HOW WE WORK
Here's how working together usually unfolds, one step at a time.
Bring a real problem. We talk through what you're trying to do and where things feel slow, and you leave with clear next steps, ones you can take on yourself or that we can work through together.
Book a free conversationMicrosoft Teams · 20 minutes
Open times every week No preparation needed No obligationThe Needs Assessment starts with an hour together on how your work moves: where information comes from, where it gets stuck and what your team already has access to. We listen for what's slowing you down and begin shaping next steps with you.
What we often hear (examples)
Within a week, you receive an Opportunity Brief showing where AI may fit, workflow by workflow, with an honest column for what doesn't need AI at all. We start with the tools you already have, and suggest a paid tool only when it's truly needed.
Where AI may fit (example)
Your Opportunity Brief recommends where to begin. Some teams take it forward on their own, and others continue with us on the next step. Whichever you choose, we're glad to keep supporting your team as its practice grows.
Where teams often go next
Take it forward as a team AI Literacy Training Copilot or Claude onboarding Learning Loops Ongoing AI AdvisoryWHAT WE DO
Most clients start with the Needs Assessment. Every service also stands on its own, so you can come in wherever it makes sense for you.
The Needs Assessment is a paid service with one fixed price. It starts with a one-hour conversation with you, or with you and your team, and within a week you receive a written brief. What you share stays confidential. Here is what the brief covers, shown on a sample for a fictional office.
A free 20-minute call. We talk about where your work gets stuck and decide together whether a Needs Assessment is the right next step.
Other services
What you get
What you get
What you get
SUPPORTED PLATFORMS
Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is included with eligible Microsoft 365 work and school accounts, so many organizations already have it. It drafts, summarizes, answers questions and works with files you share with it, under Microsoft's enterprise data protection. The paid Microsoft 365 Copilot licence adds work grounding: Copilot can draw on the email, meetings, chats and files you already have permission to see, without you attaching them.
You may already have access to Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat through your school or district. A lot of educators do and never realize it, and many who know it is there are not sure how to actually use it. If that sounds like you, we can help you make the most of what you already have.
If your team signs in to Microsoft 365 with work accounts, Copilot Chat is likely already included in what you pay for. You don't need an IT department to start using it well. We begin with what you already have and help you decide whether a paid licence is worth it for your team.
In training, we work inside your own Microsoft 365 environment so people learn Copilot on the documents and tasks they handle in real life. The focus is on practical wins: faster drafting, cleaner summaries, and a clear sense of where Copilot helps and where a person still needs to decide.
Claude is a conversational AI assistant from Anthropic, built to be helpful, honest, and safe. It is strong at writing, research, analysis, and working through long or complex documents, and it holds a careful, considered tone that suits sensitive and high-stakes work.
In training, we show people how to brief Claude well, structure clear inputs, and use it for drafting, research, and thinking through problems. We pay close attention to judgement: checking output, protecting sensitive information, and knowing when to rely on it and when not to.
ABOUT · FICTIO CONSULTING
Based in Eastern Ontario and serving teams across Canada, we help small businesses and educators build real AI fluency.
MEET PATRICK
I like to say I work at the intersection of technology and people. The teaching came first: eighteen years teaching English in Korea, fifteen of them at the university level, beginning in 2002. Teaching across a language barrier changes how you explain things: you learn to break an idea down five different ways and to notice the exact moment it lands. AI is simply the newest technology I've helped people feel capable with.
That work deepened at St. Lawrence College, where I spent nearly six years, first as a digital learning specialist and later as an educational developer, delivering the college's internal training for faculty, staff, and administrators. Those years taught me that the technology is only ever half the question. The other half is whether it's the right tool, used well, for the people in front of it. Fictio carries that approach forward, centred on Microsoft 365 Copilot and Claude, because no two clients live in the same environment.
I'm a daily learner, and reading is part of every morning: where AI is progressing, new platforms and workflows, the latest benchmarks, the trade-offs between open and closed models. The field moves fast enough that staying current is part of the job, and it feeds every Fictio engagement: not what the technology can do in a demo, but what it can do in your work. And six years working alongside Indigenous colleagues reshaped how I think about teaching and learning itself: learning is relational, founded on relationships before content. That's how I approach this business too. The tool matters less than the trust and understanding between the people figuring it out together.
The name comes from Latin: fictio, a shaping or forming. We take how you work now and shape what's next, bringing in AI where it genuinely helps and where you're comfortable, and building the skills that widen both. Fictio exists because the gap I kept seeing was never in the tools. It was between the tools and the people expected to use them. Closing that distance is the work: helping people build the skills and the confidence to shape what's next for themselves, their organizations, and the people they serve.
FAQ · COMMON QUESTIONS
That's exactly what a Needs Assessment is for. We start with a conversation about what you're trying to do and where things feel slow or uncertain. From there, we can tell you honestly whether AI is likely to help, and if so, where to begin. You don't need to have a plan before reaching out.
Both. Some clients are a single educator or business owner who wants to build their own skills before rolling anything out to a team. Others come to us with a department or staff group ready to train together. We adapt to the size and pace that makes sense for you.
That's most of the people we work with. Our training is built around the tasks you already do, not around how AI works under the hood. You don't need to understand the technology to use it well, and we won't assume you do.
Yes. Most of what we cover works through tools you likely already have access to, like Microsoft 365. There's no infrastructure to set up and no IT team required. If you have a laptop and a few hours, we can find a useful place to start.
ChatGPT is a general-purpose AI tool made by OpenAI, available to anyone with an account. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is included with eligible Microsoft 365 work accounts, and when you sign in with that account it is covered by Microsoft's enterprise data protection. For most schools and businesses already on Microsoft 365, Copilot is the more practical starting point, and many already have access without realizing it.
Remotely by default, with clients anywhere in Canada. On-site sessions in Eastern Ontario are available where there's a room where everyone can work at a computer together, since the training happens on each person's own machine.
We tell you. If the conversation points toward a workflow issue, a process problem, or something outside what we currently support, we'll say so clearly. The goal is to help you find the right fit, not to sell a service that isn't one.
Fictio Consulting. Shape What's Next.
