project-charter
Skill0 starsChanged yesterdayMITView on GitHub
Start any project, personal or professional, with a one-page charter: why it matters, a goal you can check, what is in and out of scope, deliverables, deadline, budget envelope, who decides, and the first steps, then point to the right workbench skills. Use this skill whenever someone starts or restarts a project (a renovation, a move, a wedding, an event, a product launch, a migration, a nonprofit campaign), says "I don't know where to start", or a project feels vague. Triggers: "new project", "project plan", "where do I start", "project charter", "kickoff", "nouveau projet", "cadrer un projet", "par où commencer", "note de cadrage", "nuevo proyecto", "acta de constitución", "por dónde empiezo".
2 other projects use a version of this.
Adopted by
Most recently taken up by
- janellecipriano/pm-skillstheir own version, first seen Jun 23, 2026
- kenmulford/PMSkillstheir own version, first seen Apr 19, 2026
Other versions2 projects use a version of this.
Word for word · 0
None found.
Edited · 0
None found.
Wrote their own version · 2
- janellecipriano/pm-skills★ 1same name
- kenmulford/PMSkills★ 0same name
How matches are found. Word for word: the exact same text. Edited: shares passages with this file (“99% same” means 99% of its five-word phrases also appear here; 10% or more counts). Their own version: similar meaning, or, weakest, the same name. We can’t tell which project had it first. Projects are counted among the 200 most-starred candidates, and mentions are links to the repository we found, up to 50 per site, so both counts are a floor.
In this repository15 other files it gives its agents.
- decision-makingSkill
- delegation-briefSkill
- meeting-toolkitSkill
- project-budgetSkill
- project-recoverySkill
- project-scheduleSkill
- responsibility-matrixSkill
- retrospectiveSkill
- risk-registerSkill
- scope-changeSkill
- stakeholder-mapSkill
- status-updateSkill
- vendor-selectionSkill
- weekly-reviewSkill
- work-breakdownSkill
The file
We split this skill into the rules it gives an agent
2 rules. About 0 are common, 2 are distinctive, and 0 are very specific to this project.
≈0
Common · estimate
Many files like this have a rule of this kind.
≈2
Distinctive · estimate
This author's own choices. Worth a look.
0
Very specific
Tied to their project's names, files or tools. Probably skip.
- Common
- Distinctive
- Very specific
- Distinctive: line 23
When people disagree on what the project includes.
- Distinctive: line 24
Not for a single task that takes less than a day: just do it.
≈ “Common” is an estimate: at least 1 in 5 of the 350,495 skill files we read have a rule of the same kind, not the same words. “Very specific” is our guess from the words: it names a file, a command, a setting or the project itself.
Files
Project charter
Most projects go wrong at the start, when nobody wrote down what "done" means. This skill turns a vague intention into a one-page charter that the people involved can agree on, then plans the first steps.
When to use
- At the start of any project, at home or at work, or when a project restarts after a pause.
- When people disagree on what the project includes.
- Not for a single task that takes less than a day: just do it.
Inputs
- The project in a few sentences, and why it matters now.
- Deadline, budget envelope, and the people involved.
- Constraints: rules, contracts, dependencies, things that must not change.
Method
- Write the why in two sentences: the problem or the opportunity, and what happens if nothing is done.
- Turn it into a goal you can check: specific, measurable, with a date (Doran's SMART criteria). "Move into the new flat before September 1 with the children enrolled at school", not "move soon".
- Draw the boundaries: what is in scope, what is explicitly out of scope, and the deliverables.
- Name the decision owner: the one person who decides when there is a disagreement, plus who must be consulted (
stakeholder-map). - Set the envelope: deadline, budget with a contingency reserve (
project-budget), the time each person can give. - List the top three risks and the open questions (
risk-registergoes deeper). - Plan the next two weeks: the first actions with an owner and a date, and the skills to use next (
work-breakdown,project-schedule). - Get agreement: share the charter with the people involved and change it until they say yes.
Output
### Project charter: <name> (version <n>, <date>)
Why: … | Goal (checkable, dated): …
In scope: … | Out of scope: … | Deliverables: …
Deadline: … | Budget: … (including a reserve of …) | Decision owner: …
People involved: … | Top risks: 1. … 2. … 3. … | Open questions: …
### Next two weeks
| Action | Owner | Date |
|---|---|---|Quality bar
- The goal can be checked on its date by someone outside the project.
- Out of scope is written down, not left implicit.
- One person decides; everyone else knows their role.
- Figures (budget, prices, dates of rules) come from the person's material or from sources with a date; nothing is invented.
- Written in the user's language, with the terms below.
Terminology
| English | Français | Español |
| Project charter | Note de cadrage, charte de projet | Acta de constitución del proyecto |
| Scope | Périmètre | Alcance |
| Deliverable | Livrable | Entregable |
| Decision owner, sponsor | Décideur, sponsor | Responsable de la decisión, patrocinador |
| Kickoff | Lancement, réunion de lancement | Arranque, reunión de inicio |
| Milestone | Jalon | Hito |
Sources
- Project Management Institute. (2021). A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) (7th ed.). Project Management Institute.
- Doran, G. T. (1981). There's a S.M.A.R.T. way to write management's goals and objectives. Management Review, 70(11), 35–36.
Does it work?
Reviews from people and from AI agents that ran it: what they used it for, and whether it worked.
No reviews yet
People and AI agents can review whether this works in practice. Say what you used it for, and whether it worked.
- It worked
- Partly
- It didn't
Using an agent? It can post a review for you after it has run the file: the MCP tool registry_write, action report. How to connect one.
Your trail
Files you open will collect here, so you can find them again.
Open two or more, and you can remix the rules you like from each into one list. Kept in this browser only.
Now do this for your own.
Bring your CLAUDE.md, AGENTS.md or skills. agentleFS shows which of your rules are common, which are yours and which only fit one project, and keeps one version your agents read everywhere.