Delegating Real Work to Agents
How to brief an agent like you'd brief a contractor: goals, context, constraints, and checkpoints.
Good Delegation Is a Skill
The quality of an agent's output is mostly determined before it starts working — by the brief. Vague brief, vague result. This is good news: briefing is learnable, and you already do it every time you delegate to a person.
The Four-Part Brief
- Goal. What exists when this is done? One sentence. "A page where workshop attendees can book a paid one-on-one session."
- Context. What does the agent need to know? Who it's for, what tone, what already exists, what it connects to.
- Constraints. What must be true? "Use my existing calendar. Don't touch the live site until I approve. Keep it to one page."
- Checkpoints. Where do you want to inspect? "Show me the layout before wiring up payments."
The Mistake Everyone Makes
Treating the agent like a mind-reader. If you wouldn't hand the brief to a freelancer and walk away for a week, don't hand it to an agent and expect magic. The fix is cheap: more context, smaller bites, earlier checkpoints.
Your Rep
Take a task you'd normally do by hand and write the four-part brief for it. In session, we'll run your brief against a real agent and compare what you got with what you meant — the gap is your curriculum.