| name | build-cycle |
| description | The recurring founder ritual — run after every meaningful ship or weekly, whichever comes first. Guides you through honest reflection, user signal synthesis, MPP/PMF assessment, and one clear decision for the next cycle. Produces a dated cycle record that compounds over time. Use whenever you've shipped something and want to figure out what it taught you and what to do next. |
| phase | compound |
| version | 1.0.0 |
Build Cycle
The ritual you run again and again — all the way to PMF and beyond.
What This Is
Not a tool you pick up once. A rhythm.
Engineers document every solved problem so the next occurrence takes minutes, not hours. That's /compound. The Build Cycle is the founder equivalent: after every meaningful ship, you run this ritual. It asks the honest questions, synthesizes what you learned, and produces one record that compounds over time.
After 10 cycles, you have a complete record of your product's evolution — what you tried, what you learned, how you navigated each failure point, and exactly how you got to where you are.
Cadence: Run after each meaningful ship. Or weekly if you ship continuously. Never less than once a week. Never more than once a day — daily cycles are too granular to surface real signal.
Quick Start
Human-First Response
Default: answer in chat first with Verdict, Do this now, and Details saved.
Keep chat under 150 words unless asked; do not paste the full artifact.
Write/update the requested .md file as the durable record for agents.
Say: "Run build cycle" or "Let's do our cycle" or "What did we learn?"
This takes 20–30 minutes. Do it with intention — not rushed. Total time invested compounds.
What gets produced:
cycles/YYYY-MM-DD.md — the permanent cycle record- Updated
founder-context.md — your source of truth
How It Opens
Before asking you anything, the skill reads two things:
founder-context.md — your product's current state, north star, stage- The most recent
cycles/ document — what happened last cycle, what you decided
If neither exists, the skill runs a one-time First Cycle Setup (see below).
After reading both, the skill opens with a single orienting statement — not a question:
"Last cycle you decided to [X]. Before we reflect on how that went, I want to name one thing I noticed from your context: [observation]. Let's start there."
This is borrowed from the best therapy and coaching: name what you see before asking what they feel.
The Six Phases
Run in order. Don't skip phases even when you're in a hurry — the order matters.
Phase 1 — The Honest Open
One question: "What actually happened since last cycle — not what you hoped would happen, but what actually happened?"
This is not a status update. The agent is listening for:
- The gap between what was planned and what shipped
- What got avoided or deprioritized
- Tone: are you energized, exhausted, confused, or numb?
After you answer, the agent reflects back what it heard — including the things you said but might have glossed over. This is the "document-review" move: surface what's being minimized.
The uncomfortable question for this phase: "What are you not saying?"
Phase 2 — What Users Actually Did
One question: "What did your users do — not what you hoped they'd do, not what they said they'd do, but what they actually did?"
This phase separates signal from noise by distinguishing:
| Signal Type | Weight |
|---|
| Behavior (what they did without being asked) | High |
| Unprompted feedback (what they said without being asked) | High |
| Prompted feedback (what they said when you asked) | Medium |
| What you want to believe | Zero |
The agent asks follow-up questions here — one at a time, never more than three:
- "Did any users do something you didn't expect?"
- "Did any users NOT do something you expected?"
- "Has anyone told someone else about this without you asking them to?"
The uncomfortable question: "Is there user behavior you've been avoiding looking at?"
Phase 3 — The Honest Assessment (Parallel)
Phase 3 runs three independent analyses simultaneously — MPP scoring, PMF signal assessment, and cycle pattern reading. These have no dependencies on each other. Run them in parallel.
Spawn these 3 agents simultaneously:
Agent A — MPP Scorer
Reads: founder-context.md, last cycle record, any user behavior data from Phases 1–2
Task: Score MPP using the 5 criteria from mpp-criteria.md
Returns: Composite score (1–10) + the single criterion holding the score back + one sentence on why
Agent B — PMF Signal Analyst
Reads: founder-context.md, all cycles/ records
Task: Assess PMF signal strength
Signal levels:
- None: Users use it once and don't return. No unprompted sharing.
- Faint: Some users return. 1–2 unprompted mentions across all cycles.
- Building: A core group retains consistently. Word of mouth starting without incentive.
- Clear: Users would be upset if it disappeared. Usage grows without effort.
Returns: Signal level + the specific evidence for that rating + the one behavior that would move it to the next level
Agent C — Pattern Reader
Reads: All cycles/ records (last 3 minimum, all if available)
Task: Identify patterns across cycles
Patterns to find:
- Momentum: Is MPP score trending up, flat, or declining?
- Effort: What type of work keeps repeating without producing signal?
- Avoidance: What has been mentioned across cycles but never acted on?
- User: Is there a user type showing stronger signal than others?
Returns: Momentum trend + the most important pattern (effort or avoidance, whichever is stronger)
Wait for all 3 agents. The orchestrator presents findings.
The orchestrator does NOT soften the assessment. If the score is 3/10, say 3/10. Present all three agent findings, then ask:
"What's the most honest reason we're at this score?"
This is not rhetorical. It's the most important question in the cycle. Take time here.
The uncomfortable question: "If this score doesn't improve next cycle, what does that mean?"
If Pattern Reader returns 3+ consecutive flat or declining cycles: Do not continue to Phase 5. Name it: "I need to flag something. We've had [N] cycles without improving signal. That's not a reason to panic, but it is a reason to diagnose before deciding. I want to run the Failure Navigator before we choose what to do next." See failure-modes.md.
Sequential Fallback (Codex / OpenCode)
If the agent cannot run parallel subagents, run Phase 3 in this order:
- MPP Scorer
- PMF Signal Analyst
- Pattern Reader
- Orchestrator synthesis
Same output. ~2–3× longer.
Phase 4 — Synthesis
With all three agent returns from Phase 3 in hand, the orchestrator (no subagents — this is synthesis work) connects the findings:
- What does the MPP score tell us about the Phase 1 and 2 findings?
- What does the PMF signal tell us about which parts of the product are working?
- What does the pattern read reveal that neither score alone would show?
One paragraph. No lists. This is the co-founder thinking out loud — connecting the dots between what was built, what users did, and what the numbers say.
Phase 5 — One Decision
Not a list. One thing.
The agent synthesizes everything from Phases 1–4 and proposes a single decision for the next cycle. The format is always:
"The most important thing you can do in the next [cycle period] is [specific action], because [reason grounded in the cycle's findings]. You'll know it worked if [specific observable signal]."
Then the agent asks: "Does this feel right — or is there something the data is pointing to that I'm missing?"
This is the co-founder moment. Not just presenting the analysis — checking it against your instinct, which sometimes sees things data doesn't.
The one decision becomes the commitment field in the cycle record.
Phase 6 — The Record
The agent writes two things:
1. cycles/YYYY-MM-DD.md — the permanent record
Following the template in cycle-template.md. This document is never edited after the cycle closes — it's a permanent record, like a ship's log. Future cycles can reference it, but not change it.
2. Updated founder-context.md
The source of truth is updated:
- Stage (has it changed?)
- North star metric and current value
- MPP score
- PMF signal strength
- Current focus (the one decision from Phase 5)
- Last cycle date and key learning
First Cycle Setup
If no founder-context.md or cycles/ exists, the agent runs a one-time setup:
It asks 6 questions — one at a time:
- "What are you building, in one sentence?"
- "Who specifically is your first customer — describe their situation, not their demographics."
- "What stage are you at? (Pre-launch / Just launched / Have users / Revenue)"
- "What's the one metric you're tracking right now?"
- "What's the biggest thing you're unsure about?"
- "What did you try most recently, and what happened?"
This creates founder-context.md and cycles/[today].md (the first cycle). Setup takes 10 minutes.
The Cycle Record
Each cycle produces one document. The document structure is in cycle-template.md.
The cycles/ directory becomes your product's memory:
cycles/
├── 2026-02-01.md # First ship — the baseline
├── 2026-02-08.md # First users
├── 2026-02-15.md # First feedback
├── 2026-02-22.md # First sign something is working
└── ... # The full story, in your own words
After 10 cycles, you'll have something most founders don't: a clear record of why you made every significant decision, what you learned from it, and how the product evolved. This is not just useful for you — it's the clearest possible input for a fundraising narrative, a co-founder conversation, or a moment of doubt where you need to remember why you started.
What the Build Cycle Is Not
- Not a retrospective format borrowed from engineering sprints. Those are team-coordination tools. This is a founder-learning tool.
- Not cheerleading. If your signal is weak, the cycle says so. Honest over kind.
- Not a feature planning session. Features happen after the cycle. The cycle decides what problem to solve — not how to solve it.
- Not skippable when things are going well. The best cycles happen when things feel good. They find the fragility before it becomes a crisis.
Related Skills
- Use mpp-evaluator for a deep-dive MPP scoring session between cycles
- Use failure-navigator when build-cycle detects stagnation (3+ flat cycles)
- Use co-founder (Partner phase) for the broader PMF journey and beyond
- Use pmf-signal-reader (PMF phase) when build-cycle shows "Building" PMF signal and you want to understand it deeply
