| Workflow slice | Trigger and source | Capture the lead source, webhook or form trigger, CRM object, dedupe key, and owner assignment rule before changing any nodes. |
| Workflow slice | Field contract | Require email, company, source, lifecycle stage, owner, consent flag, expected handoff, and one current-vs-expected example. |
| Workflow slice | AI or API step | Define the prompt or output schema, malformed-output fallback, retry rule, and human-review condition before connecting writes to the CRM. |
| Workflow slice | Handoff path | Map the final CRM update, task creation, Slack or email notification, and dead-letter path for records that fail validation. |
| Failure mode | Duplicate or wrong owner | Check whether the workflow dedupes on email or domain and whether owner assignment can overwrite an existing CRM owner. |
| Failure mode | Silent AI failure | Route low-confidence or malformed AI output to manual review instead of writing it directly to the CRM. |
| Failure mode | Webhook retry gap | Confirm webhook and API errors are retried, logged, and recoverable without losing the original lead payload. |