Foundations

Foundations

• Definition and terminology → What AI Employees are and how they are named.

• Manual vs. Autonomous → How they work in chat vs. automated tasks.

• Default behavior → What they do automatically without extra setup.

• AI Skills Definitions → Actions available in your skill workflow.

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Definitions and Terminology

AI Employees are automated agents that operate as team-level users within Motion. They can perform tasks, run skills, and interact in chat, following the same role-based access controls (RBAC) as human teammates.

Term	Definition
AI Employee	A team-level agent in Motion that executes tasks or skills. Appears alongside human members in the workspace.
Canonical AI Employees	Predefined employees provided by Motion, such as Alfred, Mili, and Suki. Each is configured with specific skills or behaviors.
Skills	Capabilities assigned to an AI Employee, which define what actions they can perform (e.g., drafting, scheduling, summarizing).
Context	The workspace or user environment the AI Employee runs under when acting. Context determines access to tasks, projects, and integrations.
Connections	Linked integrations (e.g., Google Calendar, Slack) that AI Employees use when executing skills. Access depends on the configured connection.
RBAC (Role-Based Access Control)	AI Employees follow the same role and permission rules as workspace members (e.g., Viewer, Editor).
Autonomous Mode	When an AI Employee runs skills automatically in the background, without direct user prompts.
Manual Mode	When an AI Employee is triggered directly by a user through chat or assigned task.

Manual vs. Autonomous

AI Employees can operate in two distinct modes. These modes define how an employee is triggered, how actions are applied, and what level of user approval is required.

Mode	Definition	Behavior
Manual	User-triggered actions where the AI Employee runs only when explicitly prompted.	Initiated through chat or by assigning a task to the AI Employee. Executes only the requested skill. Requires approval for write operations (e.g., creating, editing, or deleting).
Autonomous	Continuous or scheduled operation where the AI Employee runs skills automatically in the background.	Triggered by conditions or schedules defined in skills. Can generate drafts, updates, or reminders without direct input. Still respects permissions and may require approvals for sensitive actions.

Default Behavior

AI Employees follow predictable defaults when no custom configuration is applied.

Rule	Details
Presence	AI Employees appear in the workspace directory as team-level users with assigned names (e.g., Alfred, Mili, Suki).
Skill execution	Skills run only when explicitly triggered (manual mode) unless configured to run autonomously.
Permissions	Default to the role assigned in workspace RBAC (e.g., Viewer, Editor, Admin). They cannot exceed those permissions.
Approvals	Any write action (create, edit, delete) requires user approval the first time it is requested.
Connections	AI Employees cannot use external services until the relevant integration is connected at the workspace level.
Visibility	All actions are logged in chat or workspace activity history by default.

AI Skill Definitions

General Actions

These are common actions that can be used in many workflows, such as:

Step name	Definition
Conditional Split	A branching action that evaluates conditions to determine the next path in a workflow. Note: a conditional split can only be added after a step.
Generate Text	Produces written content automatically based on prompts, context, or AI instructions.
AI Instruction	Executes a specific AI-driven command or directive provided by the user to shape workflow output.
JSON Document Extraction	Extracts and structures key information from a JSON file or API response for use in workflows.
Research a Topic	Gathers insights, summaries, and details on a given subject using AI or connected data sources.
Research a Person	Searches relevant public information, background, and context about an individual.
Websearch (Exa)	Searches the web using Exa to retrieve accurate, up-to-date sources and results.
Google Search	Performs a search directly through Google to return relevant web results.

Motion Actions

These steps interact directly with Motion’s core features:

Step Name	Definition
Create Doc	Automatically generate a new document in Motion.
Append to Doc	Add content to an existing document in Motion.
Send Notification (Motion Inbox)	Deliver a notification directly to the Motion Inbox.
Create Motion Task	Add a new task to a project or workspace
Update Motion Task	Change details of an existing task.
Create Motion Project	Start a new project in Motion.
Update Motion Project	Change details of an existing project.
Search Motion Tasks	Find and retrieve tasks in Motion by filters or keywords.
Search Motion Projects	Find and retrieve projects in Motion by filters or keywords.
Search Motion Calendar	Look up scheduled events, meetings, or time blocks in Motion’s calendar.
Search Motion Documents	Locate documents stored in Motion by filters or keywords.
Select Available Timeslot	Search for and select an available timeslot within Motion’s calendar.

Integrations

These steps let your AI Employee work with other platforms and services you use:

Application	Definition
Google Search	Find information using Google.
Exa	Search or retrieve data from Exa.
Salesforce	Interact with Salesforce records.
Gmail and Outlook	Send, receive, or search emails.
Slack	Send messages, monitor channels, or react to activity in your team chat tools.
More Integrations (see below for details)	Connect with many other supported platforms, such as HubSpot, Figma, Reddit, and more. Each integration may have its own set of actions, like making API requests or updating records.

More Integrations

Each integration starts with this:

Describe an HTTP request to make with examples, the name of the platform or service, an API endpoint or URL, and any API keys or tokens required to make the call. This step is not "agentic"; you must extract the results in another step using the output of this step.

Integration	Integration	Integration
1Password Airtable Algolia Anrok Auth0 (Client Credentials) Azure DevOps Bill (Connect API) Brevo Canva Cloudentity Coda Commercetools CompanyCam Copper Discourse Dixa e-conomic Emarsys Core API (WSSE) Emarsys (OAuth) Entrata EvaluAgent Exa Figma FindyMail Fiserv	Gem Github Gmail Grafana Incident.io Insightly Klaviyo Lattice Loops.so Luma Mailgun Malwarebytes Medallia Metabase Microsoft Teams Mindbody Miro Mixpanel Next Cloud OCS Odoo (Client Credentials) OpenAI Outlook Pandadoc Paychex PostHog Quickbase	Recruiterflow Replicate Rippling Rock Gym Pro Rootly Salesforce SAP Concur SAP SuccessFactors Sedna SendGrid Sentry Shortcut Slack Smartrecruiters Spotify TapClicks Twilio UKG Pro Unanet Vimeo WhatsApp Business Workday xAI Xero (Client Credentials)