/build-brief

Garden · not yet reviewed Beta, from the WDAI Build Cycle pilot Version 0.1.0

Plans a small AI build before anything gets built. Picks the simplest approach that works (paper, a document or spreadsheet, a prompt, an agent or an app), writes what it must do, what can wait and how to tell if it helped, then has AI propose a plan and wait for approval of the first step.

How to call it

Once it's installed, ask for it by name, for example "use build-brief on this" or type /build-brief . Your AI tool also starts it without being asked when your request matches its description.

When it starts: someone has an idea and is about to ask AI to build, automate or write something substantial, or says "plan this", "scope this", "help me build…".

Connections

Practises

• Steer
• Describe the task

Concepts it uses

• Steering (garden)
• Smallest useful version (garden)
• Solution ladder (garden)
• Context engineering (garden)

Comes after

• /frame-the-problem (garden)
• practice-coach (garden)
• /brainstorm (garden)

Try next

• /prove-it (garden)
• /make-it-repeatable (garden)

Used in blueprints

• Build a style guide so AI drafts sound like you (garden)
• Write a handover brief before you give an agent a real task (garden)
• Hire and onboard an AI copilot for one piece of work (garden)
• Let AI ask before it plans (garden)
• Teach your AI assistant your team's jargon, one confirmed term at a time (garden)
• Turn messy notes into a status draft you can check (garden)
• Write a one-page build plan before you ask AI to make an app (garden)

From the field, after this

• ChatPRD plugin (Cursor, Codex, ChatGPT) (garden)
• compound-engineering (plugin) (garden)
• awesome-pm-skills (garden)
• lenny-skills (garden)

The skill itself

This is the instruction text your AI tool reads, shown as written.

Build brief

Write a short brief, then a plan the person approves one step at a time. The brief is how they steer: AI tends to build more than they need, so they direct it, set guardrails and cut scope.

How this skill behaves

They write the brief; you ask questions, tighten it and plan. Ask one question at a time. “Just do it” gets a draft brief from what they’ve said, with your guesses marked, and a plan that still waits for approval.

Steps

1. Pick the lowest rung that works. Ask them to describe the paper or manual version first: how they’d do it with no software. Then walk up the ladder (simple document or spreadsheet → prompt → agent → app) and stop at the first rung that solves the problem. Many problems only need a prompt.
2. Write the brief together. Ask these one at a time; their words go in the brief:
   • What am I trying to do, and who will it help?
   • What will I give the AI, and what should it make?
   • What must it do?
   • What can wait until later?
   • How will I tell whether it helped?
3. Smallest useful version. Ask “What’s the smallest version that would still be useful?” Help them cut, and suggest two small options they choose between.
4. Plan before building. Propose a short plan from the brief. Point out every guess you made and any feature they didn’t ask for. Don’t build yet.
5. They restate and approve. Ask them to say the plan back in their own words and approve the first step only. Build that step, show it, then ask before the next.

Output

The brief (five answers), the chosen rung, and a numbered plan with step 1 approved. Save the brief: it becomes the spec for prove-it and make-it-repeatable.

Connect it

When it helps, name the parallel in their field: a project charter, a creative brief, or briefing a contractor.

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Credit: Build Card, Build Brief and solution ladder from WDAI's Build Cycle (programs team); steering principle from WDAI's AI Advanced curriculum (released 2026-10-16). Rewritten for the commons.

Licence: Apache-2.0 (instructions) and CC BY 4.0 (teaching text). From AI Practice Commons by Women Defining AI; method from the WDAI Build Cycle (beta).. Plain Markdown for agents: /skills/build-brief.md