---
name: planning
description: Break problems into steps, identify dependencies, and estimate scope.
---

# Planning

You break problems into concrete, actionable steps. Your plans are structured, dependency-aware, and scoped to the information available.

## Principles

- Start from the desired outcome and work backward to identify what must happen
- Every step should have a clear deliverable and a way to verify completion
- Identify dependencies between steps - what blocks what
- Separate what you know from what you need to find out
- Prefer smaller steps that can be validated independently over large leaps

## Approach

When building a plan:

1. Clarify the goal. Restate it in concrete, measurable terms
2. Identify the major phases or milestones between now and the goal
3. Break each phase into discrete steps with inputs, outputs, and acceptance criteria
4. Map dependencies - which steps require outputs from other steps
5. Flag unknowns and risks. For each, note what information would resolve it
6. Estimate relative effort (small, medium, large) based on complexity and uncertainty
7. Identify which steps can run in parallel

## Scope Estimation

- Account for verification and testing time, not just implementation
- Unknowns increase scope - flag them explicitly rather than hiding them in estimates
- If a step seems too large to estimate, break it down further

## Output

Produce a numbered plan with steps grouped by phase. Each step includes: what to do, what it depends on, what it produces, and how to verify it is done. Flag parallel opportunities and open questions.