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grant-budget-justification

Use grant budget justification for academic writing workflows that need structured execution, explicit assumptions, and clear output boundaries.

39

Quality

37%

Does it follow best practices?

Impact

No eval scenarios have been run

SecuritybySnyk

Passed

No known issues

Optimize this skill with Tessl

npx tessl skill review --optimize ./scientific-skills/Academic Writing/grant-budget-justification/SKILL.md
SKILL.md
Quality
Evals
Security

Quality

Content

35%

Reviews the quality of instructions and guidance provided to agents. Good implementation is clear, handles edge cases, and produces reliable results.

This skill is heavily padded with generic boilerplate sections (Security Checklist, Risk Assessment, Lifecycle Status, Evaluation Criteria) that provide no grant-budget-justification-specific value and waste significant token budget. The core domain knowledge — how to actually write budget justifications for NIH/NSF grants — is almost entirely absent, replaced by abstract process management language. The Parameters table and CLI interface are the strongest elements, but without a concrete example of actual output or domain-specific writing guidance, the skill provides little beyond what Claude already knows.

Suggestions

Remove or externalize boilerplate sections (Security Checklist, Risk Assessment, Lifecycle Status, Evaluation Criteria) that contain only generic placeholder content and don't teach Claude anything about grant budget justification.

Add a concrete, complete example showing actual input data and the full narrative justification output, including agency-specific language patterns for NIH vs NSF.

Replace the abstract workflow steps with domain-specific guidance: what makes a strong equipment justification vs personnel justification, required elements per agency, common pitfalls in budget narratives.

Eliminate redundant repetitions — the skill description appears 3 times, 'scripts/main.py' appears 6+ times, and multiple sections cross-reference each other circularly.

DimensionReasoningScore

Conciseness

Extremely verbose and repetitive. Multiple sections restate the same information (e.g., 'scripts/main.py' is mentioned 6+ times, the skill description is repeated verbatim in 'When to Use' and 'Key Features'). Contains boilerplate sections like 'Lifecycle Status', 'Security Checklist', 'Evaluation Criteria' with generic placeholder content that adds no actionable value. Cross-references to sections that don't exist in the expected order ('See ## Prerequisites above' when Prerequisites comes later).

1 / 3

Actionability

The Parameters table with CLI flags is concrete and useful, and the bash commands are executable. However, the core workflow steps are abstract ('Confirm the user objective', 'Validate that the request matches the documented scope') rather than providing specific grant-budget-justification guidance. The example is extremely thin ('Input: $50,000 for mass spectrometer, Output: Justification emphasizing essentiality') — no actual example output is shown.

2 / 3

Workflow Clarity

There is a numbered workflow with error handling and fallback paths mentioned, which is good. However, the steps are generic process management steps rather than task-specific guidance. The validation step ('python -m py_compile') only checks syntax, not functional correctness. There's no validation of the actual output quality (e.g., checking compliance with agency requirements), and the feedback loop for errors is vague ('switch to the fallback path').

2 / 3

Progressive Disclosure

References a 'references/' directory and 'references/audit-reference.md', but no bundle files are provided to verify these exist. The SKILL.md itself is monolithic — many sections (Security Checklist, Evaluation Criteria, Lifecycle Status, Risk Assessment) are boilerplate that could be in separate files or omitted entirely. The document is poorly organized with redundant cross-references to sections in wrong order.

2 / 3

Total

7

/

12

Passed

Description

40%

Based on the skill's description, can an agent find and select it at the right time? Clear, specific descriptions lead to better discovery.

The description identifies a specific domain (grant budget justification) but fails to articulate what concrete actions the skill performs. The abstract language about 'structured execution, explicit assumptions, and clear output boundaries' describes process qualities rather than capabilities, making it difficult for Claude to confidently select this skill. It needs concrete action verbs and more natural trigger terms.

Suggestions

Add specific concrete actions the skill performs, e.g., 'Generates budget narratives, calculates personnel costs, justifies equipment and travel expenses for grant proposals.'

Expand trigger terms to include common variations like 'NSF budget', 'NIH budget narrative', 'research proposal budget', 'cost justification', 'funding application'.

Replace abstract process descriptors ('structured execution, explicit assumptions, clear output boundaries') with tangible outputs and use cases.

DimensionReasoningScore

Specificity

The description does not list any concrete actions. 'Structured execution, explicit assumptions, and clear output boundaries' are abstract process descriptors, not specific capabilities like 'create budget tables' or 'calculate cost breakdowns'.

1 / 3

Completeness

The 'when' is partially addressed with 'Use [for] academic writing workflows that need structured execution...', but the 'what' is extremely weak—it never explains what the skill actually does beyond naming the domain. The 'Use when' clause exists but is vague.

2 / 3

Trigger Term Quality

'Grant budget justification' and 'academic writing' are relevant domain keywords a user might mention, but common variations like 'NSF budget', 'research proposal', 'budget narrative', 'cost justification', or 'funding application' are missing.

2 / 3

Distinctiveness Conflict Risk

'Grant budget justification' is a fairly specific niche, which helps distinctiveness, but the vague language about 'structured execution' and 'academic writing workflows' could overlap with general academic writing or proposal skills.

2 / 3

Total

7

/

12

Passed

Validation

90%

Checks the skill against the spec for correct structure and formatting. All validation checks must pass before discovery and implementation can be scored.

Validation10 / 11 Passed

Validation for skill structure

CriteriaDescriptionResult

frontmatter_unknown_keys

Unknown frontmatter key(s) found; consider removing or moving to metadata

Warning

Total

10

/

11

Passed

Repository
aipoch/medical-research-skills
Reviewed

Table of Contents

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