feat: Add persona-based agents (Startup CTO, Growth Marketer, Solo Founder) - #334
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Add agents/personas/ directory with: - README.md — what personas are, how to use them, comparison with agents - TEMPLATE.md — format specification for creating new personas - startup-cto.md — technical co-founder persona (engineering + strategy) - growth-marketer.md — bootstrapped growth persona (marketing + analytics) - solo-founder.md — all-in-one indie hacker persona (cross-domain) Each persona includes: - Identity & mindset (personality-driven, not just skill list) - Curated skill loadouts (primary + secondary) - Multi-step workflows for common tasks - Handoff rules for cross-persona collaboration - Anti-patterns to avoid Complements existing agents/ structure — personas for role embodiment, agents for focused task execution.
PR Review: feat: Add persona-based agentsGreat concept and well-structured implementation overall. The persona pattern fills a real gap between task-focused agents and role-based collaboration. A few issues need to be addressed before merging. Broken Skill ReferencesTwo skill paths referenced in the personas do not exist in the repository:
These broken references will silently fail when users try to activate the referenced skills. Mismatched Command NamesThe following commands referenced in YAML frontmatter don't match any existing command files in
Commands that don't exist will produce confusing behavior. Either create the missing commands or update the frontmatter to reference existing ones (e.g., Skill Reference Inconsistency in startup-cto.md
Missing Documentation Updates
Minor ObservationsHandoff naming inconsistency: Handoff targets mix un-prefixed persona names ( No personas index in agents/: The existing agents directory has no index file. Adding an entry in What Works Well
SummaryThe concept is solid and the content quality is high. The main blockers are the broken skill references ( |
Restructured all 3 personas + template + README to match the agency-agents agent format: Frontmatter alignment: - name, description, color, emoji, vibe, tools (same fields) - Removed non-standard fields: type, domain, skills, commands, model Body structure alignment: - Second-person voice: 'You are **AgentName**...' - Emoji section headers throughout (🧠 🎯 🚨 📋 🔄 💭 🚀) - Identity & Memory → Core Mission → Critical Rules → Capabilities → Workflows → Communication Style → Success Metrics → Advanced → Learning & Memory - Rich personality backstory (not just skill lists) - Concrete code/workflow examples in each section - Pattern recognition subsection in Learning & Memory Content deepening: - startup-cto: 112 → 196 lines, added due diligence prep, incident response - growth-marketer: 111 → 204 lines, added viral growth, international expansion - solo-founder: 125 → 213 lines, added quit-your-job framework, pivot decisions - Template rewritten to match exact section structure - README updated with correct field documentation
Skills Audit ReportDate: 2026-02-15 Executive SummaryThe recently added skills fall into two distinct tiers:
Overall: 4 POWERFUL, 1 SOLID, 4 SOLID, 2 GENERIC, 1 WEAK Detailed Skill Audits1. business-growth/customer-success-managerCode Quality: EXCELLENT
Problem-Solving Quality: EXCELLENT
Structure: STRONG
Verdict: POWERFUL ⭐ 2. business-growth/revenue-operationsCode Quality: EXCELLENT
Problem-Solving Quality: EXCELLENT
Structure: STRONG
Verdict: POWERFUL ⭐ 3. business-growth/sales-engineerCode Quality: EXCELLENT
Problem-Solving Quality: EXCELLENT
Structure: STRONG
Verdict: POWERFUL ⭐ 4. finance/financial-analystCode Quality: EXCELLENT
Problem-Solving Quality: EXCELLENT
Structure: STRONG
Verdict: POWERFUL ⭐ 5. marketing-skill/campaign-analyticsCode Quality: VERY GOOD
Problem-Solving Quality: VERY GOOD
Structure: STRONG
Verdict: SOLID (borderline POWERFUL) 6. project-management/jira-expertCode Quality: N/A — No scripts Problem-Solving Quality: GOOD
Structure: ADEQUATE
Verdict: SOLID 7. project-management/confluence-expertCode Quality: N/A — No scripts Problem-Solving Quality: GOOD
Structure: ADEQUATE
Verdict: SOLID 8. project-management/atlassian-adminCode Quality: N/A — No scripts Problem-Solving Quality: GOOD
Structure: ADEQUATE
Verdict: SOLID 9. project-management/atlassian-templatesCode Quality: N/A — No scripts Problem-Solving Quality: GOOD
Structure: ADEQUATE
Verdict: SOLID 10. project-management/scrum-masterCode Quality: N/A — No scripts Problem-Solving Quality: MEDIOCRE
Structure: WEAK
Verdict: GENERIC 11. project-management/senior-pmCode Quality: N/A — No scripts Problem-Solving Quality: WEAK
Structure: WEAK
Verdict: WEAK Comparative Analysis
Key ObservationsWhat Works (business-growth, finance, campaign-analytics)
What Doesn't Work (parts of project-management)
Recommendations
Report generated 2026-02-15. Skills assessed against the bar: "Would this make someone say 'holy shit, this actually knows what it's doing?'" Business-growth and finance skills clear that bar. Campaign-analytics nearly does. PM skills mostly don't. |
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PR Review test post |
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PR Review: Persona-Based Agents |
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Great concept. The distinction between task agents (focused execution) and personas (role embodiment) is well-articulated and fills a real gap. The persona content is high quality: detailed workflows, concrete communication examples, and actionable success metrics. The non-destructive approach (no existing files modified) is appreciated. That said, there are several structural issues against established conventions that should be addressed before merge. |
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Issues
Per agents/CLAUDE.md, every agent file must include: name, description, skills, domain, model, and tools (as an array like [Read, Write, Bash, Grep, Glob]). The personas are missing skills, domain, and model, and introduce undocumented fields (color, emoji, vibe). The tools field is also a string instead of an array. If personas intentionally use a different schema, this deviation needs to be documented in agents/CLAUDE.md.
README.md references ./scripts/convert.sh and ./scripts/install.sh. From agents/personas/, the correct relative paths are ../../scripts/convert.sh and ../../scripts/install.sh. The current paths will fail for anyone following the README instructions.
Existing agents link to specific skills via relative paths (e.g. ../../engineering/database-designer) and reference Python automation tools directly. The personas list skills conceptually but do not reference actual paths or tools, meaning they cannot leverage the 254 automation tools in the library. The README should explicitly acknowledge this as an intentional design difference from task agents, not an omission.
The production agents catalog in agents/CLAUDE.md lists 16 agents and should be updated to include these 3 new personas. The main CLAUDE.md agent count would also need updating if these are treated as first-class agents.
agents/CLAUDE.md requires the cs-* prefix for all agents. The personas skip this, which may be intentional, but there is no documentation explaining why. TEMPLATE.md should note this explicitly so future persona authors are not confused.
The agent quality checklist requires a Related Agents section. startup-cto should link to cs-cto-advisor, growth-marketer to cs-content-creator, solo-founder to both, etc. |
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Suggestions
Positive Notes
Content quality is high. The issues are mostly conformance gaps that should be straightforward to address. |
Summary
Adds persona-based agents — a complementary layer on top of existing agents and skills.
What's a Persona?
An agent definition that goes beyond task execution. Each persona includes:
3 Starter Personas
Files Added
Coexistence with Existing Agents
agents/) → focused task executionagents/personas/) → role embodiment with curated skills + workflowsMulti-tool Support
Personas convert to all supported tools via existing
scripts/convert.shandscripts/install.sh.