---
url: https://pencel.ai/docs/concepts/programs.md
description: >-
  Team lists your AI teammates. Each one has a room where you give it work, use
  its actions, answer its questions and approve what it prepares.
---

# Team and rooms {#programs-and-rooms}

**Team** is where you work with your AI teammates. Each teammate has a **room**: the place where you give it work, answer its questions and approve what it prepares.

A room looks after one area of your business: government bids, your inbox, your books, or anything else you set up. It works like a Slack channel shared with the AI teammate who does that work. You give directions, the teammate carries them out, and results show up for you to act on.

## Where to find them

**Team** in the left sidebar lists your teammates, one row per room. Each row shows the teammate's name, with the room's name next to it:

* **Rory** runs RFP Operations. Rory finds RFPs, brings you the calls only you can make, and drafts proposals.
* **Max** runs Email Chief of Staff. Max sorts what needs you and holds drafts for your review.
* A room you set up yourself is listed by its lead's name. Your own rooms can still have several teammates inside.

Click a row to open that room. Click **Team** itself to open the Team page, which shows:

* **The ready-made rooms**: RFP Operations, Email Chief of Staff and QuickBooks Accountant. If one isn't installed yet, its tile says **Use this room**. See [Ready-made Rooms](https://pencel.ai/docs/programs/).
* **Rooms you set up yourself.** See [Set up your own Room](https://pencel.ai/docs/guides/setting-up-a-program.html).
* **Add a teammate**, to describe something new or install a ready-made room. The **+** next to **Team** in the sidebar opens the same page.

Each installed room shows when it last worked and when it will work next. When a room is waiting on you, its row gets a badge and the **Team** item in the sidebar gets an amber dot.

## What's in a room

Every room has a name that starts with `#`, like `# mailroom` or `# rfp-ops`. A room has three parts:

* **The conversation.** Your messages, the teammate's replies and any questions it needs you to answer.
* **The wall**, on the right. Every room has the same four tabs:
  * **Work**: cards that need a decision or action, like a drafted reply or an expense to approve.
  * **Artifacts**: documents the room has written, like briefs, reports and proposals.
  * **Activity**: the room's background checks or searches, what's running now, what's coming up next, and past work.
  * **Channels**: ways to reach the room from outside Pencel, such as by email. A room that can't use one yet says so.
* **The header**: the room's name, its teammate's face and one **⋯** menu, **Room options**. The menu has **Settings**, **Crew**, **Schedule**, **Pause room** (or **Resume room**) and **Archive or remove…**, plus **Setup guide** when the room has one to show.

Use **Show wall** and **Hide wall** to give the conversation more space. On a narrow window, the wall takes over the screen and **Back to room** returns you to the conversation.

## Talk to a room

Type in the message box at the bottom, the way you would message a colleague. The box names who you're talking to, for example "Message Rory, or type / for actions".

* **Ask for something.** "Which of this week's bids fit us best?" or "Draft a polite reply declining the meeting."
* **Point at something.** Type `@` to pick a file, a document, a guideline or a specific teammate.
* **Drop in a file.** Drag a file in or use the paperclip. Pencel asks whether to **Keep** it for the room (every future message can use it) or **Attach once** (just for this message).
* **Give it a standing rule.** Say "always flag anything over $50K" and the room confirms it with "Saved as a standing rule". The rule applies to all future work in that room. Click **Edit rules** to change it later.
* **Follow up.** After a reply, up to three suggested next steps appear under it. Click one to start your next message.

While the room is working, the **Send** button turns into **Stop**. Press it (or Esc) to cancel. A room works on one request at a time, so anything you send meanwhile waits its turn.

::: tip Talk about one card
Click any card on the wall and the next message you send is about that card. A chip above the message box shows which card you're discussing.
:::

## Use the room's actions

The jobs you ask for most sit as chips just above the message box, up to three per room. Click one, or type `/` in the message box to list them.

| Room | Actions |
|---|---|
| RFP Operations | **Search for RFPs**, plus **Search every morning** while the daily search is off. |
| Email Chief of Staff | **Check my inbox**. Choose **New since last check**, **Whole inbox** or **Resume saved check**. |
| A room that works through a queue, such as accounting | **Work the queue** (a small card asks you to confirm first) or **Pause the queue**. |
| Other rooms | **Run a task**, once the room has replied for the first time. |

## When a room needs you

Rooms never guess about things that matter. Every question or approval waiting for you is its own card in the conversation. If some are scrolled out of view, a button at the bottom of the conversation, such as **2 waiting for you**, jumps to them. The room's row on **Team** gets a badge too, and the same items appear on [Home](https://pencel.ai/docs/concepts/home.html).

There are two kinds of requests:

* **Approvals.** Before the room sends an email, changes a record, or moves money, it shows you exactly what it's about to do. You can approve it, **Reject** it, or **Edit fields** first. For routine actions you trust, **Always Allow** stops the room asking about that action in that room. Anything that moves money or deletes something asks every time. See [Approvals and permissions](https://pencel.ai/docs/privacy-and-security/approval-workflows.html).
* **Questions.** Sometimes a room needs information only you have, such as which account to use or what counts as urgent. If you don't answer a simple question within a few minutes, the room goes ahead with the option it recommended and tells you what it picked.

### Buttons on a card

Some cards offer a button the room suggests, such as **Draft a note to the vendor**, or a fix such as **Reconnect QuickBooks**. You can also choose **More › Tell the room what to do…** and type your own instruction.

When you click, the card shows what happens next, right where you clicked: **Queued** while the room finishes something else, **Working on it**, then a line saying what was done. If the room couldn't do it, the card says why and offers **Try again**. If the room needs your OK before it sends or changes something, the approval appears on the card. Buttons the room suggests always ask before anything leaves Pencel, even if you chose **Always Allow** for that action.

## Rooms that work on their own

You don't have to ask a room for everything. Each teammate in a room has **responsibilities**: standing jobs it does without being asked. For example, it might check for new bids each morning or review new email every 30 minutes.

* **When there's nothing new, the room stays quiet.** You won't get "nothing to report" messages.
* **When it finds something**, it posts a card in the room and, if it needs you, on Home.
* **Every room has a health check.** The room's lead teammate looks for work that's stuck and suggests fixes. It can only suggest. It can never give itself more access or a bigger budget.

To change when a room works, open its settings and go to **Schedule**. See [Run work on a schedule](https://pencel.ai/docs/guides/scheduling-automation.html).

### See what the room did on its own

Open the room's **Activity** tab. It starts with the room's own routine work:

* **Background checks**: when the last check ran, when the next one is due, and past checks.
* **Searches**, in the RFP room: the last search and how many new bids it found, the next search, and recent searches. See [RFP Operations](https://pencel.ai/docs/programs/rfp-operations.html).

While a check runs, one quiet line in the room says so, for example "Checking your inbox…". Click **View activity** to follow it.

If background checks stop, the teammate tells you once in the conversation. Click **Resume checks** to start them again, **See what happened** to find out why, or **Not now**. Checks stop only after two failed checks in a row. Restarting the app, cancelling a check, pressing **Stop** or pausing never stops them.

## Room settings

Click the room's name at the top of the room, or choose **Settings** in **⋯ Room options**, to open its settings.

| Tab | What you can do |
|---|---|
| **About** | Set the room's **Goal** and its **Instructions** (one rule per line). See the documents that guide the room, including the rules you gave in chat, and attach more with **+ Attach doc**. Changes save when you click away. |
| **Crew** | See each teammate, what it's responsible for and when it last worked. Add a teammate with **+ Add teammate**, or remove one you added. |
| **Schedule** | **Pause room** or **Resume** it. Turn **Work in the background** on or off and choose how often it checks (every 15 minutes up to once a day). Press **Check now** for an immediate check. Turn each routine on or off, or **Run now**. |
| **Knowledge** | Add files and documents just for this room with **+ Add knowledge**, share a document with every room, and see what the room knows about your company. See [Knowledge](https://pencel.ai/docs/concepts/knowledge.html). |
| **Advanced** | See every account and tool the room can use and whether it asks first. **Revoke** an approval you granted. Set a **Monthly budget**. Archive, start over or remove the room. |

Some screens still call the Schedule tab **Rhythm**. It's the same place.

## Ready-made Rooms and your own {#ready-made-programs-and-your-own}

**Ready-made Rooms** come fully set up for a specific job. Install one, answer a question or two, and it starts working. See [Ready-made Rooms](https://pencel.ai/docs/programs/).

**Your own rooms** start from a description. Click **Add a teammate** (the **+** next to **Team**), describe what you want looked after and click **Create room**. The room's lead then asks what it still needs in the conversation, one question at a time, connects the accounts it needs from a card, and proposes settings you accept. See [Set up your own Room](https://pencel.ai/docs/guides/setting-up-a-program.html).

## Talk to an agent that isn't on your Team

You talk to a teammate in its room. To talk to any other agent, use the message box on [Home](https://pencel.ai/docs/concepts/home.html). Its agent picker lists **Auto**, **AI Assistant** and your agents that aren't on your Team.

To make one of those agents a teammate with its own room:

1. Start the **Add to Team** step one of two ways:
   * While you chat with the agent on Home, a line above the message box says it isn't on your Team. Click **Add to Team** on that line.
   * Or open the agent in **Studio ▸ Agents** and click **Add to Team**.
2. Say what the agent should keep on top of.
3. Click **Add to Team**. Pencel creates the room with that agent as its teammate, and the room asks for anything else it needs.

If the agent already runs a room, **Add to Team** opens that room instead.

Your past one-to-one chats with teammates are kept. Find them in Home's chat history, under the agent's name, or search for them with ⌘K.

## Money and budgets

Rooms use AI credits from your plan or your own API key. By default a room can use your whole account budget. To give a room its own limit, open its settings, go to **Advanced ▸ Monthly budget** and enter a number of credits. The room shows how much it has spent and how much is left.

When a room hits its limit, its scheduled work pauses, and a banner in the room explains why. Nothing is lost. Raise the limit or wait for next month and it picks up again. See [Control what you spend](https://pencel.ai/docs/guides/managing-costs.html).

## Good to know

* **Rooms work while Pencel is open.** Scheduled checks need the app open and your computer awake. If Pencel was closed, work resumes the next time you open it.
* **Rooms are private to you.** Pencel is single-user today, so a room's teammates are AI, not other people.
* **Each room sees only its own work.** Your inbox room doesn't see your bids, and your bid room doesn't read your email. Company knowledge you share with every room is the exception.
* **Nothing is lost if something goes wrong.** If Pencel closes in the middle of a task, the room either picks up where it left off or tells you plainly what happened.

## Related

* [Set up your own Room](https://pencel.ai/docs/guides/setting-up-a-program.html)
* [Ready-made Rooms](https://pencel.ai/docs/programs/)
* [Home](https://pencel.ai/docs/concepts/home.html)
* [Approvals and permissions](https://pencel.ai/docs/privacy-and-security/approval-workflows.html)
* [Run work on a schedule](https://pencel.ai/docs/guides/scheduling-automation.html)