How to add the Agent to chat

Add the Agent to your team's chat so anyone can write @Agent in a channel and get an answer only they can read.

The Agent can join your team's chat as a member called Agent. An admin adds it from Brain › Automations, on the Agent card, and from then on anyone can write @Agent in a channel to ask it a question. See What is the Agent? for the Agent itself.

In chat it answers questions about sales, stock, demand, suppliers, purchase orders, marketing and decisions, as in How to ask about stock, suppliers and marketing. Each answer is written from what the person asking is allowed to see.

Before you start

You need Manage automations on Settings › Permissions, which admins hold by default. The Brain › Automations row only appears to people who hold it, per What are automations?.

You also need See what the Brain has noticed. Without it, the page shows "Brain access is needed to manage the chat agent."

The Automations and Brain modules must both be on, on Settings › Modules, per How to switch parts of Tideswell on and off.

How do you add the Agent to chat?

Open Brain › Automations.
Find the Agent card, near the top of the page below the line that says whether everything is running. It reads "A teammate in chat. It answers when a message names it with @Agent. It only ever sees what the person asking is allowed to see, so two people asking the same question can get different answers."
Press Add the agent. The card's pill now reads Off.
Press Switch on. The pill now reads On.

Switching it on also starts its background check, which runs every five minutes. Once that check has run, the card shows a line such as "Last looked for new work 3m ago: Nothing waiting."

If that check is ever switched off while the Agent is on, the card warns "Its background check is switched off. New @Agent mentions still start immediately." Press Switch the check back on.

How do you ask it a question in chat?

Write @Agent in a message, pick Agent from the list that opens, add your question and send it. The Agent starts on it as soon as you send, and replies to your message in the same channel or thread where you asked.

Mentions work the same way as for any colleague, per How to tag people, tasks, documents and products. For example: "@Agent which purchase orders from Portside Mills are late?"

Why does the reply in a channel hold a link instead of the answer?

Because the answer is written from what you are allowed to see, and everyone in the channel can read the reply. So the reply says it has answered and that the answer is on a page only you can open.

Press the link and the answer opens in your Agent panel. Anyone else who presses it is told "This answer isn't yours to read" and asked to put the same question themselves, so each person gets an answer from their own permissions.

In a direct message with Agent, write @Agent the same way. You are the only reader there, so the answer arrives in the conversation itself.

Which channels does it answer in?

Every channel the Agent can see. To use it in a private channel, add Agent to that channel as a member first, the same way you add a colleague, per How to create and organise channels.

How do you choose when it answers?

Use When it answers on the Agent card. When named is the setting for chat.

Its hint reads "It answers a message that names it with @Agent, in a channel or a direct message. A message that doesn't name it gets no answer."

Never keeps it in the workspace but silent. Its hint reads "Silent, without deleting it. Its past messages stay where they are."

Can it check in on late tasks?

Yes. The Check in on late tasks switch on the Agent card has it ask each person about their late tasks each working morning, in their Agent Inbox or a direct message. It starts off. See How to have the Agent check in on late tasks.

Can it follow up on what the background jobs find?

Yes, with Follow up on saved findings, the first setting on the Agent card. Its hint reads "Read results from existing background jobs and ask what to do in Agent Inbox. Financial, stock and external actions keep their approval steps."

Turn on the Follow up on saved findings switch.
Under Default recipients, tick the people whose Agent Inbox the findings go to, up to 50. Each needs access to what the finding is about.
Press Save follow-ups.

It covers low stock, late purchase orders, unowned overdue work, waiting outreach, overdue supplier invoices, waiting approvals and failed automations. Result history under the button shows when each was last read. Nothing is posted to a channel.

Its pill reads On once it is running. Paused means something is missing, and the lines under the switch say what, such as "Agent Inbox is switched off." The Agent Inbox is covered in How to work through your Agent Inbox.

Can it draft a chat message for you?

Yes. In the Agent panel, ask it to write a post for a channel. It drafts the message for you to check, edit and approve, per How to approve, refuse or undo a suggested change.

Who can ask it questions?

Everyone who holds Use the agent on Settings › Permissions, which every role holds by default. What each answer contains then follows that person's own permissions, per How to ask about stock, suppliers and marketing.

For questions about tasks, chat, documents or outreach, or for Selling › Reports figures, ask in the Agent panel instead, per How to ask the Agent about your tasks, chat and documents.

What else does it do once it is on?

It suggests a task to chase each late purchase order, such as "Call Portside Mills about PO-1042". When the supplier has a Primary contact, the task names them. The task is assigned to the order's owner.

Nothing is created until someone approves it. The suggestion's header reads Suggested by the watcher, and it waits in the Agent panel under History › Updates › Waiting on a decision, per How to approve, refuse or undo a suggested change.

The late orders are found once a day by the What needs attention job, under Background jobs on Brain › Automations. Switch that job on as well, per How to turn an automation on, off, or run it now, and see How to find late orders and plan revisions for working through late orders by hand.

How often does it chase the same order?

Once every three weeks at most. An order that is still late three weeks after its last suggestion gets a new one, unless a chase task for it is still open.

At most three chases wait for a decision at once, most overdue first. Approve or refuse them and the next ones follow.

Where are late-order chases filed?

Under the order's own team when it has one. Next comes the team of the person who owns the order, then of the person who created it, when that person belongs to just one team. Otherwise the chase goes under the team you choose in Late orders with no team on the Agent card, which starts as Not chosen.

Its hint reads "When a purchase order runs late and has no team of its own, its suggested follow-up goes to this team. Not chosen: those orders get no suggestion." Choose a team so every late order gets a chase.

If the team you chose is later archived, the card says so in red, for example "Production was archived. Choose another team, or late orders with no team of their own get no suggestion." Choose another team.

The Agent card on Brain › Automations has its pill reading On.
When it answers on that card is set to When named.
The card shows a recent "Last looked for new work" line, not "Its background check is switched off."
Your message names it with @Agent picked from the list, not typed as plain text.
The Agent can see the channel. For a private channel, add it as a member.
You hold Use the agent.
A minute or two have passed since you sent the message.

If all of those hold, see Why an automation or workflow did not run.