Chapter 9. Work That Runs Without You
In this section
- Chapter 9. Work That Runs Without YouHow to decide whether recurring work should go to an AI Worker, fit it into the workflow your team already runs, start it on a schedule or when something happens, keep each run informed of what earlier runs found, govern what a worker does that nobody asked for, and explain the setup to the people who rely on it, on Claude or on ChatGPT.
- 9.1 Is this an agent problem?Three gates that decide whether recurring work should go to an AI Worker at all, and how to tell a fixed path from work that needs judgment.
- 9.2 Fit AI into the workflow you already haveHow to place a worker in the steps your team already follows: map each step, decide who owns it, avoid three common mapping errors, and measure before you switch.
- 9.3 Scheduled and event-triggered workThe two ways work starts without you, by the clock or when something happens, and five facts about runs that every job nobody watches must be designed for.
- 9.4 Continuity between runs: SSoR is the handoffHow a run that starts fresh learns what earlier runs found: the records it reads first, and why the SSoR record, not a chat, is the handoff.
- 9.5 Standing workersWhat makes a standing worker different from one that does a task and stops, and the three things that change how you manage it.
- 9.6 Governing initiative you did not requestFour steps a worker can take when nobody asked, and the rule that keeps that initiative inside the authority you already set.
- 9.7 Explaining value and limits to stakeholdersThe six things to tell the people who rely on work that runs without you, the words to avoid, and how to state its limits.
- 9.8 The same recurring work on today's toolsHow Anthropic's and OpenAI's own pages, and two open-source tools, let you run the same recurring work, the differences that change your setup, and what stays the same.
- 9.9 The worker in a shared roomWho a shared worker works for, whose word it follows, whose approval counts, and who checks the work that teammates build on one run.
- Lab 9: when nobody is watchingChapter 9's lab: find what the AP Worker's contract decided in the eleven days nobody watched, choose which jobs should run without you, give each run what it needs and the record it reads first, replay two weeks you know, set rules for work nobody asked for, name who still checks, check each task against its own key, and prove it on Thanksgiving in a fresh chat.
- Check yourselfRecall and practice for the whole chapter: the flashcards, and a final quiz round from all nine concepts.