What this is

Most agent tools can start helpers — often called subagents — that work on their own
task with their own context window, and report back.

Two reasons this helps.

Separate desks. A helper searching thirty files does that work in its own context window
and returns three lines. Your main session stays clean. This is often the bigger benefit.

At the same time. Independent tasks can run together instead of one after another.

When splitting works well

  • Searching. “Find everywhere we format a date.” Perfect job for a helper.
  • Independent changes in separate files. Three routes, each needing the same small
    change.
  • Getting a second opinion. Ask a fresh helper to review a change without the history of
    how it was written. It sees the code, not the reasoning, which is exactly what a reviewer
    should do.

That third one is genuinely useful and underused. The session that wrote the code is the
worst possible reviewer of it, for the same reason as Lesson 4.4: it already believes it is
right.

When splitting goes wrong

Two agents editing the same file. They overwrite each other and produce something neither
intended. If tasks touch the same files, do them one at a time.

Work that needs to be consistent. Three helpers each inventing a name for the same idea
gives you three names. Decide the shared parts yourself first, then split.

Small tasks. Starting a helper has a cost. For a two-minute job it is slower.

The honest guidance

Splitting work is useful and it is oversold. Most days you will do better with one focused
session, small steps and good tests than with five agents running at once.

Use it for searching, for genuinely independent work, and for second opinions. Reach for it
when you have a real reason, not because it feels productive.

Try this before the next lesson

  1. Ask a helper to find every place a date is formatted in Recall. Note how little comes
    back compared to what it read.
  2. Ask a fresh session to review your last commit without telling it who wrote it.
  3. Think of two Recall tasks that could truly run at once. Do they touch the same file?
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