AI Blocks › Lead and manage people
Shield a rough new idea from deadlines and doubters until it can stand up
Describe your new idea and the pressure on it. Get a verdict on early or broken, and a plan that shields it.
Protect a rough new idea until it is ready is a free AI workflow for the job "Lead and manage people". It guides your AI through several skills in order, passing each step's output to the next.
Free · No account · Made by AI Blocks · Thinking: high
What it does
A new idea is ugly at first. Ed Catmull's name for it is an ugly baby, and his point is that it cannot be judged by the standards of finished work. The people who would kill it are usually doing their jobs well. They hold schedules, sales targets and high standards. Meanwhile, the work that already exists needs no defender because the system leans its way. This workflow does two things in order. First it tells you whether the idea is early or broken, by comparing it with its own earlier versions, checking whether notes change it and asking whether the people on it still believe the problems can be solved. Only then does it write the plan to shield it, with protectors, a short list of allowed questions, funded time and a date and test for meeting the wider business.
You give it
- The idea, who leads it and how long it has run
- The groups that need output or approval from it
- Its rounds so far, with dates and what changed (strongly better)
You get
- A map of who pulls on the idea and where the pull has started to steer it
- A call to keep protecting, change the approach, change the lead or stop, with evidence and a date to look again
- A protection plan with who sees it, which questions are allowed, who pays and the hand-off date and test
Use it when
- A promising idea looks rough and someone wants to judge it as if it were finished.
- Deadlines or sales targets are pulling a new project off course.
- You can't tell if a struggling project needs patience or a hard decision.
Steps
- Incentive checker: Describe a team, plan or deal. Get who is rewarded for what, where it pulls the wrong way, and a fix.
- Startup progress reviewer: Describe an unfinished project. Get a call: keep protecting it, change the approach, change the lead or stop.
- New idea development planner: Paste your rough idea and its pressures. Get who sees it, allowed questions, funding and an end date.
How to use it
- Download the handoff pack. It's a zip with HANDOFF.md and every skill file this workflow uses.
- Give the folder to Claude (in Claude Code, or as files in a Claude Project) and say "Follow HANDOFF.md".
- Give step 1 the idea and the groups around it. Give step 2 the version history if you have it.
- If the call is not keep protecting, step 3 still runs but says the plan only applies if you choose to carry on.