Iki - The Dean

Iki is your personal Dean on ikigize—a conversational AI guide that helps you clarify goals, structure your learning journey, and coordinate your overall educational experience. Named after "ikigai" (生き甲斐), the Japanese concept of purpose and meaning, Iki helps you discover and pursue what truly matters in your learning.

What Iki Does

Iki serves as your strategic partner throughout your learning journey on ikigize. Unlike specialized agents that focus on specific tasks, Iki takes a holistic view of your goals and helps orchestrate your entire educational experience.

Your Strategic Learning Partner

Iki is designed to be your trusted guide and advisor—someone who understands your aspirations, asks thoughtful questions, and helps you create actionable learning plans aligned with your goals.

Core Capabilities

What Iki Can Help You With

Comprehensive support for planning and managing your learning journey

Goal Clarification

Conduct conversational interviews to understand your objectives

Help articulate vague aspirations into concrete goals

Identify gaps between current state and desired outcomes

Connect learning goals to broader life and career aspirations

Strategic Planning

Structure learning goals using OKR methodology

Create project contexts using PARA framework

Break down complex objectives into manageable steps

Coordinate between different aspects of your learning

Agent Coordination

Delegate tasks to specialized agents when needed

Coordinate between Professor and Librarian

Ensure consistent context across all interactions

Provide seamless handoffs between different tools

How Iki Works

Iki uses a conversational approach to understand your learning needs and create actionable plans. The interaction is designed to feel natural while being highly effective at gathering the information needed to support you.

The Iki Process

Initial Conversation

Iki starts by asking open-ended questions about your goals and aspirations

•What do you want to learn or achieve?
•What motivates this goal?
•What have you tried before?

Context Gathering

Through thoughtful follow-up questions, Iki builds a complete picture

•Current skills and resources
•Constraints and challenges
•Timeline and preferences
•Success criteria

Goal Structuring

Iki synthesizes your input into structured objectives and plans

•Define clear, measurable objectives
•Identify key results to track progress
•Structure information using PARA methodology
•Create actionable project contexts

Ongoing Guidance

Iki provides continued support as you work toward your goals

•Monitor progress and adjust plans
•Suggest resources and next steps
•Coordinate specialized agent support
•Maintain motivation and accountability

Methodological Foundation

Iki's approach is grounded in two proven frameworks for goal setting and knowledge management:

OKR (Objectives and Key Results)

Iki uses OKR methodology to help you set and track meaningful goals:

Objectives: Qualitative descriptions of what you want to achieve
Key Results: Quantifiable metrics that indicate progress toward objectives
Alignment: Ensuring learning goals connect to broader life objectives
Measurability: Creating concrete ways to track your progress

PARA (Projects, Areas, Resources, Archives)

Iki structures your learning context using PARA principles:

Projects: Short-term efforts with specific outcomes
Areas: Ongoing responsibilities requiring maintenance
Resources: Reference materials and learning content
Archives: Completed projects and inactive materials

Expert Guidance

You don't need to understand OKR or PARA frameworks to work with Iki—the agent naturally applies these methodologies through conversational interaction, making sophisticated planning approaches accessible to everyone.

Interaction Style

Iki is designed to interact with you in a natural, empathetic way:

Conversational & Empathetic Iki asks thoughtful questions and responds to your unique situation with understanding and encouragement.

Adaptive & Responsive The agent adjusts its questions and suggestions based on your responses, never following a rigid script.

Patient & Non-Overwhelming Iki asks one or two questions at a time, building understanding gradually rather than interrogating you with forms.

Action-Oriented While empathetic, Iki maintains focus on creating actionable plans that move you toward your goals.

Expertise-Aware Iki knows when to coordinate with specialized agents like Professor or Librarian for domain-specific needs.

Example Interactions

Starting a New Learning Goal

You: I want to learn web development but I'm not sure where to start.

Iki: That's a great goal! Web development is a broad field with lots of possibilities. Let me understand a bit more about what draws you to this. What specifically interests you about web development? Is it building your own projects, career transition, or something else?

You: I want to change careers—I'm currently in marketing but want to move into tech.

Iki: A career transition into tech—that's exciting and definitely achievable. Your marketing background could actually be a real advantage. Can you tell me more about your timeline? Are you looking to make this transition within a specific timeframe, and do you have particular constraints like needing to work while learning?

Refining Vague Goals

You: I need to get better at data analysis.

Iki: Data analysis is a valuable skill! To help you create the most effective learning path, I'd like to understand more about your context. What kind of data analysis are you interested in? For example, are you working with customer data, scientific research, financial analysis, or something else?

Current Status

Development Phase

Iki was prototyped in 2024 and is currently being refined as part of the platform's agent system overhaul. The core conversational capabilities and OKR/PARA integration are established, with ongoing improvements to context awareness and coordination capabilities.

Current Capabilities:

Conversational goal exploration
OKR-based objective structuring
PARA-based project context creation
Basic agent coordination

In Development:

Enhanced memory and context retention
Improved progress tracking
Deeper platform integration
More sophisticated goal decomposition

Best Practices for Working with Iki

Be Honest About Uncertainty It's okay to not have everything figured out—Iki is designed to help you clarify fuzzy goals.

Provide Context The more Iki understands about your situation, constraints, and motivations, the better it can help.

Engage in Dialogue Don't just answer questions—ask your own, share concerns, and treat it as a real conversation.

Trust the Process Iki's questions might seem to go in unexpected directions, but they're designed to build a complete understanding.

Iterate and Refine Your initial goals and plans aren't set in stone—work with Iki to adjust as you learn and grow.

Your Next Steps

Now that you understand Iki's role as your learning guide, explore how other agents support specific aspects of your journey:

Professor Agent - Creates structured learning content and instructional guides
Librarian Agent - Discovers and curates learning resources
Agent Overview - How all agents work together

Task Management - How Iki helps structure your learning tasks
Learning Philosophy - The principles guiding Iki's approach
System Overview - How goal-setting integrates with the platform

Iki is more than just an AI assistant—it's your partner in creating a purposeful, effective learning journey that aligns with your unique goals and aspirations.