⬡ Overview
📋 Brief
🎯 Intents
✍️ Script
▶ Test
🔧 Refine
📐 Canvas
◇ Check
★ Results
0 / 5
Hands-On Lab · Module 12 · BAA 12.0

Dialogue
Design

Good agents don't just answer questions — they guide conversations. You'll design a full conversational script for a travel booking agent: mapping user intents, writing clarification flows, presenting options clearly, and refining prompts from real user feedback.

Learning Objectives
💬
Design Conversational Interfaces
Promote clear, efficient, and natural communication between users and agents.
🧪
Test Agent Interactions
Ensure dialogues are user-friendly, intuitive, and easy to understand across different user types.
🔧
Refine From Feedback
Improve agent prompts in response to user frustration signals and confusion patterns.
Lab Roadmap
—
Brief — Meet Voyager, your travel booking agent
Learn the scope, user base, and principles of good dialogue
1
Map User Intents
Identify the 5 core intents and the ambiguity patterns your agent must handle
2
Write the Conversational Script
Design greeting, clarification, option presentation, error recovery, and confirmation — node by node
3
Test Across 3 User Personas
Run live test conversations — a vague traveler, a demanding business traveler, an anxious first-timer
4
Refine From User Feedback
Diagnose 4 real feedback signals and rewrite the broken prompts
5
Complete the Design Canvas
Assemble the final specification document your engineering team would implement
—
Knowledge Check · 7 questions · 70% to pass
The Agent Brief

Meet Voyager

Voyager is a conversational travel booking agent. It books flights, hotels, and packages through natural conversation. Your job is to design the dialogue that makes Voyager feel like a brilliant travel consultant — not a search form.

Product Brief

Voyager users arrive with wildly different levels of specificity. Some know exactly what they want: "Business class, JFK to Heathrow, Oct 14, returning Oct 21, under $4,000." Most don't: "I want to go somewhere warm in November."

The agent's dialogue must handle the full spectrum — from decisive to undecided. It must ask exactly the right clarifying questions (not too many, not too few), present options in a scannable format the user can act on, recover gracefully from confusion, and feel like a conversation rather than a form.

The number-one failure mode of travel agents is asking too many questions before giving any value. Users abandon when they feel interrogated. The design challenge is gathering necessary information while always moving the conversation forward.

❌ Bad Dialogue Patterns
Asking 3+ questions in a single turn
Showing options without prices or key differentiators
Responding to ambiguity with "I don't understand"
Confirming every detail before proceeding
Re-asking for information already given
Using technical jargon (fare class, IATA codes)
✓ Good Dialogue Patterns
One question per turn, maximum
Show 3 options max with clear differentiators
Default to an assumption and let users correct it
Surface value early — partial info is enough to start
Confirm only the decision-critical details before booking
Use plain language (economy, direct, price range)
💡 Core design principle: A great travel agent makes you feel understood before you finish your sentence. They fill in reasonable assumptions and ask only about the gaps that actually matter. Design Voyager to do the same.
Section 01 · Analysis

Map User Intents

Every user message carries an intent — often an ambiguous one. Before writing dialogue, you need to know what users are actually trying to say, and the minimum clarification needed to move forward. Open all 5 intents, then answer the comprehension question.

⚠️ Ambiguity is the enemy of booking. "Somewhere warm" can mean Cancún, Bali, or the Maldives. "Not too expensive" means $400 to one user and $4,000 to another. Resolve ambiguity with the fewest possible turns — or anchor with options and let the user self-select.
Section 02 · Design Activity

Write the Conversational Script

Work through 5 critical dialogue nodes — choosing the right response strategy at each decision point. Your choices assemble into a complete, readable conversation script at the end.

💡 One turn, one purpose. Each agent turn should do one thing: either provide value or resolve one specific ambiguity. Never ask a question AND deliver an answer in the same turn — users prioritize one and miss the other.
Section 03 · Testing

Test Across 3 Personas

A dialogue that works for one user type will fail for another. Test Voyager against three personas with different communication styles. Watch where it excels and where it breaks — those failures are your design inputs for the Refine section.

Voyager · Travel Agent select a persona above
Quick Prompts
Section 04 · Refinement

Refine From User Feedback

Real user testing surfaces friction points. Below are four actual feedback signals from the Voyager beta. For each: diagnose what went wrong in the original design, then see the corrected version.

🔮 Feedback signals are design data. When users abandon, repeat themselves, say "just book it," or express frustration — that is diagnostic signal, not noise. Trace each signal back to the exact turn where the breakdown happened.
Section 05 · Deliverable

Dialogue Design Canvas

You've mapped intents, written a script, tested personas, and refined prompts. Now assemble the final design canvas — the document a real product team would use to implement Voyager's conversational logic.

💡 Specificity matters. "Ask about budget" is a bad canvas entry. "If no price range is given within 2 turns, offer three tiers as selectable options: Budget / Mid-range / Premium" is a good one. Vague specs produce inconsistent implementations.
Knowledge Check

7 Questions

Drawn from every section. 70% to pass.

Question 1 of 7Score: 0 / 0
Lab Debrief

Dialogue Design Complete