Attaching Knowledge to an Agent
Attaching knowledge allows an agent to reference your organization’s documents, files, and external content during runtime. Instead of responding only from general model training, the agent can retrieve information directly from approved knowledge sources to generate more accurate, contextual, and business-specific responses.
Knowledge can be sourced from uploaded files or connected platforms such as Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, and Microsoft SharePoint. Once attached, the content becomes available to the agent through the platform’s knowledge retrieval capabilities.
What This Enables
With attached knowledge, agents can:
Answer questions using internal business documents
Reference policies, guidelines, or product documentation
Retrieve context from uploaded files and connected repositories
Deliver more consistent and traceable responses
Reduce reliance on generic model knowledge
This transforms the agent from a general AI assistant into a domain-aware business agent grounded in your organization’s data.
Before You Begin
Before attaching knowledge, ensure that:
You have the source content ready for upload or import
Supported files are within the allowed upload size limit (10 MB)
Required integrations such as Google Drive, OneDrive, or SharePoint are already connected
You understand whether preprocessing is required for your content type
Typical supported content includes:
PDFs
Documents
Spreadsheets
Policy files
Structured business reference material
How to Attach Knowledge
1. Open the Builder Canvas
From the Agent Builder canvas, select + Add Knowledge within the Knowledge section above the agent node. This opens the Attach Knowledge workflow.
2. Select a Knowledge Category
Choose the category that best matches the content being attached. Categories help organize knowledge sources and improve downstream retrieval behavior.
Examples include:
General Documentation
Financial Services
Policies & Compliance
Underwriting Guidelines
Healthcare
Legal
Insurance
Manufacturing
If no category is an exact match, select the closest applicable category or use a general-purpose option.
3. Import or Upload Content
Knowledge can be added through connected integrations or direct upload.
Available import options include:
Google Drive
Microsoft OneDrive
Microsoft SharePoint
You can also drag and drop files directly into the upload area for local uploads.
4. Configure the Preprocessing Pipeline
The Preprocessing Pipeline determines how the platform prepares content before indexing.
When enabled, the platform can perform:
Intelligent document chunking
OCR for scanned PDFs
Layout-aware extraction
Table and structured data parsing
Recommended Usage
Clean text-based documents
Leave preprocessing disabled
Scanned PDFs
Enable preprocessing
Table-heavy or structured documents
Enable preprocessing
Retrieval quality issues
Re-import with preprocessing enabled
5. Complete the Attachment
Once at least one file has been imported or uploaded, select Done to attach the knowledge source to the agent.
The knowledge source then appears as a node within the Knowledge section of the Builder Canvas.
Runtime Behavior
After attachment:
The content is indexed and made available to the agent
The agent can retrieve relevant passages during conversations
Responses become grounded in attached business content
The platform uses retrieval workflows to fetch the most relevant information dynamically
If attached knowledge does not sufficiently answer a query, the agent can still fall back to general model reasoning or request clarification.
Common Issues and Troubleshooting
Done Button Remains Disabled
Cause: No file or external content has been selected yet.
Resolution: Upload a file or import content from a connected source.
Agent Is Not Using Attached Knowledge
Possible reasons:
The knowledge retrieval capability is not attached to the agent
Agent instructions do not explicitly guide the agent to consult knowledge sources
The uploaded content does not contain relevant information
Recommended checks:
Verify the knowledge retrieval skill is enabled
Review agent instructions and retrieval behavior
Validate the uploaded source content
Retrieval Quality Is Poor
For scanned or complex documents:
Re-import the content with preprocessing enabled
Ensure the source document is readable and structured properly
Avoid low-quality scans where possible
Preprocessing generally improves retrieval accuracy for OCR-heavy and layout-complex documents.
Why Knowledge Attachment Matters
Knowledge attachment is foundational to building reliable enterprise agents.
It enables:
Business-grounded responses
Consistent answers across users
Reduced hallucination risk
Better compliance and traceability
Domain-specific intelligence
Instead of relying solely on generalized training data, the agent retrieves information from approved organizational sources, making outputs more trustworthy, explainable, and operationally useful.
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