Agentic AI Working Group

Formerly the Generative AI Working Group

Why we exist

The AI Forum formed this working group in 2023, originally as the Large Language Models Working Group, to help New Zealand organisations navigate a technology that was changing faster than any guidance could keep up with. As the technology broadened, so did we, becoming the Generative AI Working Group and launching our flagship output: the Living Whitepaper, an open source record of AI adoption in Aotearoa New Zealand.

The technology has moved again, and so has the way we work. AI is no longer just a tool that generates outputs for us to copy and paste. Increasingly, we delegate whole tasks to AI agents that plan, act, and complete work with little or no human intervention. This shift to agentic AI is changing how organisations operate, at an accelerating pace. It is where the most significant productivity gains are being realised, and where the most significant new risks are emerging.

The working group has evolved to match. As the Agentic AI Working Group, we bring together practitioners, researchers, and leaders from across Aotearoa to make sense of agentic ways of working: what to embrace, what to watch out for, and how to do it well at the size and scale of most New Zealand organisations.

Purpose

We help New Zealand organisations adopt agentic ways of working with confidence. We focus on:

Surfacing the opportunity. Sharing practical, tested guidance on using agents effectively, from delegating well and designing human-agent workflows to managing the rising costs that come with heavy agent use.
Highlighting the risks. Agentic AI introduces new challenges around data security, access and permissions, and accountability for autonomous actions. It also raises cultural and human questions: organisations are no longer purely human-to-human environments, but mixed teams of people and agents, and that changes how work, trust, and responsibility flow.
Keeping it relevant to Aotearoa. Everything we produce is grounded in the realities of New Zealand organisations, most of which are small to medium in scale, and reflects our local context, including te ao Māori perspectives on data, governance, and the responsible use of AI.
Feeding the wider ecosystem. We share what we learn with the AI Governance Working Group and other AI Forum working groups, including the sector-specific groups.

What we do

Maintaining the Living Whitepaper

We maintain livingwhitepaper.com, an open source record of AI adoption in Aotearoa New Zealand. An AI agent publishes a monthly national snapshot and sector reports, and members steer it by providing sector guidance, reviewing reports for quality, and proposing new sectors and topics. Members and their organisations also support the running costs, with contributors credited.

Monthly knowledge share

Working group members meet virtually each month to discuss what is moving in the agentic AI space: new capabilities, emerging practices, costs, incidents, and lessons from real deployments. These sessions are also where we shape ideas for community meetups, thought leadership, and other ways to share what we learn.

Community meetups

We run open community meetups on specific topics under the agentic ways of working umbrella, hosted by the working group, its members, or both. Topics include:

The software development lifecycle in the age of agents
Agentic AI in professional industries, such as civil engineering, where regulatory standards and professional liability shape how autonomy can be applied
Managing the economics of agents: usage, tokens, and cost control
Security and governance for agents acting on your organisation’s behalf

Have a topic you would like to see covered, or want to host or speak at a meetup? We would love to hear from you.

Get involved

The Agentic AI Working Group welcomes members who are actively working with agentic AI, whether building, deploying, governing, or researching it. As a member, you can join the monthly knowledge share, help steer the Living Whitepaper, and host or speak at community meetups.

To get involved, contact the working group.