabled to enforce identity verification.
• The target environment must have the appropriate security roles (e.g., Environment Maker) assigned to the intended audience.
• If the agent uses external connections, either a service principal or environment‑level connection must be configured.

Configuration Steps

To share an agent, follow these steps within Copilot Studio:

1. Open the agent you wish to share.
2. Select the three‑dot menu (⋯) on the top bar and choose Share.
3. Specify the sharing scope:
   • Enter security group names for organization‑wide or group‑based sharing.
   • Or list individual users for direct sharing.
   • Or select “Everyone in ” to make the agent available to the entire tenant.
4. Review the permissions for each group or user, ensuring the correct role (e.g., Agent Viewer, Analytics Viewer) is applied.
5. Optionally enable Classic Sharing to send email invitations (requires the security group to have email enabled) or copy a link for manual distribution.
6. Confirm the sharing operation.

Managing Access and Revocation

Access can be revoked at any time by returning to the Share dialog and removing the relevant security group, user, or “Everyone” scope. When an agent is stopped from being shared, affected users lose access after their current conversation times out (typically 30 minutes of inactivity). This design prevents lingering access while still allowing ongoing sessions to complete gracefully.

Security and Governance Implications

Identity and Authentication

Manual authentication with Entra ID ensures that only verified identities can interact with the agent. Enforcing “Require users to sign‑in” adds a layer of assurance that the agent is only consumable by authorized personnel. However, this also means that any misconfiguration in Entra ID group membership—such as a group with SecurityEnabled = false—will block sharing, as Microsoft 365 groups without security enabled are excluded from agent sharing.

Role Assignment and Privilege Management

System Administrators are responsible for assigning environment‑level roles. The Environment Maker role automatically grants the ChatBotReaders privilege, which is essential for users to execute embedded Power Automate flows. Custom security roles can be created to grant the ChatBotReaders privilege selectively, allowing fine‑grained control over who can run flows without giving full environment maker rights.

When sharing an agent, administrators are notified if a user lacks sufficient environment permissions; the system can automatically assign the Environment Maker role during the sharing process, simplifying compliance.

Data Access and Transcripts

The Bot Transcript Viewer role controls access to conversation transcripts stored in Dataverse. By default, only administrators possess this role. To enable broader visibility—while adhering to privacy and compliance policies—organizations should create dedicated environments for specific agent families and assign the Bot Transcript Viewer role only to users who have completed appropriate privacy training. This approach limits exposure of sensitive dialogue data.

Analytics and Evaluation Roles

Analytics Viewer provides read‑only insight into metrics and drill‑downs to individual user questions, supporting data‑driven decision‑making without exposing edit capabilities. The Agent Viewer role extends this capability to evaluation test sets, allowing stakeholders to run repeatable tests and assess performance while the agent owner retains full control over content and configuration.

Operational Considerations and Pitfalls

Propagation Delays

Changes to team membership or role assignments can take time to propagate. New team members may need up to 10 minutes before an agent becomes visible in Copilot Studio, while visibility in the Teams app can require up to 15 minutes. Organizational changes—such as restoring or deleting a team—may require up to two hours for the updates to reflect across all client experiences.

Concurrent Editing Conflicts

When multiple authors edit the same topic simultaneously, Copilot Studio detects conflicts upon save. Users are presented with two options: Discard changes (reload the agent with the latest version, losing their work) or Save copy (preserve their changes in a separate topic). The recommended practice is to save a copy, review the colleague’s modifications, merge the topics, and then delete the duplicate. This workflow mitigates data loss and maintains a clear audit trail.

Flow Sharing Limitations

Because flows are not automatically shared with an agent, administrators must ensure that any Power Automate flow used by the agent is accessible to the intended audience. Failure to do so can result in runtime errors when users attempt to invoke the flow via the Test panel. Explicitly sharing the flow in Power Automate, either by adding users as contributors or by using environment‑level permissions, resolves this issue.

License and Trial Constraints

Only users with a valid Copilot Studio per‑user license—or those on an active trial—can consume the agent. This licensing model impacts scaling strategies; large enterprises may need to allocate licenses proactively or employ shared service accounts with service principal authentication to avoid license exhaustion.

Why this matters to enterprise IT

Enterprise IT must balance the need for rapid innovation with rigorous governance, security, and compliance requirements. The ability to share Copilot Studio agents securely ensures that conversational AI solutions can be leveraged across departments without creating silos or exposing sensitive data. Proper use of security groups, role‑based access, and environment‑level configurations reduces the risk of inadvertent data leakage, supports auditability, and aligns with corporate policies on identity and access management. Moreover, understanding the operational nuances—such as propagation delays and conflict resolution—helps IT teams plan rollout schedules, set realistic adoption timelines, and avoid service disruptions.

EBS Consulting Perspective

From a consulting standpoint, the sharing capabilities of Copilot Studio present both opportunities and challenges. The most effective governance model combines three pillars:

1. Clear Sharing Policy: Define whether agents are shared organization‑wide, per‑team, or on a per‑group basis. Document the intended audience and the corresponding licensing requirements.
2. Role‑Based Access Framework: Map business functions (e.g., analysts, developers, executives) to the appropriate security roles (Analytics Viewer, Agent Viewer, Environment Maker). Use the Power Platform admin center to enforce these roles at the environment level, ensuring that privilege assignment is consistent and auditable.
3. Technical Enablement: Implement environment‑level connections via service principals where possible, and verify that all required flows are shared in Power Automate. Conduct early‑stage testing with a pilot group to surface any authentication or permission issues before broader rollout.

By institutionalizing these practices, enterprises can achieve scalable, secure deployment of Copilot Studio agents while maintaining compliance with internal security policies and external regulations.

Practical Next Steps

1. Inventory all existing agents and verify that each owner holds a Copilot Studio per‑user license or an active trial.
2. Identify the target audience for each agent (e.g., specific department, project team, organization‑wide) and select the appropriate sharing method.
3. Establish security groups in Microsoft Entra ID that align with business units; ensure each group has email enabled if automated invitations are desired.
4. Configure authentication to “manual with Entra ID” and enforce “require sign‑in” to guarantee identity verification.
5. For agents using external services, evaluate the feasibility of using a service principal or environment‑level connections to decouple credentials from individual users.
6. Assign the necessary Dataverse security roles (Environment Maker, Bot Transcript Viewer, Analytics Viewer, Agent Viewer) through the Power Platform admin center, documenting the rationale for each assignment.
7. Communicate the sharing plan to stakeholders, providing clear instructions on how to access the agent (link, Teams tab, or direct chat) and how to request additional permissions.
8. Monitor usage and permission changes via the Power Platform admin center and Copilot Studio analytics, adjusting role assignments and sharing scopes as needed.

Conclusion

Effective sharing of Microsoft Copilot Studio agents hinges on a combination of licensing compliance, identity management, role‑based access control, and thoughtful governance. By leveraging security groups, environment‑level configurations, and the built‑in security roles, enterprises can securely expose conversational AI capabilities to the right users while preserving data privacy and operational stability. The outlined implementation steps and best‑practice considerations provide a clear roadmap for IT leaders to integrate Copilot Studio into their broader AI strategy, ensuring that the technology delivers measurable business value without compromising security or governance.

EBS Consulting Advice

If your organization is evaluating Share agents with other users – Microsoft Copilot Studio, do not treat the technology decision in isolation. Start with the business outcome, current architecture, security and identity controls, operational constraints, migration dependencies and governance requirements. A practical assessment should identify the current-state gaps, prioritize the risks and define an implementation roadmap with measurable outcomes.

EBS can help assess the environment, develop the architecture and modernization roadmap, and translate the technical options into an actionable business plan. Relevant EBS services: Microsoft Azure consulting Microsoft Solution Assessments Modern Workplace.

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