AI step: parse, classify, summarize, answer

An AI step is a place in a scenario where conventional logic fails, and an 'understanding' assistant is needed. Four AI working roles inside the pipeline: parse (extract the name, amount, date from the text), classify (is this a complaint, question or spam), summarize (compress a long letter into three lines), generate (write a draft response). Mechanics: you give the AI ​​a piece of data and a task instruction as input, and get back a predictable result that goes further along the pipeline. Leverage: write the instructions as if you were explaining to a new trainee - what is at the input, what needs to be done, in what form to return it. Insider: Ask the AI ​​to respond with structure, not free text - for example, 'return the category with one word from the list.' Then the next step can reliably rely on this. Second trick: always add the option 'not sure / other', otherwise the AI ​​will forcefully push a non-standard case into an inappropriate category. A typical rookie mistake: vague instructions like 'process the letter'. AI is not a telepath: the vaguer the task, the more unpredictable the output and the more often the next step breaks.