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MCP Overview

MCP access lets your organization connect an AI assistant it already uses, such as Claude or Microsoft Copilot, to Amplify. Once connected, people can ask that assistant about their Amplify data — for example, which initiatives are behind on their benefits, or what's at risk in a program — and get answers alongside their other work, without opening Amplify. It uses the Model Context Protocol (MCP), an open standard for connecting AI assistants to other systems.

This article covers what MCP access includes, and what's needed to set it up. For the steps for each assistant, see What's needed to set it up.

MCP access is in beta, and needs to be turned on for your organization. Speak to your Customer Success Manager to have it turned on.

What MCP access covers

A connected assistant can read:

  • Initiatives — across your hierarchy, with their classification, stage, dates, owners, totals, and custom fields.
  • Benefits — with their plan, forecast, and actual values, by period and by financial year. This means it can find benefits with missing actuals or forecasts, or compare years.
  • Costs — with their category and cost group, and their budget, forecast, and actual values, by period and by financial year.
  • Goals — with their targets, and the values rolled up from the benefits linked to them.
  • RAID items — every type, including action plans and change logs, with their status, owner, impact, likelihood, rating, mitigation, and financial impact.
  • Tasks and milestones — from initiatives' schedules, with their dates, baseline dates, progress, and whether they're overdue or coming up.
  • Stage gate approvals — which initiatives are waiting on approval to move to their next stage, and who their approvers are.

It can also read your organization's classifications, stages, measurement units, and ratings, so it can describe your data in your own terms. When an answer names an initiative, it can link to the initiative, or its Performance Dashboard, in Amplify.

What it can't do

  • MCP access is read-only. A connected assistant can't create, change, or delete anything in Amplify — not initiatives, benefits, or any other item.
  • It only sees what you can see. Each person connects with their own Amplify account, and the assistant can only read the data that person's Amplify permissions allow. Connecting doesn't give anyone access to anything new.
  • It doesn't cover everything in Amplify. Status reports, documents, resources, timesheets, and scenarios aren't included. For approvals waiting on you, use your Personal Dashboard.
  • It isn't Ask Amplify. MCP gives your assistant access to your data, but not to Ask Amplify's agents, Crystal and Anthony, or the AI features built into Amplify, such as generating status reports. For those, see AI in Amplify.

How it works

  1. An administrator in your organization sets up the connection once, in Amplify and in your AI assistant.
  2. Each person connects the assistant to Amplify once, by signing in to Amplify and allowing it read access.
  3. When someone asks the assistant about their Amplify data, it reads the data it needs from Amplify, as that person, and answers.

What's needed to set it up

Setting up MCP access needs:

  • MCP access turned on for your organization — by your Customer Success Manager. Until it is, the AI Assistant (MCP) OAuth section isn't shown under Administration > Authentication.
  • An Amplify administrator — to copy the connection details from the AI Assistant (MCP) OAuth section, such as the MCP Server URL, and to add your assistant's sign-in address to its Redirect Whitelist.
  • An administrator for your AI assistant — to add Amplify as a connector, such as an Owner in Claude, or a Global or AI Administrator in Microsoft 365.
  • A plan or licence for your assistant — that supports custom connectors, such as a Claude Team or Enterprise plan, or a Microsoft 365 Copilot licence for each person.
  • An Amplify account for each person — who'll connect.

For the steps for each assistant, see:

Your data

Once your assistant reads data from Amplify, that data is handled by the assistant under your organization's agreement with its provider — including where it's processed, and whether it's used for training. Check those terms before connecting it. For how Amplify's own AI handles your data, see AI Data and Privacy.

For Amplify's own AI features, see AI in Amplify.