What separates an agent from a workflow

A workflow follows a path you drew. An agent chooses its own path from the tools you gave it. That difference is the whole subject — and the reason agents fail in ways workflows do not.

In this lesson we look at three real automations and decide, for each, whether an agent is the right shape at all.

The rule of thumb

If you can draw the decision tree completely, build a workflow. Reach for an agent when the branching depends on content you cannot enumerate ahead of time.