Delegating to AI

Garden · not yet reviewed Emerging: new and still settling Widely discussed since 2026-01

Deciding whether a task is worth handing to AI, by weighing how long it takes you against how often the AI gets it right and how long asking and checking take, then handing it over with a brief like you'd give a colleague. Framed this way by Ethan Mollick.

Also called: handing work to an agent · handover brief · is it worth delegating · management as an AI skill

Connections

Understand first

Ideas this one builds on.

• Jagged frontier (garden)
• Agents (garden)

Related

Often used together or easily confused.

• Steering (garden)
• Verification (garden)
• Solution ladder (garden)
• Onboard AI like a new hire (garden)

Blueprints that practise it

• Write a handover brief before you give an agent a real task (garden)

Resources that teach it

• The Eight Levels of AI Adoption (garden)
• Management as AI superpower (garden)
• On Working with Wizards (garden)

Competency

• Describe the task
• Steer
• Check the result

Find delegating to ai on the commons map ↗

You may know it from

• advertising a creative brief One page that says what the work is for, who it is for, what it must include and when it is due, written before anyone starts.
• military the five-paragraph order Situation, mission, how it will be done, support and command: a fixed shape so nothing important is left out of a handover.

In plain words

In “Management as AI superpower” (January 2026), Ethan Mollick offers a quick test for whether to hand a task to AI. Compare three things: how long the task takes you, how often the AI gets this kind of task right, and how long it takes to ask, wait and check. If checking takes almost as long as doing, or the AI often fails at this kind of task, keep it.

If you do hand it over, brief it the way you’d brief a new colleague. Mollick’s list: the goal and why it matters, limits on what the AI may do, what done looks like, the outputs, checkpoints, and a self-check before it hands back.

Example

A volunteer coordinator considers asking an agent to sort 200 sign-up forms by availability. It would take her two hours; checking a sample takes fifteen minutes. She writes a five-line brief, including “flag any form with no phone number, don’t guess”, and hands it over.

How it connects

• Builds on the jagged frontier (how often will it succeed?) and agents (what can it do alone?).
• Steering is what you do while the work runs; verification comes after it.
• Sometimes the answer is a simpler rung on the solution ladder.

Try it

Pick one task you plan to give AI. Write down your three numbers: minutes to do it yourself, a guess at how often AI gets it right, and minutes to check. Decide, then write the brief.

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Read this card as plain Markdown: /concepts/con-delegating-to-ai.md. Know a parallel from your own field, or a product that implements this? Add it.