| name | delegation |
| description | Self-contained delegation philosophy for handoffs that don't fall through cracks. Use when delegating tasks to team members, contractors, or AI agents. |
| user-invocable | false |
Self-Contained Delegation
Philosophy: Every delegation should contain everything needed to close itself - including what the recipient should do AND communicate upon completion.
The Problem
Standard delegation:
- You delegate task X to someone
- They complete it
- They say "done"
- You forgot what you needed it for
- Ball dropped. Context lost. Follow-up forgotten.
The Solution: Self-Contained Delegation
Every delegation includes:
- The task itself - what needs to be done
- Success criteria - how to know it's done correctly
- Callback template - the EXACT message/email to send upon completion
- Next action context - what the requester will do with the result
Template
TASK: [What needs to be done]
SUCCESS CRITERIA:
- [Criterion 1]
- [Criterion 2]
UPON COMPLETION, SEND THIS TO [recipient]:
---
Subject: [Pre-written subject]
[Pre-written message body with placeholders for results]
Next step for you: [What requester will do when they receive this]
---
Example: Developer Task
Bad delegation:
"Implement a pricing API endpoint"
Self-contained delegation:
TASK: Implement GET /api/v1/pricing endpoint that returns current plan prices
SUCCESS CRITERIA:
- Returns JSON with all plan tiers and prices
- Includes regional pricing (Israel vs international)
- Has proper error handling
- Deployed to production
UPON COMPLETION, EMAIL <PROJECT_OWNER_EMAIL>:
Subject: Pricing API endpoint implemented
The pricing API endpoint is now live:
- Endpoint: <API_ENDPOINT>
- Returns: [paste sample response]
You can now use this in the Weekly Digest audit SOP to verify
balance adjustments match official pricing.
Why This Works
- Nothing falls through cracks - the callback template ensures follow-up happens
- Context preserved - recipient knows WHY this matters, not just WHAT to do
- Zero back-and-forth - no "what was this for again?" messages
- Requester can forget safely - the delegation carries its own memory
- Scales to async - works across timezones, AI agents, long-running tasks
Related Concepts
| Concept | Relationship |
|---|
| Closed-loop communication (aviation) | Confirms receipt; SCD goes further by pre-loading the response |
| Definition of Done (Agile) | Defines completion criteria; SCD adds callback template |
| Runbooks (DevOps) | Pre-written incident responses; SCD applies this to delegation |
When to Use
- Delegating to team members (especially across timezones)
- Creating GitHub issues for developers
- Assigning tasks to AI agents
- Any handoff where you might forget context by completion time
- Tasks with long lead times (days/weeks)
Anti-Patterns
- ❌ "Do X and let me know when done" (no callback template)
- ❌ "Implement feature Y" (no success criteria, no next-action context)
- ❌ Assuming you'll remember what to do when notified of completion
- ❌ Relying on recipient to know what you need from the result
