Knowledge Agent Skills

Skills are configurable behavior modes on a Knowledge Agent. Each skill defines how the agent responds to a specific type of question or workflow - answering quick questions, conducting deep research, walking through a troubleshooting process, or creating a support ticket.

Instead of building multiple Knowledge Agents for different tasks, you can add multiple skills to a single agent. The agent reads each skill's name and description, then automatically routes to the best-fit skill based on the user's message. Users don't need to manually select a skill - the routing happens behind the scenes.

Skills work everywhere Knowledge Agents work: the Guru web app, Slack, the browser extension, API, and MCP.

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Access Required

You must be a Knowledge Agent Owner, Admin, or relevant custom role to create, edit, or delete Skills on a Knowledge Agent.

Default skills

New Knowledge Agents are created with two pre-configured skills:

• Answer. Handles direct questions using your connected sources. AI Agent Center tracking is enabled by default.
• Research. Performs deep, multi-source research for complex questions. AI Agent Center tracking is disabled by default.

Both default skills are fully editable. You can rename them, update their instructions, change their tracking settings, or delete them entirely. They are starting points - not locked templates.

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Note

Existing Knowledge Agents created before Skills became available do not automatically receive skills. Skills are only pre-configured on newly created Knowledge Agents. If you do not see the ability to add Skills under your Agent settings and are interested in this functionality, reach out to our support team to get this enabled.

Creating a skill

1. Open your Knowledge Agent and go to the Skills tab.
2. Click Add Skill.
3. Give the skill a name that describes its purpose (e.g., "IT Troubleshooting" or "Benefits FAQ").
4. Write a description that explains when this skill should be used. The agent uses this description to decide whether to route a question to this skill, so be specific about what types of questions or tasks it handles.
5. Add instructions to define how the skill should behave. This is where you control the skill's tone, response format, constraints, and workflow steps. Learn more about writing a strong skill here.
6. Configure the AI Agent Center tracking toggle (see "Tracking skills in the AI Agent Center" below).
7. Click Save.

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Tip

The skill description is the most important field for routing accuracy. A vague description like "helps with questions" won't give the agent enough signal to route correctly. A specific description like "answers questions about employee benefits, PTO policies, and leave requests using HR policy documents" will.

Tracking skills in the AI Agent Center

Each skill has an independent tracking toggle that controls whether its invocations appear in the AI Agent Center.

• Tracking on: When the skill is invoked, Guru runs post-processing to extract citations, generate an explanation, and classify the interaction as answered or unanswered. A record appears in the AI Agent Center's Questions tab.
• Tracking off: The skill runs normally, but no AI Agent Center question record is created.

Multiple skills on the same Knowledge Agent can each have tracking enabled, and each invocation produces an independent AI Agent Center record.

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Important

Skills-enabled Knowledge Agents use a different AI Agent Center workflow than legacy Knowledge Agents. Answer editing and expert assignment are not available for skills-enabled agents. The AI Agent Center focuses instead on thread visibility, per-skill tracking records, and the ability to draft Cards from answers. For more details, see Guru's AI Agent Center.

Frequently asked questions about Skills

How does the agent decide which skill to use? The agent reads each skill's name and description, then matches the user's message to the best-fit skill using natural-language routing. Users don't manually select skills.

Can I have multiple skills with tracking enabled? Yes. Each tracked skill produces its own independent AI Agent Center record.

Do skills work in Slack? Yes. When a user interacts with a skills-enabled Knowledge Agent in Slack, the agent routes through skills the same way it does in the web app. The @Guru mention is still required for each message in a thread.

Do skills work through MCP and the API? Yes. External tools connecting to Guru through the MCP server or API interact with skills-enabled agents the same way — the agent routes to the appropriate skill automatically.

Can I delete the default Answer or Research skill? Yes. Both default skills are fully editable and deletable. You can also create entirely new skills to replace them.

What happens if I turn tracking off on a skill? Future invocations of that skill won't create AI Agent Center records. Existing records from previous invocations are not affected.