team-communication-protocols

Structured messaging protocols for agent team communication including message type selection, plan approval, shutdown procedures, and anti-patterns to avoid. Use this skill when establishing communication norms for a newly spawned team, when deciding whether to send a direct message or a broadcast, when a team-lead needs to review and approve an implementer's plan before work begins, when orchestrating a graceful team shutdown after all tasks are complete, or when debugging why teammates are not coordinating correctly at integration points.

Quality

—

Does it follow best practices?

Impact

—

No eval scenarios have been run

Securityby

Passed

No known issues

Quality

Content

92%

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

The skill body is concise, actionable, and clearly sequenced with validation checkpoints across its workflows. Its only gap is progressive disclosure: a references/messaging-patterns.md file exists but is orphaned, never linked from the body.

Suggestions

Add a short section or link in the body pointing to references/messaging-patterns.md (e.g., under Message Type Selection: "For ready-to-use message templates, see [messaging-patterns.md](references/messaging-patterns.md)"), so the existing bundle file is discoverable.

Consider moving the detailed template content that lives only in the reference into a one-level-deep pointer rather than leaving it entirely disconnected from the SKILL.md overview.

Dimension	Reasoning	Score
Conciseness	Lean, well-organized body that assumes Claude's competence — no boilerplate explanations of basic concepts, and every section earns its place with tight JSON examples.	3 / 3
Actionability	Provides copy-paste-ready JSON message payloads, a concrete config path (~/.claude/teams/{team-name}/config.json), and named tool calls (SendMessage, ExitPlanMode, TeamDelete) rather than abstract direction.	3 / 3
Workflow Clarity	Multi-step processes are explicitly numbered (Plan Approval Workflow, Graceful Shutdown Sequence) with validation feedback loops (shutdown_response approve/reject, rejection handling) and troubleshooting for edge cases like deadlocks.	3 / 3
Progressive Disclosure	The body is well-organized into clear sections, but the one bundle file (references/messaging-patterns.md) is never referenced or signaled in the body, so the supplementary material is not navigable from the overview.	2 / 3
	Total	11 / 12 Passed

Description

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.

A strong, well-structured description that concretely lists capabilities and provides explicit "Use this skill when..." triggers covering several realistic scenarios. It is concise yet complete and clearly distinguishable from sibling team skills.

Dimension	Reasoning	Score
Specificity	Names multiple concrete actions — "message type selection, plan approval, shutdown procedures, and anti-patterns to avoid" — rather than vague language.	3 / 3
Completeness	Explicitly answers both what ("Structured messaging protocols for agent team communication including...") and when ("Use this skill when...") with explicit triggers.	3 / 3
Trigger Term Quality	Covers natural terms a user would actually say: "direct message or a broadcast", "review and approve an implementer's plan", "graceful team shutdown", "teammates are not coordinating correctly".	3 / 3
Distinctiveness Conflict Risk	A clear, distinct niche — agent team communication protocols — with specific triggers (newly spawned team, plan approval, shutdown) unlikely to conflict with other skills; written in third person.	3 / 3
	Total	12 / 12 Passed

Validation

87%

Warnings & errors only

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

Validation — 14 / 16 Passed

Validation for skill structure

Criteria	Description	Result
frontmatter_unknown_keys	Unknown frontmatter key(s) found; consider removing or moving to metadata	Warning
relative_links	Relative link issues: 2 suspicious	Warning

	Total	14 / 16 Passed

Repository: wshobson/agents
Commit: 5cc2549

Reviewed: 8 days ago

Table of Contents

Discovery Implementation Validation

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