As a travel advisor or a travel agency owner, do you need an AI employee or do you need an AI agent? I get asked this all the time, because there's a lot of talk on the internet about both, and it sounds like you have to pick one.
You don't have to pick, because there's no difference between them. They're the same thing.
“AI agent is usually a term that is used by techie people to describe an artificial bot of some sort that is able to make decisions based on a final outcome.”
What people mean by an AI agent
AI agent is usually the term techie people use. They mean an artificial bot of some sort that can make decisions based on a final outcome. The outcome might be that every email in the inbox gets answered. You hand it the result you want, and it works out how to get there.
That's different from a workflow. A workflow is go here, click here, check the email, look here, look there. Every step is spelled out for it. An agent gets the outcome, and a workflow gets the steps.
How it works
Steps or an outcome
Workflow
You give it the steps
- Go here
- Click here
- Check the email
- Look there
AI agent
You give it the outcome
- Every email answered
- It decides how to get there
In business terms, an AI employee with a job title
ConciergeCustomer service manager
Claire's own numbers
From a techie word to a role in your agency
- 1
Workflow
every step spelled out: go here, click here
- 2
AI agent
given a final outcome and makes decisions toward it
- 3
AI employee
the same thing, named in business terms
- 4
A role
a concierge or a customer service manager with a job
How Claire turns "AI agent" into an AI employee with a job.
Source: Claire B. Soares, from her own travel business and live trainings.
What I mean by an AI employee
An AI employee is the business term, and it's the one I use with travel advisors. It's the same idea, described the way you'd describe a hire. You don't think, I need a bot that makes decisions toward an outcome. You think, I want a customer service manager. Or I want a concierge, and that concierge will handle all the dining requests and all of the spa bookings.
Once you name it like a role, it gets much easier to decide what it should own. A concierge has a job. So does a customer service manager. You can write down what that job is, what it hands back to you, and what it should never do without asking.
So which one do you need?
Whichever word you prefer, because you're asking for the same thing. If the technical language makes you freeze, use the business language. Think about the roles in your agency that eat your day and start there.
A note before you build one
Write the job description before you write anything else. One role, a few lines on what it owns, what it hands back to you, and what it must ask about first, like anything that messages a client or spends money. Start with one AI employee and let it run for a while before you add the second.
Start with your first one
Inside Travel AI University we walk you through creating the different AI employees for a travel agency. If you want to start today, my free AI Masterclass covers setting up Claude and building your first AI employee, live with me. Come build it with me.
Common Questions
What is the difference between an AI agent and an AI employee?
There's no real difference. AI agent is the term technical people use for a bot that makes decisions toward a final outcome. AI employee is the business term for the same thing, described as a role, like a concierge or a customer service manager inside a travel agency.
How is an AI agent different from a workflow?
A workflow spells out every step: go here, click here, check the email, look there. An AI agent is given an outcome instead, such as answering every email in the inbox, and it makes decisions on its own about how to reach that outcome.
What AI employee should a travel agency create first?
Start with the role that eats most of your day. Claire gives examples like a customer service manager, or a concierge that handles dining requests and spa bookings. Naming it as a role makes it easier to write down what it owns and when it should ask you.
Written By
Claire B. Soares
Claire B. Soares is the founder of Travel AI University, a 6x Condé Nast Traveler Top Travel Specialist, and a Certified AI Consultant with a B.S. in Computer Science. A top 10% enterprise sales executive, she sold $3.4B+ in enterprise software to Google, Microsoft, IBM, Boeing, the federal government, and the DoD, then built $16M+ in luxury travel sales.
About Claire
