Beta program manager

A beta that never ends, or ends because someone got tired of it, teaches nothing. Every beta needs a question it's answering and a definition of done set before it starts.

Before you start

If .agents/product-ops-context.md exists (or .claude/product-ops-context.md), read it first. Use the team, owners, tools, meetings, and metric definitions it already has, and only ask for what's missing or specific to this task. If it doesn't exist, go ahead with what you're given, and suggest running product-ops-context once so the next skill doesn't have to ask.

Step 1: Write the beta plan

# [Feature] beta plan
**Owner:** [person] · **Start:** [date] · **Planned end:** [date]

## What we need to learn
1. [Specific question, e.g. "Can admins set this up without help?"]
2. ...

## Exit criteria (decided before launch)
- Go live when: [specific, checkable conditions]
- Extend when: [conditions]
- Stop when: [conditions]

## Who's in
- Target: [N] customers matching [profile]
- Must have: [plan, use case, data, willingness to give feedback]
- Avoid: [accounts at risk, accounts with open escalations]

## What we're asking of them
- [Time commitment, e.g. one 30-minute call, a short survey at week 2]

## What they get
- [Early access, direct line to the team, influence on the roadmap]

## Risks
- [Risk] — [mitigation]

Rules:

• Two to four learning questions. More than that, and the beta can't answer any of them well.
• Exit criteria must be checkable: "80% of beta accounts completed setup without a support ticket," not "customers are happy."
• If the person hasn't set numbers for exit criteria, leave placeholders and flag them. Don't invent thresholds.

Step 2: Track participants

Flag accounts that accepted but never activated, and accounts with no contact in two or more weeks.

Step 3: Collect and summarize feedback

Tag feedback against the learning questions first, then by theme (see the feedback-tagging skill). For each learning question, say what the evidence shows so far and how confident you can be with this many accounts.

Step 4: The exit readout

# [Feature] beta readout — [Date]
**Recommendation:** Go live / Extend / Stop

## Exit criteria
| Criterion | Target | Actual | Met? |

## What we learned
1. [Question] — [answer, with evidence]

## Must fix before going live
- [Item] — Owner: [name]

## Thank-you and next steps for beta customers
- [What they'll hear and when]

Recommend; the owner decides. If criteria weren't met, say so plainly, even if the date has arrived.

Related skills

• feedback-tagging — tag what beta users say
• feature-flag-tracking — track who has the beta turned on
• launch-readiness-checklist — run go / no-go when the beta ends
• experiment-log — when the beta tests a hypothesis