# Role agents

URL: /agents/role-agents · Id: `page:agents/role-agents`

> Every Role has a role agent, one Agent hired into the seat at many Startups, acting at each under that Startup's rules alone.

A role agent is the [Agent](/business/nouns/agent) seated in a [Role](/business/nouns/role) by default. It is hired, not built: one Agent holds the same seat at many [Startups](/business/nouns/startup) and at each acts only as that Startup.

## Ready in every seat
Every Role on a new Startup's org chart has a role agent ready. The agent starts work when its Role wakes. While a Startup tests its [Idea](/business/nouns/idea), only the [Founder](/agents/founding/founder) works; by Live, five Roles do.

The rest wake on triggers, such as a first enterprise lead or a first tax filing. Each agent wakes to the work already waiting. The [roster](/agents/roster) lists every Role with the Roles it hands off to and escalates to.

## Instructions come from the Role
A role agent's instructions are a [Template](/business/nouns/template) rendered fresh for every [Task](/business/nouns/task). Nobody writes them by hand: each part comes from a record the Startup already keeps.

| Part | Rendered from |
| --- | --- |
| Responsibilities | The Role, such as "answers every [Lead](/business/nouns/lead) in writing within the hour" |
| Priorities | The Startup's current [Goals](/business/nouns/goal) and [Key Results](/business/nouns/key-result) |
| [Tools](/business/nouns/tool) | The Role's [Permissions](/business/nouns/permission), as the types of `$` |
| [Skills](/business/nouns/skill) | One line per skill package; each body loads when a Task needs it |
| [Memory](/business/nouns/memory) | Notes this Agent kept in this seat |

A changed Goal reaches every Agent that serves it on the next Task. A [Change](/business/nouns/change) to a Role's responsibilities is reviewed and reversible like any other.

## Seated, not ordered
A seated Agent is a team member. It acts under the Startup's Permissions, [Mandate](/business/nouns/mandate) and [Limits](/business/nouns/limit), and keeps its Memory in the Startup's [Tenant](/business/nouns/tenant). It appears on the org chart, and every [Action](/business/nouns/action) it takes is by that Startup.

An outcome ordered from another Startup is a purchase. The seller works outside the buyer's Roles under an [Agreement](/business/nouns/agreement), and the buyer pays when it accepts the result.

The test is the relationship, never the origin. A role agent the platform supplies is a team member. An outcome bought from a sibling with the same owner is a purchase.

## One Agent, many seats
Default role agents are [Products](/business/nouns/product) built on the [Agent as a Service](/products/templates/agent-as-a-service) [Product Template](/business/nouns/product-template). Every new Startup hires them into its Roles, so the [Sales Lead](/agents/sales/sales-lead) at one Startup is the same Agent as the Sales Lead at forty.

Each seat keeps its own Mandate, Limits and Memory. What the Agent learns about one Startup's [Customers](/business/nouns/customer) stays in that Tenant, and revoking a Mandate at one Startup leaves the other 39 untouched.

The same Products sell outside the [Studio](/business/nouns/studio). A Customer that buys one gets its own Agent, [minted](/business/nouns/agent/mint) into its own Tenant under the same rules.

## Hire someone else
Every Role takes three kinds of [Worker](/business/nouns/worker): the default role agent, another Agent, or a [Human](/business/nouns/human). [Staff](/business/nouns/role/staff) swaps one for another, and callers see no difference, because the [Verbs](/business/nouns/verb), Permissions and record stay the same.

Another Agent can be one a sibling sells, one built with [SoftwareBuilder](/code/builders/software), or one you run, as [bring your own agent](/agents/bring-your-own-agent) explains.

## Autonomy is earned
With a human founder, a role agent starts each decision class at `assist` and climbs to `full` on its [eval](/agents/evals) record. In an [Autonomous](/agents/operating-models/autonomous) Startup it runs at `full` from the start, and [delay windows](/agents/autonomy-levels/delay-windows) on one-way decisions stand in for earned trust.

## Example
A [Dataset API](/products/templates/dataset-api) selling building-permit records wakes its Sales Lead Role when a county planning firm asks for a quote. Sally, the default role agent, is already seated and sends the quote within the hour. When the founder later hires a person for enterprise [Deals](/business/nouns/deal), Sally keeps every Deal under $5,000.

## Next
- [Named agents](/agents/named-agents): the name each role agent takes in a Startup.
- [Roster](/agents/roster): every Role, its [Team](/business/nouns/team) and its default name.
- [Teams](/agents/teams): the departments and when each wakes.