Test AI agents as process participants, with boundaries you can monitor
Choose one process role you can genuinely assess
Treat an AI agent as a participant in a single process, not as a chatbot that merely provides answers. The supplied NIST passages describe evaluations as a way to assess performance on tasks and inform decisions about real-world use. For agents, this involves tool use in a multi-turn feedback loop for complex problems. This supports a pilot in which you assess both the outcome and the sequence of tool steps. Therefore, choose one task with a clear start, a desired outcome, and predetermined exceptions. Limited permissions, budget limits, and human review for matters involving money, customer impact, or legal consequences are editorial design choices for this pilot; the passages do not prescribe a universal threshold for them.
Measure oversight when the workflow deviates
The NIST AI RMF Playbook mentions documenting the degree of human oversight, statistics on overrides, and recording reported errors, complaints, response time, and response types. Design the trial so that a reviewer can see what the agent intended to do, which tool action followed, whether a human intervened, and how the organization responded. Also record policy exceptions, escalations, and the decision of the accountable party. This way, you are not testing whether an agent is always right, but whether deviations become visible and a human can take over the process. Define in advance which events in the selected workflow should lead to adjustment, stopping, or expansion.
Base the pilot decision on a single completed register
Use this register after every pilot run: Process step and boundary | owner | permitted tools and authorities | oversight point | override, error, or complaint | escalation and decision. Enter only concrete events from the logs, including who assessed an exception and which go/no-go decision followed. This creates a repeatable decision record instead of an isolated demo assessment. The supplied passages describe evaluation practices and measuring oversight, overrides, errors, complaints, and escalations; they do not provide a sector-specific legal assessment, a safe level of authority, or a universal error or response-time threshold. Use this register after every pilot run: Process step and boundary | owner | permitted tools and authorities | oversight point | override, error, or complaint | escalation and decision.
