What skill best ensures AI agents succeed in production?

The answers emphasize a range of priorities—from rigorous detail, governance, and monitoring to customer collaboration and experimentation—highlighting both technical and human-centered practices as essential for real-world AI deployment.

8 answers

Answers

  • Sam Stephenson

    Founder · Granola

    Sweating the details

    Sam Stephenson says sweating the details and going the extra mile to make something actually useful is what matters, since building is easy now and most people stop too early.

    Peter Yang · Watch on YouTube

  • Sergio Torres

    Senior Vice President Product Management · Descartes Systems Group

    Define the decision first

    Sergio Torres says to start by defining the decision you want the agent to make first, calling the instinct to start with available data backwards. He argues that decision dictates which data is non-negotiable.

    SupplyChainBrain · Watch on YouTube

  • Matt Ausman

    Chief Information Officer · Zebra Technologies

    Governance

    Matt Ausman says the number one thing is to have a level of governance and understand your risk tolerance, because you can't define your rulebook until you've defined that.

    The Control Layer with Amer Altaf · The Control Layer with Amer Altaf · Listen at 52:28

  • Aditya Khandelwal

    Member of Technical Staff · Amazon

    Self-healing

    Aditya Khandelwal says to build a self-healing system, because slop is inevitable and you need a pipeline to detect, remove, and self-heal it.

    AI Engineer · Watch on YouTube

  • Todd Olson

    CEO / Founder · Pendo.Io

    Experimentation

    Todd Olson names experimentation as one of the big soft skills, saying it's a heyday for people who try many things and that we still need a lot of experimentation to find what works.

    DataCamp · Watch on YouTube

  • Daniel Herrington

    Chief AI Officer · The Zebra

    Consistent skill repository

    Daniel Herrington says their most successful practice was a skills-of-skills repository—a GetSkills MD file pulling all skills files from git so developers stay consistent, which he says helps graders be more reliable and flag reviews needing review.

    The Software Leaders Uncensored Podcast · The Software Leaders Uncensored Podcast · Listen at 16:57

  • Keith Zubchevich

    President & CEO · Conviva

    Real-time monitoring

    Keith Zubchevich says the number one thing is real-time monitoring and analytics of the agent's interface with consumers, so brands can know what's happening as it happens and fix problems before they grow. He wants monitoring of sentiment and the conversation, not just whether answers were accurate.

    The Business RoundUp with Melissa Bill · The Business RoundUp with Melissa Bill · Listen at 9:19

  • Faith Forster

    Chief Maker · Discoveree For Product Leaders & Managers

    Working alongside customers

    Faith Forster says teams should readily work alongside customers, watching how they use the product and where the friction is, because AI shifts the definition of done from shipping to adoption.

    Mind the Product · Watch on YouTube

More Product Management questions

View all →