Plan Plus — Brainstorming-Enhanced PDCA Planning

Combines brainstorming's intent discovery with bkit PDCA's structured planning to produce higher-quality Plan documents through collaborative dialogue.

Overview

Plan Plus enhances the standard /pdca plan by adding 4 brainstorming phases before document generation. This ensures that user intent is fully understood, alternatives are explored, and unnecessary features are removed before any implementation begins.

When to use Plan Plus instead of /pdca plan:

• The feature has ambiguous or complex requirements
• Multiple implementation approaches are possible
• You want to ensure YAGNI compliance from the start
• The feature involves significant architectural decisions

HARD-GATE

Process Flow

Phase 0: Context Exploration (automatic)
    ↓
Phase 1: Intent Discovery (1 question at a time)
    ↓
Phase 1.5: Premise Challenge (forcing questions, agreed premises)
    ↓
Phase 2: Alternatives Exploration (2-3 approaches, incl. "do nothing")
    ↓
Phase 3: Scope Mode + YAGNI Review (multiSelect verification)
    ↓
Phase 4: Incremental Design Validation (section-by-section, failure map)
    ↓
Phase 5: Plan Document Generation (plan-plus.template.md)
    ↓
Phase 6: Next Steps → /pdca design {feature}

Phase Details

Phase 0: Project Context Exploration (Automatic)

Before asking any questions, explore the current project state:

1. Read CLAUDE.md, package.json, pom.xml, etc. for project information
2. Check recent 5 git commits (understand current work direction)
3. Check existing docs/01-plan/ documents (prevent duplication)
4. Check ongoing PDCA status — getPdcaStatusView() in lib/pdca/status.js. It reads .bkit/state/pdca-status.json and fills in any feature whose phase is only evidenced by its documents. .bkit-memory.json is NOT this store: after migration it is .bkit/state/memory.json, which holds the 9-phase pipeline status and nothing about PDCA phase.

Share exploration results briefly: "I've reviewed the current project state: ..."

Phase 1: Intent Discovery (Brainstorming Style)

Principle: One question at a time, prefer multiple choice

Use AskUserQuestion tool to discover the following in order:

Q1. Core Purpose

"What is the core problem this feature solves?"

• Provide 3-4 choices (inferred from project context)
• Always include a custom input option

Q2. Target Users

"Who will primarily use this feature?"

• Admin / End user / Developer / External system

Q3. Success Criteria

"What criteria would indicate this feature is successful?"

• Derive specific, measurable criteria

Q4. Constraints (only when needed)

Conflicts with existing systems, performance requirements, technical constraints, etc.

Important: Minimize questions. Clear features need only Q1-Q2. Only proceed to Q3-Q4 for ambiguous features.

Phase 1.5: Premise Challenge

Phase 1 records what the user wants. This phase tests whether it is worth building in that shape. Ask one forcing question at a time with AskUserQuestion, and push on vague answers once before moving on.

Routing — ask only what the feature needs:

• New product or user-facing capability: F1-F4
• Internal tool or refactor: F2, F4
• Bug fix or small change: skip this phase and say so

Stance rules

• Take a position on every answer and state what evidence would change it. Do not reply with neutral filler ("That could work", "Interesting approach").
• Enthusiasm is not evidence of demand; a workaround the user already pays for is.
• If the user wants to move on, ask the single most important remaining question, then proceed. Do not ask a third time.

Close the phase by printing the agreed premises as a numbered list and asking the user to confirm them:

PREMISES
1. {who needs this, and why now}
2. {what they do today}
3. {the smallest useful version}

If the user rejects a premise, revise it before Phase 2 — alternatives built on a rejected premise are wasted work. Record the confirmed premises in the Plan document's "Premise Challenge" section.

Phase 2: Alternatives Exploration (Brainstorming Core)

Always propose 2-3 approaches with trade-offs for each. When Phase 1.5 ran, one of them may be "do nothing / use the existing workaround" if F4 showed the cost of inaction is low.

Format:

### Approach A: {name} — Recommended
- Pros: ...
- Cons: ...
- Best for: ...

### Approach B: {name}
- Pros: ...
- Cons: ...
- Best for: ...

### Approach C: {name} (optional)
- Pros: ...
- Cons: ...

Present the recommended approach first with clear reasoning. Use AskUserQuestion to let the user choose.

Phase 3: Scope Mode + YAGNI Review (Brainstorming Core)

First pick a scope mode for the selected approach. Recommend one, then let the user confirm with AskUserQuestion:

Every proposed addition gets its own decision: add now, defer (record in 3.2 Deferred), or drop. Record the mode in the Plan document.

Then perform a YAGNI (You Ain't Gonna Need It) review on the selected approach:

Use AskUserQuestion with multiSelect: true: "Select only what is essential for the first version:"

List all features and move unselected items to Out of Scope.

Principle: Don't abstract what can be done in 3 lines. Don't design for hypothetical future requirements.

Phase 4: Incremental Design Validation (Brainstorming Style)

Present the design section by section, getting approval after each:

1. Architecture overview → "Does this direction look right?"
2. Key components/modules → "Does this structure look right?"
3. Data flow → "Does this flow look right?"
4. Failure map → "Is anything here unacceptable to ship?"

For the failure map, list each new entry point (endpoint, command, job, UI action) and trace what happens when its input is empty, invalid, or its dependency fails:

Any row with "No" and a silent outcome must either get a handling decision or be listed as an accepted risk in section 7. Keep this short for small features — the point is that no failure is silent by accident.

If the user says "no" to any section, revise only that section and re-present.

Phase 5: Plan Document Generation

Generate the Plan document using plan-plus.template.md with results from Phases 0-4.

Additional sections (not in standard plan.template.md):

• User Intent Discovery — Core problem, target users, success criteria from Phase 1
• Premise Challenge — Forcing-question answers and confirmed premises from Phase 1.5
• Alternatives Explored — Approaches compared in Phase 2
• YAGNI Review — Scope mode and included/deferred/removed items from Phase 3
• Failure Map — Entry-point failure table from Phase 4 (in section 8)
• Brainstorming Log — Key decisions from Phases 1-4
• Executive Summary -- Auto-synthesize 4-perspective summary (Problem/Solution/Function UX Effect/Core Value) from Phases 1-4 results. Place at document top, before numbered sections.
• Executive Summary Response -- MANDATORY: After generating the Plan document, also output the Executive Summary table in your response so the user sees the summary immediately without opening the file.

Output Path: docs/01-plan/features/{feature}.plan.md

After document generation, record the phase the same way /pdca plan does: create Task [Plan] {feature}, then update .bkit/state/pdca-status.json: phase = "plan" for {feature}. Do not write it to .bkit-memory.json — that file is the pipeline store, not the PDCA one.

Phase 6: Next Steps

After Plan document generation:

Plan Plus completed
Document: docs/01-plan/features/{feature}.plan.md
Next step: /pdca design {feature}

Key Principles

Integration with PDCA

Plan Plus produces the same output as /pdca plan and feeds seamlessly into the standard PDCA cycle:

/plan-plus {feature}     ← Enhanced planning with brainstorming
    ↓
/pdca design {feature}   ← Standard PDCA continues
    ↓
/pdca do {feature}
    ↓
/pdca analyze {feature}
    ↓
/pdca report {feature}

Usage Examples

# Start brainstorming-enhanced planning
/plan-plus user-authentication

# After Plan Plus completes, continue with standard PDCA
/pdca design user-authentication
/pdca do user-authentication