What is a First Agent? One AI agent on real work in 7 days

Short answer: a First Agent is one AI agent, live on one real job in your company, in 7 days. Your team approves its work. It costs $4,900, paid up front, and counts toward the full setup if you go ahead.

Why we made it

Most companies are stuck between two bad options:

• A free pilot that nobody on the client side has time for. It drifts, then ends.
• A big program that takes months before anything works. One adviser wrote about a firm that signed a pilot six times, with the same broken plan underneath. The last one was CHF 200K (LinkedIn, 16 Oct 2026).

Only 13% of IT chiefs say AI gave real value (Gartner, 19 Oct 2026). We wanted a test that ends in a week with a clear answer.

What's included

Included	What it means
A free audit first	30 minutes to pick the job, plus a written plan in 48 hours
One agent for one job	Built for that job, with your rules
Your data connected	Only what the job needs. Read access first
A test on last month's work	We run real past cases and compare with what your team did
An approval screen	Every line marked confirmed, missing or check
A starting number	We time the job on day 1, so you can see what changed
7 days to live	On your real work, not a demo

Price: $4,900, paid before we start. If you go on to Deploy: the $4,900 counts toward the $25K setup.

How the week goes

Day	What happens
1	We pick the job, write it in one sentence and time it
2	We connect the data the job needs, read only
3	We write the rules, including the unwritten ones
4	We run last month's real work through the agent and compare
5	We fix what didn't match and set up the approval screen
6	The agent runs next to your team on today's work
7	Live. The agent does the job; your team approves

Good first jobs

A job makes a good First Agent if it passes three tests:

1. It happens every day.
2. There's a right answer you can check.
3. It costs someone hours each week.

Common picks:

• Orders read from chat or email and entered for you.
• The weekly report written from your live data by Monday morning.
• Follow-ups, so every lead or supplier gets an answer the same day.

A bad first job: "build us an AI strategy". It fails all three tests.

First Agent vs the other ways to test AI

	Free pilot	Big pilot	Licenses for everyone	First Agent
Cost	$0	Often six figures	Per seat, every month	$4,900, once
Time	Drifts	Months	Ongoing	7 days
Real work?	Often a demo	Sometimes	Up to each person	Yes
Clear end	Rarely	Rarely	No	Day 7
Who owns it	Unclear	The vendor	Each user	Your named owner
Proof	Usually none	A report	Hard to say	A starting number and a measured change

What a First Agent is not

• Not a demo. It runs on your real work from day 6.
• Not a chatbot. Nobody has to remember to ask it anything. Work arrives, and it starts.
• Not a strategy deck. You get one job done, not a report about jobs that could be done.
• Not a lock-in. If you stop, you keep the audit plan, and nothing in your systems depends on us.
• Not a promise of magic. Some jobs aren't a good fit. If the audit shows that, we'll say so before you pay.

An example week: order entry

Here's how a typical order-entry First Agent could go. This is an example, not a customer story.

• Monday: the order desk lead shows us a week of real orders. Some come by email, most by chat. We time how long each one takes to enter.
• Tuesday: we connect the product list, the price list and the order inbox. Read access only.
• Wednesday: we write down the rules. Which customers get special prices. Which products have five different names.
• Thursday: we run last week's orders through the agent and compare with what the team entered.
• Friday: we fix the gaps and set up the approval screen.
• Monday: the agent runs next to the team on live orders.
• Tuesday: live. The team approves instead of typing.

What we need from you

1. One owner. The person who knows the job. About 30 minutes a day in week 1.
2. Access. Read access to the data the job uses.
3. Examples. Last month's real cases, so we can test.
4. Approvers. Who checks the agent's work.

No big IT project. No new system.

What happens after day 7

• It works, and you want more: move to Deploy. 3 to 5 agents, your data connected, a savings board. Live in 30 days, or the setup fee back. $25K plus $5K a month, with the $4,900 counted.
• It doesn't help: switch it off. You lost a week, not a year. You keep the written plan from the audit.

Why we cap it

We run at most six First Agents at once. "Live in 7 days" is a promise, and promises need limits. If we're full, we'll tell you the next start date.

Sources

• Gartner CIO survey, 19 Oct 2026.
• Magdalena Picariello on LinkedIn, 16 Oct 2026.
• Renvel offer and caps, Nov 2026.