Harnessing the Power of AI Collaboration | Simon Lacasse , Microsoft GBB
What if your next business team isn't just made of humans, but also intelligent agents? In this episode of Mastering AI with the Experts, I sit down with Simon Lacasse, Global Black Belt for AI at Microsoft and author of the white paper Scaling Agents for Enterprise. Simon is part of Microsoft’s SWAT team of AI experts, working with global organizations to bring multi-agent systems to life in real-world production environments. We go deep into what’s actually changed in the last 12 to 18 months to make multi-agent systems deployable at enterprise scale, and why it's no longer just research labs or prototypes. It's happening right now. You’ll learn: What agent orchestration actually means (and why it's like a project manager for AI) Why the real shift isn’t smarter models, it's smarter ecosystems How protocols like A2A and MCP are creating an "internet of agents" Why GitHub Copilot is secretly a multi-agent system and what that means for your tools How to start implementing multi-agent architecture in your organization without creating chaos The biggest misconceptions about cost, complexity, and governance Simon’s productivity tips on breaking problems down and avoiding "giant prompts" Whether you're building agent infrastructure or just trying to keep up with the pace of AI change, this episode will make the architecture and strategy behind multi-agent systems finally click. 📌 Resources Mentioned 🔹 Scaling Agents for Enterprise – White Paper by Simon Lacasse https://github.com/slacassegbb/azure-... 🔹 A Guide to Designing a Multi-Agent System - White Paper by Simon Lacasse https://github.com/slacassegbb/WebBro... 🔹 A2A Protocol (Agent-to-Agent by Google) https://a2a-protocol.org/ 🔹 MCP Protocol (Model Context Protocol by Anthropic) https://modelcontextprotocol.io/ 🔹 Simon Lacasse on LinkedIn / simon-lacasse-3545386 📬 Enjoyed this episode? 🔹 Subscribe to Mastering AI for Productivity, my newsletter https://samuelboulangerai.substack.com/ 🔹 Connect with me on LinkedIn / samuelboulanger 🔹 Visit my website https://samuelboulanger.com/ Timestamps: 00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:40 Simon’s journey at Microsoft and Scaling Agents for Enterprise 00:02:33 What are multi-agent systems (simple and practical definition) 00:06:51 Orchestration explained: deterministic vs dynamic, parallel vs sequential 00:07:20 Why multi-agent systems are now realistic to deploy at enterprise scale 00:10:40 What becomes possible when moving from a single agent to an agent ecosystem 00:12:39 Should every subprocess be a specialized subagent (modularity vs monolith) 00:17:50 Real enterprise use cases already delivering business impact 00:20:17 Why A2A and MCP matter and what they enable for agent ecosystems 00:26:20 Where to start: first phases for architecture, grounding, tools, governance 00:35:47 The next 10 years: how AI reshapes work and life with human-agent collaboration