Venture Staffing — Design a Custom Agent Team

Design the right agent team for a venture based on its type, stage, and specific needs.

Input

Venture slug: $ARGUMENTS

Step 1: Read Context

1. Read portfolio/ideas/{slug}.md for the idea brief and strategist's team recommendation
2. Read all templates in templates/agents/ to understand available agent types
3. Read knowledge/ecosystem/_index.md for the ecosystem tool catalog
4. Read knowledge/ecosystem/_recommendations.md for venture-specific recommendations
5. Read portfolio/guardrails.md for operating rules
6. Read knowledge/lessons.md for relevant team design lessons

Step 2: Determine Venture Type

Based on the idea brief, classify the venture:

Type	Indicators
SaaS	Software product, subscription/recurring revenue, specific user workflows
Content/Media	Blog, newsletter, course, media property, ad or subscription revenue
Marketplace	Connects buyers and sellers, takes commission/fee, two-sided
API/Dev Tool	Developer-facing, usage-based pricing, technical integration
E-commerce	Physical or digital product sales, inventory, fulfillment
Service	Consulting, agency, freelance, time-based billing

Step 2.5: Consult Ecosystem Catalog

Filter the ecosystem catalog (_index.md) for entries matching the venture type and stage:

1. Filter by relevance — Only consider entries with Score >= 60
2. Classify each match:
   • Agent Enhancement — Can improve an existing venture agent's capabilities (e.g., a web scraping tool for a researcher agent)
   • Skill Component — Can be incorporated into a venture skill or workflow (e.g., an SEO analysis tool for a content pipeline)
   • Future-Stage Addition — Not needed at current stage, but valuable later (note which stage)
   • Reference Only — Worth knowing about, no immediate integration needed
3. Check _recommendations.md for any scout-generated recommendations specific to this venture

Carry these classifications forward into Step 6 output.

Step 3: Select and Customize Agents

Base Team (all ventures get these):

• researcher — Always needed for ongoing market awareness
• qa — Always needed to catch quality issues before and after deployment

Type-Specific Additions:

SaaS:

• builder — Core engineering (customize for the tech domain)
• marketer — Growth and distribution (customize for B2B vs B2C)
• sales-ops — Pipeline management (if B2B; delay to Launch stage if B2C)

Content/Media:

• writer — Content creation (customize for content type: blog, newsletter, course)
• marketer — SEO, distribution, audience growth (customize for content channels)

Marketplace:

• builder — Platform engineering
• marketer — Supply and demand acquisition
• Create custom supply-agent and demand-agent if sides have very different needs

API/Dev Tool:

• builder — API engineering, SDK development
• writer — Documentation, tutorials, developer guides
• Create custom devrel agent for developer community engagement

E-commerce:

• builder — Storefront, checkout, integrations
• marketer — Product marketing, ads, email
• Create custom operations agent for inventory/fulfillment

Service:

• marketer — Lead generation, positioning
• sales-ops — Client pipeline, proposals
• writer — Case studies, thought leadership

Stage-Appropriate Agents:

• VALIDATION stage: Start lean — researcher + 1-2 others
• MVP stage: Add builder (if not already)
• LAUNCH stage: Add marketer and/or sales-ops
• GROWTH stage: Add finance agent
• Note which agents will be added at future stages

Step 4: Customize Each Agent

For each selected agent, customize the template:

1. Read the template from templates/agents/{agent}.md
2. Modify the role definition to be venture-specific:
   • Add venture context (what it does, who it's for)
   • Add domain-specific expertise (e.g., "understand accounting workflows" for an invoicing tool)
   • Adjust principles for the venture's approach
3. Adjust tool access if needed:
   • Add HubSpot tools for sales-ops
   • Add specific MCP tools relevant to the venture
4. Add venture-specific instructions under "When Working on This Venture"

Step 5: Design Venture Skills

Based on the venture type and stage, design initial skills:

Common skills to include:

• research-update — Periodic market research refresh
• status-report — Generate venture status for ChiefOfStaff health checks

Type-specific skills:

• SaaS: build-feature, track-metrics
• Content: publish-content, seo-audit
• Marketplace: supply-outreach, demand-outreach

Step 6: Output Team Design

Write the team design to portfolio/ideas/{slug}-team.md:

# Team Design: {Venture Name}

**Venture Type:** {type}
**Current Stage:** VALIDATION

## Agent Team

### Starting Team (VALIDATION)
| Agent | Template | Key Customizations |
|-------|----------|-------------------|
| {agent} | {template} | {what was customized} |

### Future Additions
| Agent | Added At | Reason |
|-------|----------|--------|
| {agent} | {stage} | {why} |

## Custom Agents (not from templates)
{Description of any custom agents created}

## Skills
| Skill | Purpose |
|-------|---------|
| {skill} | {what it does} |

## Ecosystem Tools
| Tool | Category | Score | Classification | Integration Notes |
|------|----------|-------|----------------|-------------------|
| {tool} | {category} | {score} | {agent-enhancement/skill-component/future-stage/reference} | {how to integrate} |

## Venture-Specific Tool Access
{Any special MCP tools or integrations needed}

## Tool Access Plan
ChiefOfStaff grants tools based on stage. Here's what this venture gets:

| Stage | Tools Granted | Notes |
|-------|--------------|-------|
| VALIDATION | Research, Build, Deploy (landing page) | {customization notes} |
| MVP | + Full build, Database setup | {customization notes} |
| LAUNCH | + Outreach, Social publishing, Email | {customization notes} |
| GROWTH | + CRM (HubSpot), Analytics | {customization notes} |

See `portfolio/guardrails.md` Stage → Capabilities Matrix for the full reference.

Step 7: Confirm with Founder

Present the team design and ask: "This is the proposed team for {venture}. Should I proceed with bootstrapping the repo?"

On approval, hand off to the venture-bootstrap skill.