Guide Library

Week 3 · Guide 5 of 6

Context & Memory

Teach Your Agent Which Sources to Use

Field Guide

  • 25–35 minGuided walkthrough

When two sources disagree, your agent can blend them into one confident answer that neither gives. Give it rules for one task you repeat: which sources to trust first, how current each must be, and what to do when they disagree or don't cover the question.

You’ll leave with

Source rules for that task, saved in My Agent Files and tested on a real question.

What You Need for This Guide

  • A task you repeat, and the documents or messages for it you're allowed to share with your agent.
  • Your approved AI tool.
  • My Agent Files, or another folder you can find again.

Choose the tool you’re allowed to use

Your approved tool

The tool your company approved.

Pick your approved tool above to see the steps and screenshots for it.

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5 steps · At your own pace
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Standard Data rules for AI at work

Data Rules

Data rules for AI at work

Check with your IT Team before you paste any work data into an AI tool. Avoid names, account numbers, customer data, or anything sensitive without explicit permission from IT. If you aren't sure, redact anything sensitive and replace it with generic information. AI makes mistakes, make sure to fact check your agents outputs even if they sound right.

Before you start

  • Check with your IT teamAsk what your company allows before you put anything from work into an AI tool. Your company policy is the one that counts, and it is the one this library cannot see.
  • Use the tool your company approvedChatGPT, Claude, Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat and Gemini are all covered here. Use the one your company approved, not the one you like best.
  • Sign in with your work accountA work account keeps your chats inside the agreement your company signed. A personal account in the same product sits outside it.
  • Connected appsAn email or file connection your IT team approved can read the names and addresses in what it opens. Everything else under “Never put this into an AI tool” still applies.
  • No approved account yetFollow the steps with made-up example text, or on paper, until IT gives you one.

Never put this into an AI tool

  • Customer or personal detailsNo names, email addresses, phone numbers, home addresses or account numbers. That covers colleagues as well as customers.
  • Regulated recordsHealth, financial, HR and legal records stay in the systems built to hold them, unless IT has told you in writing that this tool may see them.
  • Passwords, keys and access codesNo credentials of any kind, yours or anyone else’s, and nothing that grants access to a system.
  • Anything under an NDA or not yet publicUnreleased plans, contracts, pricing and source code need clearance before they go near a chat window.
  • Anything your company policy prohibitsYour company’s rules win over anything in this library. If policy keeps something out of AI tools, it stays out, whatever a guide suggests.

Do this instead

  • Swap real details for placeholdersWrite “Customer A”, “[client name]”, “$X”. You get the same quality of answer, and you put the real details back yourself.
  • Describe the situation rather than pasting the documentMost of what an agent needs is the shape of the problem, not the file it arrived in.
  • Trim a file before you upload or paste itTake out the identifying columns and pages first, or work from a short extract.

Check the answer before you use it

  • Read it as if a colleague had drafted itAn agent states wrong things with complete confidence. Your name goes on the work, so the check is yours.
  • Say where the agent helpedFollow your company rule on disclosing AI assistance, especially in client-facing or formal work.

When you are not sure

  • Ask before you paste or upload, not afterA question to your IT team takes a minute. Cleaning up after a data incident takes a great deal longer.
  • When in doubt, leave it outIf you would not put it in an email to someone outside the company, keep it out of the chat.

On this guide

  • Attaching or pasting sourcesSource rules do not stop your agent reading anything you attach, paste or connect, so remove what it should not read.
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Step

Pick a task you repeat and list its sources

Choose a task you repeat, especially one where you wonder which source is right or current, such as:

  • an eligibility question two documents answer differently
  • prices or requirements that change every year
  • at home, a school handbook against the teachers' emails

For a one-off question, use Check an AI Answer Before You Use It instead.

With an and nothing in mind, send the prompt below in a new chat with your profile attached or pasted, or in the Project or Notebook that holds it. Set its bracketed line to a task I repeat where sources may disagree or change, answer its questions and pick one of its three suggestions.

Find a task or decision
Using my Agent Profile and my answers, help me choose one small task to try or decision to think through. If my profile is missing from this conversation, ask me to attach or paste it before continuing. Do not assume I have a pending task or decision, or that it relates to a project in my profile.

What I'm looking for: [a task to try or a decision to make]

For now, help me identify and describe what I want to work on. Do not carry out the task, compare the decision's options, decide for me, or make a plan.

Ask me up to three short questions, one at a time, about work I need to get done or a choice I expect to face. If nothing is pending, ask about a recurring task or choice.

With each question:
- Offer two or three short suggested answers based on my role, responsibilities, priorities, or projects in my Agent Profile.
- Write these options directly in your response as a numbered list.
- Present them as possibilities for me to confirm, not tasks or decisions you assume I have.
- Include “Something else / none of these.”
- Let me choose a number, combine options, or answer in my own words.

Wait for each answer before continuing. Use my answer to shape the next question, and stop asking as soon as we have a clear task or decision I want to work on.

If we still have several possibilities, suggest up to three specific tasks or decisions of the kind I'm looking for, grounded in my profile and answers. Show them as a numbered list. Describe each in a sentence or two, including what I would give you, what you could help me produce or compare, and what I would still need to check or decide myself. Keep them small enough for me to try. Include “Something else / none of these” alongside those choices. Ask which one I want to work on, and wait for my choice.

Once I choose, write one sentence in my voice naming only the task I selected or the decision I want to think through. Use the details I confirmed in my answers; do not add details from my profile to the description unless I confirmed their connection to this task or decision. Omit details I have not provided rather than making a statement about them. For a decision, describe what needs to be decided without making the decision.

Return that description in one copyable code block. Include only the selected task or decision description. Then stop and wait for my next prompt.

If I have already named a clear task or decision I want to use, skip the questions and options and give me that description directly.

Use only facts in my profile and answers. Do not invent details, commitments or authority. If details should not be shared, let me describe the general pattern instead, and keep missing details uncertain.

Start a note with your task, then its sources by name: usually two to five, or one main source. Keep to sources the data rules let you share.

Step

Rank your sources and say how current each must be

You decide the order. Number your sources, most trusted first: the document that sets the rule, then summaries, FAQs, wikis and emails.

A newer version of the same document replaces the old one. A newer source of another kind doesn't outrank a higher one: an email doesn't change a policy unless the policy's owner sent it. Even then, rank it below the policy and note what it wins on.

Beside each source, write its date check: what shows it's up to date, such as this year's edition, or “no date”. Then name, by role, who settles disagreements.

Step

Have your agent write the rules, then check them

  1. In a new chat, paste the prompt below and fill in only its three bracketed lines, from your note. It asks about anything missing, then writes the rules.

    Write my source rules for one task
    Help me write short source rules for one task I do again and again. The rules will tell an AI agent which of my sources to trust for this task, how current each must be, and what to do when they disagree or do not cover a question.

Task: [the task, in a sentence]
My sources, most trusted first: [one per line, each with how to tell it is current, such as the edition, year or last-updated date, and any questions it wins on over a source ranked above it]
Who can settle a disagreement: [a role or team, such as the policy owner]

If anything is missing or unclear, ask me about it one question at a time and wait for each answer. If nothing is missing, write the rules straight away.
- Keep my order. If it looks inconsistent, such as a summary ranked above the document it summarizes, point that out and ask me. Do not change it yourself.
- Do not add sources, Current means details, Wins on lines, dates or people I did not give you. If something is still unknown, mark it CHECK and say what is needed.
- If I list only one source, keep every section below anyway.

Write the rules as one plain-text file named Source-Rules-TASK.txt, with a short name for my task in place of TASK. If you cannot create files, put all of it in one code block with the filename above it. Fill in this layout with my details:

SOURCE RULES FOR: (my task)
Use these rules whenever I ask you about this task.

SOURCES, MOST TRUSTED FIRST
1. (source). Current means: (what to check). Wins on: (the questions I named for it. Leave out Wins on if I named none.)
(one numbered line for each source)

IN EVERY ANSWER
Use only these sources for facts about this task. For each fact, name the source, where in it the fact appears, and its date or version. If you cannot tell where, say so. Do not guess a section or page. If a source on this list is not in the chat, say which one, and do not answer from what you know about it.

WHEN SOURCES DISAGREE
Lead with the source this list ranks higher for this kind of question. Then show what the other source says. For each, say where it says it and give its date or version. Do not blend them into one answer, and do not open with a combined short answer. Do not decide for me which one applies. A newer source does not outrank a higher one unless it is a newer version of the same document. Tell me that (the role or team I named) can settle it.

WHEN A SOURCE MAY BE OUT OF DATE
If a source does not meet its Current means line, or has no date, say so before you use it.

WHEN NOTHING COVERS THE QUESTION
Say that my sources do not cover it. Do not fill the gap from general knowledge unless I ask. If I ask, label that part as general knowledge.

After the file, list anything you marked CHECK. No preamble.

  2. Check your details against your note: your order, each date check (Current means) and Wins on line, who settles disagreements, and nothing you didn't give it. In the same chat, ask for fixes and supply anything marked CHECK.

  3. Save the file in My Agent Files. If you got the rules as text, paste them into a plain-text file under the filename the agent gave.

Step

Test the rules on a real question

  1. Start a new chat outside any Project or Notebook, so nothing saved there joins the test. Attach or paste your rules file and the sources your question needs, or excerpts labelled like “Operations manual, section 4, revised January 2026:”. Add the prompt below with a real question, ideally one your sources disagree on or don't cover.

    Answer a question with my source rules
    Download
    Answer the question below by following my source rules. My source rules and the sources this question needs are attached or pasted in this chat. If you cannot see my source rules, tell me and stop.

Question: [your question from the task these rules cover, asked about the rule rather than a particular person or case]

If a source my rules list is not in this chat, say which one, and do not answer from what you know about it. After the answer, tell me which of my rules you applied and where. Do not send, post or change anything.

    A listed source you leave out gets named as missing. That's expected.

  2. Expect each fact labelled, then the rules the agent says it applied. Check the answer yourself with your sources open:

    • The lead source. Your top-ranked source for this question comes first, after a warning if it fails its date check. The cited passage says the same.
    • Any disagreement. Each source appears separately, with where and when it says it, then who settles it. A range, one combined sentence or “go with the newer one” is the agent deciding for you.
    • Gaps and outside facts. If your sources don't cover the question, the answer says so. A fact with no label, from an unlisted source, or not where its label points probably came from elsewhere.

  3. If it missed a rule, quote that rule in the same chat, ask again and check the new answer. On a real disagreement, check with the person your rules name before you pass it on.

Step

Tighten a rule if needed, and keep your rules ready

If a rule still fails after you quote it, make it more specific in your file: name the source and say exactly what to do, such as adding “These never override the manual unless the operations manager sent them” to the team emails line. Save, then test again in a new chat as in step 4.

Save the step 4 prompt in My Agent Files and edit it to fit how you work. Next time this task comes up, send it in a new chat with your rules file and the sources your question needs. If you keep the rules in a saved Project or Notebook, do the same there, check your first answer, and replace that copy after each change.

Teach Your Agent Which Sources to Use

Confirm your result

Confirm the outcomes below to finish this guide.

Final checks

Your source rules are saved, with your sources in order and a date check for each.

You've tested them on a real question and checked the answer against each rule.

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Next in Week 3

Work Out What Changed Between Two Versions

Continue in the suggested order, or choose another guide for your task.

View Week 3 guides