Build your first AI agent (practical tutorial)

Step 1 — Pick one boring, high-volume task (e.g. draft a weekly status from notes). Write the success criteria in one sentence.

Step 2 — List allowed inputs and tools. Prefer read-only tools first. Decide what must be human-approved before send or write.

Step 3 — Draft the agent brief: role, constraints, output format, and failure behaviour (“ask the user” vs “stop”).

Step 4 — Run three test cases: happy path, missing data, and policy edge case. Log what broke.

Step 5 — Practise the same design pattern with Amro Academy Learning Agents and the Build AI Agents course path, then expand tools only after the supervised loop is reliable.