Useful AI agents need clear boundaries.
Why permissions, evaluations, and human judgment belong in the first release.
Start with the smallest useful action.
An agent becomes valuable when it can help complete work. Start with a bounded workflow: gather information, propose an action, and request approval. Expand autonomy only when the evidence supports it.
Make permissions explicit.
Treat each connected tool as an interface with a defined purpose. Limit what the agent can read and change. Preserve the permissions of the person using it, and separate low-impact retrieval from actions that alter records or contact customers.
Design the exception path.
Incomplete information, unavailable services, and ambiguous instructions are normal operating conditions. Give the user an understandable status and a route to take over. A graceful handoff is a feature.
Evaluate the whole workflow.
Test whether the right information was retrieved, the correct tool was selected, and the final outcome met the requirement. Keep examples of failures and revisit them as prompts, models, and integrations change.