Hand off local work

Recognize the moment

You do not have to begin every outcome inside the Fleet. A local Agent, design surface, editor or product preview can be the fastest place to work while you are actively shaping the question.

The handoff moment usually arrives after one of these:

• a UI direction or prototype is ready for implementation and review;
• a backend architecture or technical design is ready to be challenged and made concrete;
• research or diagnosis established evidence another Agent can continue from;
• an implementation, test result or code review needs accountable follow-through.

Hand off when the next step deserves a durable owner, not merely another chat turn.

Hand off the outcome, not the transcript

Suppose your local Agent reproduces a checkout defect and finds that one update route trusts client-only validation. Do not ask First Mate to “continue this chat.” Use the handoff guide for the reusable package and acceptance mechanics, then give First Mate a concrete note such as:

The checkout update route accepts payloads rejected by the create route. Please stop address
changes from bypassing server validation. The reproduction is on main; see Issue 214 and
commit abc123 on diagnosis/address-validation. Preserve the public API and existing payloads.
Open a pull request through the repository's checks, but do not merge.

The transcript may remain useful background, but the handoff stands on an outcome, inspectable evidence and explicit boundaries. If code matters, commit it to a branch, produce a patch or point to another durable artifact. An uncommitted local working tree cannot carry the responsibility.

Let First Mate accept responsibility

Give the note to First Mate through the interface your Fleet actually provides. A connected local Agent may use an approved integration to preserve it as an external event when First Mate is already working. Preservation is not acceptance: the event remains evidence until reconciliation. The handoff guide explains the package and boundary; the delegation guide points to the procedure that owns the intake and acceptance mechanics that turn accepted intent into accountable Fleet work.

That boundary prevents a useful local idea from silently becoming duplicate work or exceeding the authority you meant to grant.

Take the evidence back

The Fleet can return a diagnosis report, a reviewed pull request, a blocker or one exact decision. Review that result locally if that is where you work best. You can ask your local Agent to compare the evidence, refine the direction or prototype the next question, then send another bounded handoff.

local exploration
  → bounded handoff
  → accountable Fleet work
  → evidence back
  → review or refine locally

Each loop starts from current durable evidence. It does not assume an earlier transcript still describes the company.

Bring the company into the loop

Some work needs more than an owner. It needs customer context, domain expertise, technical critique or an exact human decision. The Flect workplace assembles the work and seeks wisdom from the relevant people while keeping contribution, accountable ownership and authority distinct. Its built-in Agent helps inspect or revise a draft before approved intent returns to First Mate. Read Human work surfaces for that wider interface pattern and Continue local work with the Fleet for the reusable handoff checklist.

Next, watch and steer the work after the Fleet accepts the outcome.