Lesson 2: Controls the model cannot talk its way past
33 min read·13 Oct 2026
Module 12 · Lesson 2 · About 60 minutes · Needs: Modules 3 and 5 (tools, loop, approvals), Module 10 Lesson 3 (dry runs)
The situation
It is Friday 29 May 2026, week 7. Yesterday Sam red-teamed the agent with R-1008, Tom's message with the planted note. Shadow mode starts on Monday.
Sam wants one place to read every rule: "Your guards are scattered across the tools, the systems and the loop." Marta wants a ceiling on what a bad day can cost. Priya wants a button that stops every run. And Dev has just added fetch_page, so the agent can read help-centre pages.
This lesson builds that place: a Policy layer between the model's tool calls and the tools. R-1008 tests every control; Aisha's R-1001 checks that honest work still gets through.