Build a Space

Build a Space when the agent needs a local workroom, not just a better prompt. A good Space gives ThinkWork the people, context, files, triggers, and rules it needs to behave consistently for a team, customer, project, workflow, inbox, or channel.

The best Spaces are small enough to have a clear purpose and rich enough that the agent can stop asking the same setup questions every time.

When to create a Space

Create a Space when at least one of these is true:

Signal	Example
The work has a distinct audience	Finance review, Customer Success, implementation team
The work has its own source material	Customer contracts, onboarding intake, project notes
The work enters through its own channel	Support inbox, customer onboarding email, scheduled digest
The work needs a different access boundary	Private executive planning, customer-specific room
The work repeats enough to become a pattern	Closed-won customer onboarding, renewal review, credit approval
The agent should follow local rules	Use this checklist, ask these intake questions, escalate to this role

Do not create a Space just because a user asked a one-off question. Start in an existing Space when the work already belongs there. Create a new Space when the workroom itself is different.

Write the Space in plain language

The Space Workspace is where operators write local files. A typical Space starts with a CONTEXT.md file that answers five questions:

1. What work happens here?
2. Who participates?
3. What source information should the agent trust?
4. What should the agent ask when information is missing?
5. What should never happen automatically?

Good Space context sounds like an experienced teammate explaining how the work runs. It should not sound like a generic prompt library.

Put this in Space files

• The purpose of the Space.
• Roles and owners.
• Intake questions.
• Required source links or documents.
• Local procedures and checklists.
• Examples of good requests and good responses.
• Escalation and review rules.
• Tool-specific instructions for this workroom.
• Goal templates for repeated workflows.
• Known exclusions and “do not do this” rules.

Leave this out

• Tenant-wide rules that belong in the Tenant Agent.
• Private user preferences that belong to User context.
• Reusable specialist behavior that should live in a folder specialist.
• Secrets, passwords, API keys, or raw customer credentials.
• Long reference dumps that belong in a knowledge base.

Note

Current behavior: Operators edit Space files in Admin under Space Studio > Workspace. In the Spaces app, users can inspect the same Space Workspace from the Space detail header Files button.

Space vs. folder specialist

Spaces and folder specialists are easy to confuse because both use files. They solve different problems.

Use	When the difference is
Space	The workroom: customer, team, project, workflow, inbox, channel, access, triggers, knowledge, or local policy.
Folder specialist	Reusable delegated behavior: research, finance review, triage, QA, drafting, onboarding, or another capability the agent may call from many Spaces.

A Finance Space can make the tenant platform agent work inside a finance context. A finance folder specialist can provide reusable finance-review behavior that the same agent may call from Customer Onboarding, Sales, or Support.

Turn repeated work into a Goal pattern

When a Space starts to run the same workflow repeatedly, define a Goal pattern. A Goal is not just a checklist. It is an outcome contract:

Contract field	Question it answers
Outcome	What should be true when this is done?
Owner	Who is accountable?
Mode	Should the agent Delegate or Collaborate?
Progress model	How do we know work is moving?
Completion rule	What must be true before the work is ready?
Review policy	Who must confirm or request changes?

Customer Onboarding is the reference pattern. The Space owns the onboarding instructions and reusable files. Each onboarding case creates a Thread. When the work needs accountability, ThinkWork represents the outcome as a Goal with progress, review, and a thread-local Goal Folder.

Tip

North Star: A mature Space should carry enough folder-native context that another agent runtime could inspect the files and understand the work. That does not mean every database-backed state field lives in markdown. Structured status, permissions, and review remain ThinkWork runtime state.

A useful Space file starter

# Customer Onboarding

## What This Space Does

This Space coordinates customer onboarding after a closed-won opportunity.
The agent keeps the Thread factual, asks humans for missing source information,
and keeps required checklist tasks moving.

## Intake We Need

- Contract or order-form link
- Primary contact name and email
- Accounts payable contact name and email
- Billing and shipping address
- Tax exemption status
- Credit terms request
- DocuSign recipient

## Operating Rules

- Do not mark onboarding complete automatically.
- Ask the human in the Thread when required intake is missing.
- Keep finance, accounting, sales, and operations handoffs visible.
- Require human final review before closure.

The file does not need to be long. It needs to be specific.

Operator checklist

Before inviting users into a Space, check:

• The Space has a clear name and purpose.
• CONTEXT.md explains what the agent should do here.
• Intake questions are written down.
• Access is public or private intentionally.
• Knowledge bases are attached only when useful.
• Triggers create work in the right Space.
• Repeated workflows have a Goal contract or a clear path toward one.
• Review rules are explicit for risky work.

Related pages

• Spaces Guide - the full practical guide.
• Work in a Space - what users experience after the Space exists.
• Goals and Files - how repeated work becomes structured workflow.
• Admin - Spaces - Space Studio reference.
• Workspace Context - how Space files enter the agent turn.