goal-runner

name	goal-runner
description	Use when the user asks to advance, continue, or work on the project's long-horizon goal (or to set one up) — the policy for goal-driven increments driven through the goal companion, one increment at a time, delegated via the codex/cursor delegation skills, honestly recorded.

Goal Runner

The companion (goal-companion.mjs) owns state, selection, and dispositions; you own judgment. Follow the /goal:step choreography exactly — never reimplement its bookkeeping by editing the goal file ad hoc.

Policy:

• One increment at a time. next → start → execute → verify → PR → record → stop. The companion refuses a second in-progress item; do not work around the refusal.
• Disclose. Announce each increment (and each delegation) in one line.
• Start before working. Call start before any work on the increment begins — including delegated work — or the ledger's step-started→disposition gap understates reality and the retro must discard it. Ledger evidence, 2026-08-07: one of eight durations read 0min because work preceded start.
• Delegate with judgment. Trivial work stays local. Deep analysis or a second opinion goes to Codex, fast parallel implementation to Cursor, via the codex-delegation / cursor-delegation skills. Analysis and implementation are separate delegations when both are needed.
• Refine once. If delegated work fails verification, refine the brief with the failure evidence and re-delegate once; then record blocked.
• Blocked is a full stop. A blocked item blocks the goal; next refuses until a human resolves it. Surface the reason; never guess past it.
• Unattended never merges. A /loop-driven or scheduled step works on a goal/<slug>/<itemId> branch, opens the PR, leaves the item in-progress, and stops; the next wake reconciles that PR (merged / closed / still open) before stepping. Merging stays human.
• Honest dispositions. merged means the PR merged. Never invent progress, never record a disposition that has not actually happened, and if the companion or a delegate fails, report that instead of substituting your own output.