Proposed worksheet · Method notes updated 11 November 2026 · Not independently tested

The decision

Compare a narrow change against a competent baseline before calling it an optimization.

Use this guide with your own evidence

The draft includes this method’s reference and proposed checks. Confirm they fit your task, then add your authorized scope and observations. No checks have been run.

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Use this when

You want to change instructions, models, tools or workflow structure to improve an agent’s work.

Skip this when

There is no defined task or quality contract yet. First make the desired outcome inspectable.

Work through the checks

  1. Freeze the comparison

    Specify the task set, inputs, tools, permissions, acceptance tests and conditions before running. Vary one factor where practical. Preserve failures and retries instead of quietly excluding them.

  2. Measure the whole outcome

    Track valid completion, elapsed time, owner review and rework, available billed usage and required checks. Token or tool-call counts diagnose cost; they do not establish usefulness alone.

  3. Test the cases that can change the decision

    Include normal, invalid and interrupted flows. Include a case where the new method should not help. Treat missing tools and unavailable measurements as unknown, not zero.

  4. Decide with the limits visible

    Report each task separately in a tiny pilot. Keep severe safety failures visible rather than averaging them away. Include setup and maintenance costs. A local improvement is not a universal claim.

What would count as success?

  1. The baseline is competent and both conditions share the same requirements. Evidence for check 1
  2. Results include failed and interrupted runs. Evidence for check 2
  3. The recommendation reflects quality, owner effort and measured costs together. Evidence for check 3

Evidence to bring back

Proposed evidence plan, not observed results or extra mandatory process. Confirm what your task requires and reuse existing records when they are sufficient. Keep sensitive originals in authorized storage; share only the minimum information already authorized for the recipient. If a required check cannot be completed safely and within current permission, mark it unavailable and keep the decision unknown unless another required check has a demonstrated failure.

  1. The baseline is competent and both conditions share the same requirements.

    Proposed evidence for acceptance check 1. No result has been observed here.

    Bring back: Keep the frozen task inputs, shared requirements, permissions and version/configuration of each condition, with the baseline’s acceptance results. State differences that cannot be controlled.

    Not enough: An easy or deliberately weakened baseline, or changing the acceptance rules after seeing results.

  2. Results include failed and interrupted runs.

    Proposed evidence for acceptance check 2. No result has been observed here.

    Bring back: Keep a per-task run ledger including failed, interrupted and retried attempts, their outcomes and the reason for any exclusion. Record unavailable measurements explicitly.

    Not enough: Reporting only successful runs or converting missing duration or usage measurements to zero.

  3. The recommendation reflects quality, owner effort and measured costs together.

    Proposed evidence for acceptance check 3. No result has been observed here.

    Bring back: Keep per-task quality results, owner review/rework, measured usage where available, and setup/maintenance effort. Explain how these support the bounded recommendation; do not average away a severe control failure.

    Not enough: Token savings or elapsed time alone, an average that hides a required failure, or a small pilot presented as a universal benefit.

Stop or recover

If quality regresses or required controls fail, stop the rollout and preserve the evidence. Revert only to a known safe state, not merely the older version.

What this does not establish

No controlled agent comparison is supplied by this worksheet. No savings, speedup or paid value is claimed.

Reference links

Links checked 10 November 2026. Each note below states what the reference supports. No source review validates this worksheet’s effectiveness or replaces testing in your environment.

Take this worksheet with you

Section links identify this page, not an immutable copy. Numbered checks may change in later revisions. For an exact reference, retain build revision release-2026-11-11-r12 and the method source hash in the JSON or Markdown version.

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