Are we all becoming AI agent managers?
“Can I build an agent for that?”
When I returned from my round-the-world adventure earlier this year and was figuring out what my new daily life looked like, I asked myself this question multiple times per day. Coming from a company hyper-focused on how to use AI for efficiency, it was top of mind to apply what I learned about automating enterprise processes to building my consulting business. I was very proud of the series of agents I built to help manage my day. At the time, I needed help building new routines and these AI agents helped me get back into the swing of things.
Now, 4 months later, I find myself deprecating some of these AI agents, or using them differently than I had when I built them. My needs are different now, or I miss the value from doing a task myself. I’m reaching a point in my business where I have established processes and I’m ready to automate some workflows. As a solo entrepreneur, it’s exciting to build a team of employees without hiring humans. As an experienced manager, it’s important to remember to block time for employee work reviews.
A core start-up teams needs the following roles. I’ve been playing all of them up to now, but it’s time to get some support: CEO, Sales, Marketing, Product, Customer Service, and Finance. This week, I’m ready to “hire” Sales and Marketing agent interns. I always think of new AI agents as interns because they need a lot of instruction and time from me in order to be effective. AI agents also do best on tasks with well established processes and workflows it can follow to achieve the desired outcome.
As a team of one, it’s easy to not establish standard operating procedures (SOPs) for my work, going through my day focused on discrete tasks without thinking through the strategy behind it. That approach isn’t working for me anymore, so it’s time to run my company like a large enterprise: writing strategy documents and establishing SOPs. These two elements are critical foundations for AI automation. You can give an intern (human or AI) a strategy document with set goals and an SOP guide to follow. Then review all the work to ensure the goal is met and the SOP followed. Over time, interns develop into full team members that work with less instruction, but always require work reviews. I look forward to a day when I can trust an AI team member to work autonomously without my review, but I’m not there yet.
When it comes to building a team, I’m applying to same thinking to AI agents as I do to human employees. What work do I want to delegate? What is the job description for the role I will delegate the work to? Is there a gap in my core competencies I need filled by this role? Do I have a clearly defined strategy and SOP to hand off to this role? When I can answer these questions and write a job description, then it’s time to hire.
“Can I build an agent for that?” becomes “Let’s write a job description for the role I need filled on my team.”