A useful orchestration pattern
A planner interprets the goal and constraints. A worker creates the result. Specialist reviewers inspect different qualities in parallel. A synthesis step combines their findings. A gate either delivers the result or returns structured feedback for a bounded retry.
Why parallel review matters
Independent reviewers can focus on structure, factual support, task fidelity, security, or usability without forcing one agent to hold every criterion at once. Their outputs must be structured enough to combine and trace.
Design the failure path first
The system needs explicit answers for what happens when reviewers disagree, a tool fails, evidence is missing, a retry repeats the same problem, or the action is too consequential to automate. Retry limits and human escalation prevent infinite loops.
Measure workflow quality
- Completion rate and human acceptance
- Reviewer agreement and recurring failure categories
- Retries per completed task
- Latency and model/tool cost
- Escalation frequency
- Errors reaching downstream systems
Use fewer agents when possible
A deterministic workflow or one well-scoped agent is often better. Multi-agent orchestration is justified when work can genuinely run in parallel, specialist review reduces risk, or the task benefits from separation between creation and verification.