Roles: thinking, researching, producing, reviewing

This lesson is still being tested: it improves with learners' feedback. If something is unclear, it is the lesson that needs fixing, not you.

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to

tell apart four roles in a piece of work: thinking, researching, producing, reviewing;
keep the fifth one for yourself: deciding;
say when a second tool is worth it, and when it complicates things for nothing;
split the roles of one of your projects.

Why it matters to you

When you discover several AIs, you want to try everything everywhere. The result: the same job in three tools, three different answers, and more time spent comparing than moving forward. Thinking in roles puts things back in order: each step has a function, a tool, and something it must hand back. This is the basis of the six lessons that follow.

Before you start


You need	Your usual assistant (a free account is enough) and your project sheet from module 6
Cost	€0
Duration	25 minutes
Reminder	Nothing from the “never” list in what you give to an AI, whichever one it is

Understand it in 3 minutes

The roles in a piece of work:

Role	What it does	What it hands back	Already seen
Think	Clarify the request, ask the questions, suggest a plan	A plan, questions, options	Module 2, lesson 2
Research	Find information, with its sources	Sourced and dated facts	Module 3, lesson 5
Produce	Write the text, the document, the table, the code	A result	Modules 3, 4 and 8
Review	Look for mistakes, omissions, gaps against the request	A list of problems	Lesson 4 of this module
Decide	Keep, correct, send, publish	Your decision	Always you

A role is not necessarily a tool. A new conversation does not contain the history of the previous one: it judges the result without knowing the choices that produced it. It can still receive context through memory (turned on by default in Claude on the Free, Pro or Max plans), through search of your past conversations (reserved for Claude’s paid plans), through your custom instructions, or through a project (module 2, lesson 5).

In Claude Code, a subagent also works in its own context (module 7, lesson 5).

When a second tool is worth it:

it has a capability that the first one does not have in your plan: working in your files, searching the web, reading a format;
the work matters enough to deserve a second opinion, from another model;
you want to compare, once, to choose your tool (lesson 2).

When it complicates things for nothing: a simple task that your usual tool already does well; or an exchange that forces you to keep copying the context from one tool to the other.

Do it together

1Step 1: Spot the roles in an example

Take a simple example: writing the invitation to an evening event, from the notes of a meeting.

Role	Here	Possible tool
Think	What should the invitation say? What is missing from the notes?	Your assistant
Research	Nothing: everything is in the notes	None
Produce	Write the invitation from the notes	Your assistant, with a precise request (lesson 3)
Review	Check the date, the time, the place, what is missing	A new conversation, or another tool (lesson 4)
Decide	Correct, complete, send	You

Note: the “Research” line is empty. That is normal: not every role is needed every time.

2Step 2: Split the roles of your project

Open your project sheet from module 6. For the step you are on, ask your assistant:

Here is the current step of my project: [paste the step and its criteria].
Help me split the work into roles: think, research, produce, review.
For each role, say what it must hand back, and whether it is useful here or not.
Do not suggest a specific tool: I will choose myself. Do not start the work.

Then fill in this table in your journal, with your tools:

STEP: [name of the step]
| Role       | Useful? | Tool chosen | What it receives | What it hands back |
| Think      |         |             |                  |                    |
| Research   |         |             |                  |                    |
| Produce    |         |             |                  |                    |
| Review     |         |             |                  |                    |
| Decide     | yes     | me          |                  |                    |

Your turn

Fill in the table for the current step of your project.
For each tool you chose, write in one line why that one: a capability, a second opinion, or simply your usual tool.
If you put in two different tools, keep the table: lesson 3 teaches you how to pass the work from one to the other.

Check your work

It worked if:

your table has one line per role, and the “Decide” line says “me”;
each useful role says what it must hand back;
each tool has a reason to be there;
you did not add a tool “just to see”.

Common mistakes:

giving the same request to three tools and no longer knowing which one to keep;
reviewing in the conversation that produced the text: you lose the fresh pair of eyes;
letting an AI decide (“send it if it’s good”);
filling in every role every time, even the ones that serve no purpose.

Keep it and pick it up later

Keep the roles table in your journal, next to the current step.
The deliverable of module 9 (lesson 7) starts from this table.

Going further

optional

In Claude Code, the “research” role is a good fit for a subagent, which hands back a summary without cluttering your conversation (module 7, lesson 5).

New words

3 words explained

Word	What it means
Role	A function in a piece of work: think, research, produce, review, decide
New conversation	A conversation that starts over without the history of the previous one
Second opinion	The review of a piece of work by another point of view: another conversation, another model, or a person