AGENT OPERATIONS (AGENTOPS)

DEFINED ESCALATION PATHS TO HUMANS Escalation means passing a problem to a person or to a higher level of authority. A defined escalation path is a written plan describing who is notified, how fast, and with what authority, for each type of situation. There are two kinds. First, escalation within a task: the agent hands a specific decision to a human, such as approving a large refund. Second, escalation of incidents: operations staff alert more senior people when something goes wrong across the system. Define clear triggers, such as a number of users affected, a severity level, money at risk, or any suspected data exposure. Define roles, such as the on-call engineer, who is the person currently responsible for responding to alerts, and the escalation chain above them. Define time targets, such as acknowledging within five minutes. Also define what the agent does while waiting, such as pausing or continuing in a safe limited mode. Without a written path, problems rely on someone happening to notice, which fails at night, on weekends, and during holidays.