Stop building agents first — define the job, inputs, guardrails, memory, and outputs

Stop building agents.

Most people open Claude Code and ask it to "make an agent."

You should do the boring part first.

Here's my workflow (steal this):

1. Write the job description

One sentence:
"this agent turns messy customer calls into clean CRM updates."

If I can't explain the job, the agent can't do it.

1. Define the inputs

Screenshots.
Emails.
Docs.
API fields.
Meeting notes.

Bad agents fail because the input is vague.

1. Write the forbidden actions

No deleting.
No sending.
No editing billing.
No changing source data without approval.

This is where trust actually comes from.

1. Give it tiny memory

Not "remember everything."

Just:

• customer name
• last decision
• current blocker
• next action

Small memory beats fake intelligence.

1. Make the output boring

I want:

• summary
• decision
• confidence
• what needs human review

If I can't inspect it in 10 seconds, it is not production.

1. Run it manually 5 times

Watch where it panics.
Watch where it guesses.
Watch where it sounds confident while being wrong.

Then automate.

The agent is never the product first.

The workflow is.

Author's reply in the comments:
@alexabelonix make it better and easier for yourself

@merheb All of it kinda lol

Mostly codex and Claude for coding

Openclaw and Hermes for harness

Perplexity for research

And some other tools for other random jobs