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Brief 41

Handoff Audit

Every agent-to-human and agent-to-agent baton pass — context dropped, work duplicated, escalations landing where nobody looks.

HANDOFFS.md4 phases7 lenses~2.8k chars

Free & open · no signup · read-only — it ends by asking · nothing leaves your machine

What it does

You are working inside this repo. Mission: trace every baton pass in the system — agent to human, human to agent, agent to agent — and find where context drops, work duplicates, or the baton lands where nobody is standing.

Read-only pass. Your only write is the report file.

What it looks for

7 lenses it looks through

Phase 2 sweeps the codebase through every one of these, citing file and line for each finding.

1

Context drops

the receiver missing what the sender knew: a human shown a conclusion without the evidence; agent B without agent A's constraints and failed attempts

2

Dead ends

escalations posted to channels nobody watches; agents waiting on human input with no timeout, reminder, or fallback

3

Duplication

receiver redoing sender's work because the handoff didn't carry it, or trust in it

4

Acknowledgment

does the sender know the baton was caught? Fire-and-forget passes that fail silently (see 03)

5

Correction flow

a human fixes agent output: does the fix flow back into prompts, memory, or evals — or evaporate (see 45)?

6

Queue visibility

pending handoffs: countable, aged, alarmed? Or discovered when a user complains

7

Format mismatch

agent emits JSON where the human needs prose; human writes prose where the agent needs fields; translation done badly or not at all

The deliverable

What lands in your repo

One structured report at the repo root — or in reports/, if you keep one — the same shape every time, ready for a teammate — or the optional Studio — to act on.

HANDOFFS.md
1
Handoff map
from → to · payload · channel · deadline · load-bearing?
2
Findings
each: handoff · lens · what's lost · fix
3
Payload specs
for the worst 3, the exact fields the receiver needs
4
Timeout and fallback table
every human-wait, bounded
5
The one handoff to fix first
Start the report with today's date. If HANDOFFS.md already exists from a previous run, read it first and lead with what changed since.
One file. Evidence-backed. It ends by asking before touching anything.
How it works

What it makes the agent do

Every Goal Prompt follows the same four steps, so results are consistent and repeatable — no matter which one you run.

1
Phase 1

Map the handoffs

Enumerate them.

2
Phase 2

Audit through 7 lenses

Context drops — the receiver missing what the sender knew.

3
Phase 3

Curate

Rank by stall cost.

4
Phase 4

Report

Create HANDOFFS.md at repo root.

Get started

Three ways to run this Goal Prompt

01 · COPY

Paste it in

Copy it and paste it into your agent inside the repo you want checked.

02 · INSTALL

As a slash command

Install the goal plugin once — two commands — then just type /goal:handoff-audit.

1/plugin marketplace add GhostlyGawd/goal-prompts
2/plugin install goal@goal-prompts

Or install only this Goal Prompt as /goal-handoff-audit:

curl -fsSL https://goal-prompts.vercel.app/install | BRIEF=41 sh
03 · AGENT

From an agent (MCP)

Let an agent fetch it mid-conversation, or pull the raw Goal Prompt by URL.

https://goal-prompts.vercel.app/raw/41.md
Transparency

The exact prompt

Nothing hidden — this is the whole Goal Prompt, verbatim. Read it in a minute, edit it, or copy it as-is.

Read the full brief (2,762 characters)
# Goal: Handoff Audit

You are working inside this repo. Mission: trace every baton pass in the system — agent to human, human to agent, agent to agent — and find where context drops, work duplicates, or the baton lands where nobody is standing.

Read-only pass. Your only write is the report file.

## Phase 1 — Map the handoffs
- Enumerate them: escalations, approvals, notifications, task submissions, corrections, sub-agent calls, pipeline stages.
- For each: what payload transfers, in what format, through what channel, with what deadline.
- Which handoffs are load-bearing — the product stalls if they stall?

## Phase 2 — Audit through 7 lenses
1. **Context drops** — the receiver missing what the sender knew: a human shown a conclusion without the evidence; agent B without agent A's constraints and failed attempts
2. **Dead ends** — escalations posted to channels nobody watches; agents waiting on human input with no timeout, reminder, or fallback
3. **Duplication** — receiver redoing sender's work because the handoff didn't carry it, or trust in it
4. **Acknowledgment** — does the sender know the baton was caught? Fire-and-forget passes that fail silently (see 03)
5. **Correction flow** — a human fixes agent output: does the fix flow back into prompts, memory, or evals — or evaporate (see 45)?
6. **Queue visibility** — pending handoffs: countable, aged, alarmed? Or discovered when a user complains
7. **Format mismatch** — agent emits JSON where the human needs prose; human writes prose where the agent needs fields; translation done badly or not at all

## Phase 3 — Curate
- Rank by stall cost: load-bearing handoffs first
- Every fix names the mechanism: payload spec, timeout + fallback, ack, digest

## Phase 4 — Report
Create `HANDOFFS.md` at repo root:
1. **Handoff map** — from → to · payload · channel · deadline · load-bearing?
2. **Findings** — each: handoff · lens · what's lost · fix
3. **Payload specs** — for the worst 3, the exact fields the receiver needs
4. **Timeout and fallback table** — every human-wait, bounded
5. **The one handoff to fix first**

Start the report with today's date. If `HANDOFFS.md` already exists from a previous run, read it first and lead with what changed since.

## Rules
- A handoff is a contract: payload, deadline, and acknowledgment, or it's a hope
- Escalation paths must terminate at a human who will actually see it
- No handoffs between humans, agents, or systems in this repo? Say so in a one-paragraph null report and stop — a null result is a valid finding.
- If a `reports/` directory exists at the repo root, write the report there instead of the root.
- Before asking, present the top findings as a ranked list in plain words
- Report only — end by asking which handoffs to fix

House rules for this Goal Prompt

  • A handoff is a contract: payload, deadline, and acknowledgment, or it's a hope
  • Escalation paths must terminate at a human who will actually see it
  • No handoffs between humans, agents, or systems in this repo? Say so in a one-paragraph null report and stop — a null result is a valid finding.
  • If a reports/ directory exists at the repo root, write the report there instead of the root.
  • Before asking, present the top findings as a ranked list in plain words
  • Report only — end by asking which handoffs to fix
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