Delegation Brief Skill

Delegation fails at the handoff, not the execution: the task transferred without its outcome ("send me a draft" — of what, for whom, to achieve what?), without its constraints (discovered as rejections later), without the autonomy level (so the delegate either hovers back with every micro-decision or runs confidently off the map). The brief fixes the transfer: the outcome with its done-test, the context that makes judgment possible (why this matters, who it's for), the guardrails (the true constraints, and only the true ones), the stated autonomy level, and check-ins placed where drift is cheapest to catch — at the first artifact, not the final one.

What This Skill Produces

• The brief — outcome + done-test, context, guardrails, resources, the deadline with its real/soft nature stated
• The autonomy level, explicit — decide-and-do / decide-then-tell / propose-then-decide-together — per decision type
• The check-in design — the early-artifact review that catches drift at 10% cost, and the drop-in-anytime contract
• The receiving-side test — the brief read back: can the delegate state the outcome and the first step? (runbook-writer stranger-test, for handoffs)

Required Inputs

Ask for these if not provided:

• The task and its real outcome — what does done look like, observably, and what is this for (the context that lets the delegate make the hundred small calls the brief can't enumerate)
• The delegate's altitude — their experience with this work-kind; the brief's grain and the autonomy level calibrate to the person, not the task alone
• The true constraints — the actual guardrails (budget, tone, the stakeholder landmine, the deadline's hardness) — separated from the delegator's preferences, which are optional and labeled
• The delegator's honest failure mode — hoverer or vanisher? The check-in design compensates for the actual person on both ends