writing-skills

Agents bypass process documentation under pressure by rationalizing shortcuts based on common sense rather than complying with intended discipline. This Skill uses a TDD-style RED-GREEN-REFACTOR cycle to verify documentation prevents rationalizations during realistic pressure scenarios.

Test agent compliance with process documentation by running a baseline without the Skill, capturing verbatim rationalizations, applying a minimal documentation fix, and re-verifying under combined pressure scenarios like sunk cost or authority pressure.

You can apply test-driven development to writing agent skills by treating each documentation change as a RED-GREEN-REFACTOR cycle, converting process rules into testable compliance requirements validated against failure-inducing situations.

Validate agent skills using realistic pressure scenarios including time constraints, sunk cost, authority pressure, and exhaustion. These failure-inducing situations prove whether process documentation prevents rationalizations and maintains agent compliance.

Structure agent skills for discovery and compliance by using a third-person "Use when…" YAML description optimized for skill activation, alongside explicit anti-exceptions and red flags that help agents self-correct before violating process discipline.

Avoid using TDD for process documentation when modifying skills that do not enforce discipline or ordering requirements across tasks and sessions, as this approach specifically targets preventing rationalization shortcuts in compliance scenarios.