SESSION 3 · ~60M
Sub-agents & delegation
Delegation — to cheaper models and to parallel workers — is how you scale your own output without scaling your own hours.
A sub-agent is a separate agent instance you spawn to handle a piece of a task, returning its result to you. Delegating work to sub-agents lets one person coordinate many parallel efforts — and to cheaper models — multiplying what you can ship in a day.
Patterns of delegation
- Parallel fan-out — many sub-agents do identical independent tasks (review 10 files, summarize 20 notes) and you merge.
- Architect/worker split — one agent plans, workers execute pieces, an integrator assembles.
- Cheap-model dispatch — routine steps go to a smaller, cheaper model; only hard steps use the expensive one.
The economics are decisive. A cheap model that handles 80% of the work at roughly 5% of the cost makes delegation almost always worth it — provided you can review the output. Your role shifts from doing to directing and quality-controlling.
Reviewing delegated work is the skill. Sub-agents return plausible results that can be subtly wrong. Build verification into every delegation: ask for sources, run the tests, spot-check outputs. At the scale delegation enables, unverified output is worse than no output.
Give sub-agents crisp, self-contained briefs. Because they run in their own context, they can't see what you know. The quality of their output is almost entirely determined by the clarity of the task you hand them — write the brief as if to a smart new hire on day one.
TRY IT
Take a task with three independent parts (e.g., summarize three documents). Note how each part could go to a separate sub-agent in parallel, with you merging at the end. Sketch the brief you'd give each one — clear briefs are 90% of good delegation.
CHECK YOUR UNDERSTANDING
What is the economic argument the module makes for delegating to cheaper models?
What is the primary skill required when working with sub-agents?
Why must sub-agent briefs be self-contained?
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