Draft a structured grant proposal from research ideas and literature. Supports KAKENHI (Japan), NSF (US), NSFC (China, including 面上/青年/优青/杰青/海外优青/重点), ERC (EU), DFG (Germany), SNSF (Switzerland), ARC (Australia), NWO (Netherlands), and generic formats. Use when user says "write grant", "grant proposal", "申請書", "write KAKENHI", "科研費", "基金申请", "写基金", "NSF proposal", or wants to turn research ideas into a funding application.
58
70%
Does it follow best practices?
Impact
—
No eval scenarios have been run
Advisory
Suggest reviewing before use
Optimize this skill with Tessl
npx tessl skill review --optimize ./skills/grant-proposal/SKILL.mdQuality
Discovery
100%Based on the skill's description, can an agent find and select it at the right time? Clear, specific descriptions lead to better discovery.
This is an excellent skill description that clearly communicates its purpose, lists specific supported funding agencies with impressive detail (including NSFC sub-categories), and provides comprehensive multilingual trigger terms. It follows the recommended pattern with an explicit 'Use when...' clause and uses third-person voice throughout. The description is both thorough and well-structured without being unnecessarily verbose.
| Dimension | Reasoning | Score |
|---|---|---|
Specificity | Lists a concrete action ('Draft a structured grant proposal from research ideas and literature') and enumerates multiple specific funding agencies with sub-types (e.g., NSFC sub-categories like 面上/青年/优青/杰青/海外优青/重点). This is highly specific about what the skill does. | 3 / 3 |
Completeness | Clearly answers both 'what' (draft structured grant proposals from research ideas, supporting multiple funding agencies) and 'when' (explicit 'Use when...' clause with specific trigger phrases and the general case of turning research ideas into funding applications). | 3 / 3 |
Trigger Term Quality | Excellent coverage of natural trigger terms across multiple languages: 'write grant', 'grant proposal', '申請書', 'write KAKENHI', '科研費', '基金申请', '写基金', 'NSF proposal', and 'funding application'. These are terms users would naturally say in English, Japanese, and Chinese. | 3 / 3 |
Distinctiveness Conflict Risk | Highly distinctive niche: grant proposal writing for specific funding agencies. The combination of agency names (KAKENHI, NSF, NSFC, ERC, DFG, etc.) and multilingual trigger terms makes it very unlikely to conflict with other skills. | 3 / 3 |
Total | 12 / 12 Passed |
Implementation
39%Reviews the quality of instructions and guidance provided to agents. Good implementation is clear, handles edge cases, and produces reliable results.
This skill has an exceptionally well-designed workflow with clear phases, checkpoints, state persistence, and error recovery — the workflow clarity is its strongest dimension. However, it is severely undermined by its extreme length and monolithic structure: grant agency specifications, drafting guidelines, figure generation instructions, and review protocols are all inline rather than split into referenced files. The result is a token-expensive skill that buries its actionable workflow under hundreds of lines of reference material that should be progressively disclosed.
Suggestions
Extract grant type specifications (KAKENHI, NSF, NSFC, ERC, DFG, SNSF, ARC, NWO tables) into a separate GRANT_TYPES.md reference file, keeping only a brief summary table with links in the main SKILL.md.
Extract grant-specific drafting guidelines (KAKENHI style, NSF style, NSFC style, ERC style) into a separate DRAFTING_GUIDELINES.md, referenced from Phase 3.
Remove explanatory content Claude already knows, such as 'Grant proposals argue for future work (feasibility + potential), not completed work (results + claims)' and the paper-vs-grant narrative arc comparison — these are basic knowledge for an LLM.
Add a concrete example of good grant prose output (e.g., a sample Specific Aims page) to make the drafting phase more actionable rather than just describing what to write.
| Dimension | Reasoning | Score |
|---|---|---|
Conciseness | Extremely verbose at ~500+ lines. Extensively explains grant writing concepts Claude already knows (e.g., 'Grant proposals argue for future work, not completed work'), includes massive specification tables for every grant agency that could be in separate reference files, and repeats information across sections (e.g., grant-specific criteria appear in both the specifications table and the drafting guidelines). | 1 / 3 |
Actionability | Provides concrete workflow steps, specific MCP call formats, and detailed section templates. However, much of the 'actionable' content is actually orchestration pseudocode (invoking sub-skills like /research-lit, /novelty-check) rather than executable code, and the actual prose-writing guidance is more descriptive than prescriptive (e.g., 'Write complete prose — no outlines or placeholders' without showing what good grant prose looks like). | 2 / 3 |
Workflow Clarity | Excellent multi-phase workflow with explicit checkpoints (⛔ STOP HERE), clear phase numbering (0-5), state persistence via GRANT_STATE.json for recovery, severity-ranked reviewer feedback handling, and explicit user confirmation gates. The feedback loop (draft → review → revise → re-review) is well-defined with MAX_REVIEW_ROUNDS. | 3 / 3 |
Progressive Disclosure | Monolithic wall of text with all grant type specifications, drafting guidelines, figure generation instructions, review protocols, and output formats inline. The grant type specification tables alone (~100 lines) should be in a separate reference file. References to sub-skills and shared protocols exist but the core content that should be split out (agency specs, LaTeX templates, drafting guidelines per agency) is all crammed into one massive file. | 1 / 3 |
Total | 7 / 12 Passed |
Validation
72%Checks the skill against the spec for correct structure and formatting. All validation checks must pass before discovery and implementation can be scored.
Validation — 8 / 11 Passed
Validation for skill structure
| Criteria | Description | Result |
|---|---|---|
skill_md_line_count | SKILL.md is long (669 lines); consider splitting into references/ and linking | Warning |
allowed_tools_field | 'allowed-tools' contains unusual tool name(s) | Warning |
frontmatter_unknown_keys | Unknown frontmatter key(s) found; consider removing or moving to metadata | Warning |
Total | 8 / 11 Passed | |
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