Question 1

When should I hire an agentic AI consultant?

Accepted Answer

Hire an agentic AI consultant when your team needs to build autonomous, multi-step AI workflows — such as agents that browse the web, call APIs, or orchestrate multi-model pipelines — and lacks in-house experience with LangGraph, tool-use reliability, or production agent safety. A consultant is faster than hiring a full-time engineer if your timeline is under 6 months.

Question 2

What is the difference between RAG and fine-tuning?

Accepted Answer

RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) fixes knowledge gaps by injecting relevant documents at inference time — ideal for private or frequently updated data. Fine-tuning fixes behaviour gaps by adjusting model weights on curated examples — best when you need consistent tone, output format, or domain-specific reasoning. In 2026, most production systems use both: a fine-tuned model as the base, with RAG for dynamic knowledge retrieval.

Question 3

What does an AI systems architect do?

Accepted Answer

An AI systems architect designs the end-to-end infrastructure for AI products — including model selection, data pipelines, vector stores, agent orchestration, evaluation frameworks, and deployment strategy. Unlike an ML engineer who focuses on model training, or a data scientist focused on analysis, an AI systems architect owns the full production system design.

Question 4

What is the difference between Ethereum and Solana?

Accepted Answer

Ethereum uses the Gasper consensus mechanism (Proof of Stake + Casper FFG), prioritising security and decentralisation over speed — it processes roughly 15–30 TPS. Solana uses Proof of History combined with Tower BFT, achieving 2,000–65,000 TPS at lower cost, but with greater centralisation risk. Ethereum is preferred for DeFi and high-value applications; Solana suits high-frequency, low-cost use cases.

Question 5

What are multi-agent design patterns in production AI?

Accepted Answer

The four multi-agent patterns that work reliably in production are: Sequential (agents chain output to input in a fixed order), Orchestrator-Worker (a coordinator agent delegates tasks to specialised sub-agents), Hierarchical (nested orchestration across multiple management levels), and Dynamic Handoff (agents route tasks to the best-suited agent at runtime). LangGraph is the most common framework for implementing all four.

Question 6

Should I hire an AI engineer full-time or use a consultant?

Accepted Answer

Use a consultant if you need a working system in 1–3 months, have a defined scope, or are pre-Series A. Hire full-time when you have a live product requiring ongoing iteration, a team to mentor, and 6+ months of runway budgeted for the role. The hybrid model — consultant to build the initial system, then a mid-level engineer to maintain it — is what most seed-stage teams in 2026 actually use.

Writing on agentic AI, blockchain, and AI systems architecture.

Hiring & Consulting

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What an AI Systems Architect Actually Does (and When You Need One vs. an ML Engineer)

Hire AI Engineers or Use a Consultant? The Decision Guide

More posts coming soon