Workbooks AI MCP Server
Workbooks includes an MCP server, so you can use Workbooks from the AI assistant you already work in, such as Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini or Copilot. Your assistant can find and read records, run reports, create and update records, and run your Workbooks AI Agents, all within the permissions of the user who connected it.
MCP (Model Context Protocol) is an open standard that lets AI assistants connect to business systems. Think of it as a standard plug: any compatible assistant can work with any compatible system. Rather than relying on information that’s been copied or pasted into it, your assistant works with your live Workbooks data.
MCP doesn’t replace Workbooks AI. It’s another way to reach it. Your data, permissions and Agent configuration all stay in Workbooks, and MCP lets you use them from somewhere else.
What you need
- A Workbooks AI license: every user who connects an assistant needs one. The MCP server works using the AI tools that come with the license.
- An MCP-ready AI assistant: such as Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini or Copilot, on a plan that supports connectors.
- Your existing Workbooks permissions: there’s nothing new to set up. Your assistant uses the same access you already have.
Connecting your assistant
Your MCP URL is available within Start > Configuration > Workbooks AI > Overview.
Add this URL as a connector in your AI assistant. The exact steps depend on the assistant you use, so check its own help pages for adding a custom or remote MCP connector. When prompted, sign in with your own Workbooks login. Each user connects as themselves, so the assistant only ever sees and does what that user can.
What your assistant can do
- Find and read records: People, Organizations, Cases, Projects and more.
- Run reports: use the reports the connected user can already access, and use the results when answering questions or carrying out tasks.
- Create and update records: add leads, log activity and update fields, including across many records at once.
- Draft emails: prepared in Workbooks for you to check and send.
- Enrich company data: from Companies House and other connected data sources.
- Run your Workbooks AI Agents: hand tasks to the Agents your administrators have configured.
Running Workbooks AI Agents from your assistant
When a request matches one of your configured Workbooks AI Agents, your assistant can suggest the Agent and run it through MCP. It will ask before running anything. For example: “Your team has an Opportunity Review Agent in Workbooks. Would you like me to run it on this deal?”
The Agent then uses the instructions, criteria and output format your administrators have set up, and the result comes back into your conversation. This means your team gets your organization’s agreed approach, whichever tool they’re working in.
Examples
- Asking a quick question: “Who do we know at this customer, and what’s still open with them?” Your assistant searches for the organization, pulls the related people and opportunities, and summarizes them in plain English.
- Turning event notes into opportunities: share your notes from an event and ask your assistant to create an opportunity for each conversation. It matches people and organizations to existing records, creates any that are missing, and shows you the list to review before creating anything.
- Setting up a project from a spreadsheet: ask your assistant to upload a project plan, and it creates the Project and its Project Tasks in Workbooks. If the project already exists, it stops and asks how you’d like to proceed rather than creating duplicates.
- Preparing for a meeting: before a renewal meeting, ask for the customer’s open Cases from Workbooks alongside recent emails and the last proposal from your shared files, if your assistant is connected to those too.
- Creating documentation from support history: your assistant can review a resolved Case and its Activities, check whether the information already exists in your Knowledge Base, and create or update an Article where appropriate.
- Analyzing your data: “Look at our recent opportunities. What’s working, what isn’t, and what’s our average deal size?”
TIP: For bulk work, such as creating or updating lots of records, ask your assistant to show you what it plans to do before it runs. Duplicate checks, mandatory fields and permissions still apply, just as they would if you were working in Workbooks directly.
Access and permissions
Access through MCP is controlled by the Workbooks user account connected to the AI assistant. The assistant can only see the records that user can see and only take the actions that user is allowed to take. MCP doesn’t give any additional permissions: if a user can’t view or edit a record in Workbooks, they can’t do it through MCP either, and any approval processes you have in place still apply.
Actions performed through MCP are carried out on behalf of the connected user, so they appear in Workbooks as that user’s changes.
MCP isn’t read-only by default. Administrators can choose to give particular users read-only MCP access, so their assistant can look up and report on Workbooks information without creating or changing records.
NOTE: Workbooks controls what your assistant can access in Workbooks, but not how the assistant itself stores or handles information once it has it. That depends on the assistant provider’s own terms and settings.
Workbooks AI or MCP?
The two work best together, and many organizations use both.
Use Workbooks AI when you want everyone to follow an agreed method: Agents your administrators set up once and keep improving, with consistent outputs across the team.
Use MCP when you want Workbooks information inside the assistant you already use, for bigger one-off jobs such as bulk updates, or to combine CRM data with other sources. When your assistant answers on its own, the result depends on how it’s been instructed. When it hands a task to one of your Workbooks AI Agents, it follows your team’s agreed approach.
For more information on everything included in Workbooks AI, see Workbooks AI. If you’re setting up Workbooks AI for the first time, see Getting Started with Workbooks AI.