Reflection, Tool Use, Planning, and Multi-Agent systems: the four design patterns behind every agentic AI workflow, remembered with the mnemonic "Red Turtles Paint Murals." Use this guide to understand how to move from a basic LLM prompt to a fully autonomous AI agent.
Concept: The agent reviews its own work to improve quality and accuracy.
How it works: After generating an initial output, the agent "looks" at it through a set of criteria (or a second "critic" prompt) to find errors, hallucinations, or missing details.
Benefit: Reduces mistakes and ensures the final answer is polished before the user ever sees it.
Example: An AI writes an email, then checks it against a "Brand Voice" guide to ensure the tone is correct before finishing.
Concept: Giving the AI an "API Utility Belt" to interact with the world.
How it works: The agent is provided with functions (Tools) it can call, such as searching Google, calculating complex math, or querying a private database (RAG).
Benefit: Overcomes the "knowledge cutoff" of LLMs and allows the AI to perform actual tasks rather than just generating text.
Example: An agent uses a "Calendar Tool" to check your availability and a "Mail Tool" to send an invite.
Concept: Breaking a complex goal into a sequence of logical steps.
How it works: Instead of rushing to an answer, the agent analyzes the prompt and creates a "Plan" (e.g., Step 1: Research, Step 2: Outline, Step 3: Write).
Benefit: Allows the AI to handle vague or multi-step requests without getting "lost" or giving a generic response.
Example: "Organize a trip to Japan." The agent plans to first check flights, then hotels, then local weather.
Concept: Orchestrating a "team" of specialized AI agents.
How it works: One agent acts as a Manager/Orchestrator, delegating specific parts of a task to specialized "Worker" agents (e.g., a "Researcher Agent" and a "Coder Agent").
Benefit: Massively increases the complexity of tasks the system can handle, mimicking a human department or company.
Example: A "Writer Agent" creates a draft, a "Fact-Checker Agent" verifies the links, and an "Editor Agent" approves the final version.