Building agents: start with the simplest pattern

A summary of Anthropic's article “Building effective agents”, with my notes for small businesses.

Key points

1. Start with the simplest solution. A single, well-built call is often enough.
2. A fixed chain of steps is more predictable than an agent that decides for itself.
3. An agent pays off when the steps are not known in advance.
4. Decide where a person checks before anything goes out.

How to use it

Write your process down as steps. If they are fixed, build a chain. You only need an agent once the AI has to pick the order itself.