Create and Use Assistants in Chat

An assistant is a named setup you define once and reuse across your chats: its role and rules, its work procedures, reference files such as lookup tables, the skills it may use, and how its answers come out (in the chat or as a document). Typical examples are an ISO 27001 assistant, a data protection assistant and a NIS 2 assistant, each working its own way, while each client workspace keeps its own instructions.

Assistants answer when you talk to them in a chat. To delegate a task that ISMS Copilot plans and carries out on its own, see Agent Tasks.

Open the Assistants page

In the sidebar, click Assistants. You can also click Customize, then Assistants.

The page lists your assistants on the left and the selected assistant's editor on the right.

Create an assistant

1. Click New assistant.
2. Fill in the fields:
   • Name (required), for example "ISO assistant".
   • Description: what this assistant is for.
   • Instructions: the role, tone and rules the assistant follows.
   • Work procedures: the step-by-step procedures the assistant applies in its work.
   • Skills: optional, see Skills in an assistant.
   • Answers, Document format and File names: see Choose how answers come out.
3. Click Create assistant.

New assistants start with Answers set to Automatic, so documents are created as in any chat until you choose otherwise.

To change an assistant later, select it in the list, edit it and click Save. To remove it, click Delete assistant. Conversations that used a deleted assistant continue without it.

Limits

Add reference files

Reference files hold material the assistant looks things up in, such as mapping tables, code lists or naming schemes. Keep the rules in the instructions and the lookup tables in files.

1. Create and save the assistant first.
2. In the assistant editor, under Reference files, click Add file and choose a file.
3. Wait until the file has been read and added.

Each assistant can have up to 5 files with up to 50,000 characters of text in total. The files are sent whole with every answer under this assistant, so exact codes and table rows are not missed. Because they are sent with every answer, they count toward your usage limits like any other context.

Choose how answers come out

Answers sets whether this assistant's answers become documents:

• Automatic: a document is created when the answer looks like one, as in any chat.
• Always in chat: answers stay in the chat. You can still create a document by hand.
• Always a document: every answer also produces a downloadable file. You can switch it off for one message in the chat (see Skip the document for one message).

Document format sets the format for this assistant's documents: Word (.docx), PDF (.pdf), Excel (.xlsx) or Markdown (.md). Tables and registers can still come out as Excel.

File names sets how downloaded documents are named:

• Standard: short names chosen automatically.
• Keep the document title: the file is named after the document's first heading, keeping your capitals, numbers and dashes. For example, a document whose first heading is "RL-05 Access control" downloads as RL-05-Access-control.docx. Characters that are not allowed in file names are removed.

If you use a numbering or naming scheme for your documents, describe it in the assistant's instructions so the document headings follow it, then choose Keep the document title.

Use an assistant in a chat

Pick the assistant when you start a chat

When you start a new chat, choose an assistant in the assistant picker next to the message box, or keep No assistant. You can also type @ in your first message and choose an assistant from the list: it becomes the chat's assistant.

The assistant stays with the conversation. In an existing chat, the chat's assistant shows as a chip. To work with a different assistant for the whole conversation, start a new chat.

Call another assistant for one message with @

Inside an existing chat, type @ and choose an assistant from the list. A chip appears on your message, and only the next answer comes from that assistant. The chat keeps its own assistant: your following message goes back to it automatically.

For example, in a chat with your ISO assistant you can type @ and choose your data protection assistant to get one answer on a GDPR question, then continue with the ISO assistant.

Answers written by an assistant show a small badge with the assistant's name. A message where you called an assistant shows that assistant on your message.

Skip the document for one message

When the assistant answering your next message is set to Always a document, a Document toggle appears next to the message box. It is on by default. Click it to skip the document for that one message; it turns back on for the next one.

Set a default assistant for a workspace

If you keep one workspace per client or project, you can choose the assistant that new chats in that workspace start with.

1. Open the workspace.
2. In the Default assistant card, choose an assistant.

The default assistant is preselected when you start a new chat in that workspace. You can still pick another assistant before you send the first message. The default is your own setting, and it is available in your personal workspaces.

How assistants work with workspace instructions and your preferences

An assistant defines how to work. A workspace defines the client. When both are present in a chat, ISMS Copilot applies them in this order:

1. ISMS Copilot's core rules and safety always come first. No instructions can override them.
2. The workspace instructions describe the client (who the client is, scope, terms, naming, confidentiality). The assistant does not override them.
3. The assistant's instructions and work procedures decide how to work and how to structure the output. Its reference files are used as data.
4. An active skill can shape the current task, but it does not override the workspace instructions or the assistant's method.
5. Your general custom instructions (tone, length, language) apply where nothing above says otherwise. Where they differ from the assistant, the assistant applies.

See How to use workspace instructions and How to set up custom instructions.

Skills in an assistant

In the assistant editor, Skills lets you choose which skills this assistant may use. If you choose skills, only these are used in chats with this assistant. Leave it empty to keep your usual skills. As in any chat, at most one skill is applied per message, and only when it matches your request.

Workspace skills take precedence:

• The workspace has its own skill list (see Choose skills for one workspace): the assistant can only use skills that are on in that workspace. An assistant never turns back on a skill the workspace turned off. If none of the assistant's skills are on in the workspace, no skill is used.
• The workspace uses your account-wide skills, or the chat is outside a workspace: the assistant's own skill list applies as you chose it.

When one of the assistant's skills is off in the current workspace, the assistant editor tells you which ones.

Where assistants apply

Assistants apply in Fast and Think mode in your personal chats and personal workspaces. They do not apply in:

• Beyond mode (the composer shows "Assistants apply in Fast and Think." when Beyond is selected).
• Team chats and shared team workspaces.

Related articles

• Use Skills to Tailor Your Responses
• How to use workspace instructions
• Organizing Work with Workspaces
• Generate a document from a chat reply