Q: Should I record problems that aren’t the model’s fault?
Yes. When reviewing interactions, write down anything that makes the product less useful. This includes missing or broken features that have nothing to do with the model. Additionally, don’t focus on why the error occurred, as that should only come after you prioritize which issues to fix.
For example, a support agent might tell a customer that an order has shipped without providing a tracking link. Even if your AI doesn’t have the ability to fetch a tracking link, record that problem. A prerequisite to building evals is to identify and prioritize which issues to fix through error analysis. Some of these issues may end up being engineering or design issues that don’t need an automated evaluator, but they are still important to fix!
Lastly, we’ve found that deferring root-cause analysis and focusing on problems allows you to write higher-quality annotations while looking at more data.
This article is part of our AI Evals FAQ, a collection of common questions (and answers) about LLM evaluation. View all FAQs or return to the homepage.