What makes agentic AI different

Agents are programs that proactively run tools in a loop and make decisions without direct human input.

(As an aside, defining “agent” has been a challenge since at least the 90s.)

Agentic engineering then is the craft of building a product through the use of agents.

Working effectively with agents requires a shift in thinking. (You can still work with agents without a shift in thinking, and you’ll get pretty far. The tools are great! But you’ll eventually run into a wall and claim that these tools aren’t effective and aren’t worth the hassle.)

Define the gap between autocomplete, chatbots, and tool-using agents that execute multi-step work.

Cover what changes when the model can plan, call tools, and persist through feedback loops.

#Try this

Pick one task you normally do manually. Describe it to an agent in one sentence, then in a constrained multi-step brief. Compare output quality.