The Focused Agent

A practical field guide · C. Shane Rivers

Your agent said
it was done.
What did it finish?

A compact operating manual for developers who already use coding agents and want repeatable, reviewable work.

Get the FOCUS toolkit Keep me posted on the book

The Focused Agent
Building Coding-Agent Workflows That Actually Work

The Focused Agent book cover, by C. Shane Rivers
A field guide for work with real users and consequences.

“Done” needs a little more detail.

  1. Generated
  2. Executed
  3. Observed
  4. Approved

The FOCUS method

Five habits. One complete work cycle.

A change can look good and still miss the business rule. A helpful cleanup can turn a small assignment into a large review. FOCUS gives you a way to keep the job clear from the first brief to the final decision.

  1. Frame the work

    Say what needs to change—and what done means.

  2. Orient the agent

    Give it the project context the task actually needs.

  3. Constrain the action

    Set the boundaries before the work starts.

  4. Use the right worker

    Give each role a job it can finish and hand back.

  5. Show the evidence

    Keep the checks, the results, and the human decision.

Start with your next task

Put FOCUS to work.

Ten editable forms, a printable handbook, and a completed example showing how the records fit together. Start with a small task and keep the evidence.

Download the toolkit

ZIP · Editable Markdown, PDF, and a JavaScript teaching example
No signup required. Author-review edition.

In the companion kit

  • A task brief with a clear finish line
  • A bounded delegation handoff
  • A follow-up ledger for useful discoveries
  • Review and evidence checklists
  • A recorded, synthetic application-code example

Use the parts the work needs. You don’t need ten forms for every task.

Inside the book

The situations you’ll recognize.

Three case studies follow the work through its decisions, limits, and handoffs. Recorded, reconstructed, and illustrative material are labeled for what they are.

01 / The business rule

A report that looks right.

A monthly report can add up correctly and still use the wrong date boundary. Start with what the report is supposed to mean.

02 / The scope boundary

A useful finding, at the wrong time.

Keep the discovery in a follow-up ledger. Give it a next step without turning the current assignment into a cleanup campaign.

03 / The handoff

Several workers. One decision.

Separate planning, implementation, testing, and review. Keep each handoff bounded and the human approval visible.

Also inside: a recorded publishing-workflow specimen, a permission ladder, project-memory guidance, and a thirty-day plan for putting the method to work.

Black-and-white portrait of C. Shane Rivers

About the author

I’m Shane.

I’m a full-stack developer and the founder of Aerovisus Business Solutions in Leeds, Alabama. My twenty-five-year technology career has included support, business applications, laboratory software, enterprise insurance services, and independent development.

I wrote The Focused Agent for developers, technical founders, consultants, and small teams dealing with coding agents in real work. A confident summary can leave out the test that never ran. I want the working record to make that visible.

Aerovisus Business Solutions

From Shane

Get book and toolkit updates.

Follow along as I prepare The Focused Agent and its companion materials. I’ll share book news, new examples, and useful additions to the toolkit.