Project Management Plan Generator

Generate professional project management plan Excel workbooks through an interactive, AI-assisted workflow. The skill brainstorms with the user, proposes task breakdowns, iterates on the plan, and produces a polished .xlsx file with 4 tabs: Main Program Plan (with Gantt chart), Charters, Budget, and RAID Logs.

Key principle: This is a collaborative workflow. The AI proposes, the user approves, and only then does generation happen. Never generate the workbook without explicit user approval.

Workflow Overview

This skill follows a 3-phase collaborative workflow:

Phase	Purpose	Gate
Phase 1: Discovery & Brainstorming	Understand the project, propose breakdown	Must complete before Phase 2
Phase 2: Approval & Refinement	User reviews, modifies, approves	Must get explicit approval before Phase 3
Phase 3: Generation & Delivery	Build JSON, generate Excel, deliver	Only after user says "looks good" / approves

CRITICAL: Do NOT skip to Phase 3 without completing Phases 1 and 2. The user MUST explicitly approve the plan before generation.

Phase 1: Discovery & Brainstorming

Goal: Understand the project context and propose a comprehensive plan.

Step 1: Gather Project Context

Ask the user these questions (use AskUserQuestion where appropriate):

1. Project Name: "What is the name of this project?"
2. High-Level Goals: "What are the main goals or deliverables for this project?"
3. Timeline: "What is the approximate start date and end date?"
4. Team Size/Structure: "Who are the key people or teams involved? (e.g., engineering, design, QA, PM)"
5. Key Constraints: "Are there any important deadlines, dependencies, or constraints?"

Optional follow-ups based on context:

• "Is there an existing JIRA board or project tracker I should know about?"
• "What is the approximate budget range? Any specific budget categories to track?"
• "Are there known risks or blockers?"

Step 2: AI-Proposed Breakdown

Based on the user's answers, propose a complete project plan including:

1. Milestones & Tasks: Break down the project into milestones with specific tasks, suggested workstreams, PICs (persons in charge), and estimated timelines (start/due dates)
2. Team Charter: Map core team roles to the people mentioned
3. Budget Categories: Suggest relevant budget line items based on the project type
4. RAID Items: Identify potential risks, assumptions, issues, and dependencies

Present the proposal in a clear, readable format (use markdown tables). Example:

### Proposed Task Breakdown

| # | Milestone | Task | Workstream | PIC | Start | Due |
|---|-----------|------|------------|-----|-------|-----|
| 1 | Phase 1 - Discovery | Requirements gathering | Product | Alice | 2025-01-06 | 2025-01-17 |
| 2 | Phase 1 - Discovery | Technical architecture | Engineering | Bob | 2025-01-06 | 2025-01-17 |
| ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... |

### Proposed Team Charter

| Core Team | PICs |
|-----------|------|
| Program Sponsor | [name] |
| Engineering Leads | Bob, Carol |
| ... | ... |

### Proposed Budget

| Category | Owner | Amount | Currency |
|----------|-------|--------|----------|
| Infrastructure | DevOps | 0 | IDR |
| ... | ... | ... | ... |

### Identified RAID Items

| Category | Description | Impact |
|----------|-------------|--------|
| Risk | Third-party API dependency | High |
| ... | ... | ... |

Then ask: "Please review the proposed plan above. You can approve it, or let me know what to modify, add, or remove."

Phase 2: Approval & Refinement

Goal: Iterate until the user is satisfied with the plan.

Refinement Loop

The user may:

• Approve: "Looks good", "Approve", "Let's generate it" → proceed to Phase 3
• Modify tasks: "Change task 3 to...", "Move the deadline for..." → update and re-present
• Add items: "Add a task for...", "Include a risk about..." → add and re-present
• Remove items: "Remove task 5", "We don't need the QA milestone" → remove and re-present
• Change structure: "Split Phase 1 into two milestones", "Merge these tasks" → restructure and re-present

Rules:

• After each modification, present the updated plan clearly
• Always ask for confirmation after changes: "Here's the updated plan. Ready to generate, or any more changes?"
• Do NOT proceed to Phase 3 until the user explicitly approves
• Keep track of all approved items across categories (tasks, charters, budget, RAID)

Phase 3: Generation & Delivery

Goal: Generate the Excel workbook from the approved plan.

Step 1: Build JSON Configuration

Construct a JSON configuration file from the approved plan following this schema:

{
  "project_name": "Project Alpha",
  "start_date": "2025-01-06",
  "end_date": "2025-03-31",
  "output_path": "./project-plan.xlsx",
  "tasks": [
    {
      "no": 1,
      "milestone": "Phase 1",
      "task": "Requirements gathering",
      "workstream": "Product",
      "pic": "Alice",
      "status": "Not Started",
      "start_date": "2025-01-06",
      "due_date": "2025-01-17",
      "jira_link": "",
      "remarks": ""
    }
  ],
  "charters": {
    "program_sponsor": "",
    "business": "",
    "product_design": "",
    "tpm": "",
    "pmo": "",
    "ba": "",
    "engineering_leads": "",
    "qa": ""
  },
  "budget": [
    {
      "category": "Infrastructure",
      "owner": "DevOps",
      "amount": 0,
      "currency": "IDR",
      "notes": ""
    }
  ],
  "raid": [
    {
      "no": 1,
      "category": "Risk",
      "description": "Third-party API dependency",
      "impact": "High",
      "status": "Open",
      "pic": "Bob",
      "action_items": "Evaluate fallback options"
    }
  ]
}

Field notes:

• start_date / end_date: Project-level dates (YYYY-MM-DD). Used to calculate Gantt chart range. If omitted, derived from task dates.
• output_path: Where to save the file. Default: ./project-plan.xlsx
• tasks[].status: One of "Not Started", "In Progress", "Completed", "Blocked", "On Hold"
• budget[].amount: Numeric value. Set to 0 if unknown.
• raid[].category: One of "Risk", "Assumption", "Issue", "Dependency"
• raid[].impact: One of "High", "Medium", "Low"

Step 2: Write JSON and Generate Workbook

1. Write the JSON config to a temporary file
2. Run the generation script:

python3 "${SKILL_PATH}/scripts/generate_pm_plan.py" /path/to/config.json

Where ${SKILL_PATH} is the directory containing this SKILL.md file. To find it:

• Read this SKILL.md's own path from the skill invocation context
• The scripts directory is at the same level: scripts/generate_pm_plan.py

Step 3: Verify the Output

After generation:

1. Confirm the file was created successfully
2. Report the file location to the user
3. Summarize what was generated:
   • Number of tasks in Main Program Plan
   • Gantt chart date range
   • Number of charter roles filled
   • Number of budget items
   • Number of RAID log entries

Step 4: Optional Formula Recalculation

If the xlsx skill's recalc utility is available, run it to verify formulas:

python3 /Users/irfanputra/.claude/plugins/cache/anthropic-agent-skills/document-skills/69c0b1a06741/skills/xlsx/recalc.py /path/to/output.xlsx

This step is optional — the workbook is fully functional without it. Skip if recalc.py is not found.

Workbook Structure Reference

Tab 1: Main Program Plan

• Row 1: Project name (merged, large font)
• Row 2: Column headers (No, Milestone, Task Item, Workstream, PIC, Status, Start Date, Due Date, JIRA Link, Remarks)
• Row 3+: Task data (pre-filled from approved plan, 30 rows minimum for template use)
• Status column: Dropdown validation (Not Started / In Progress / Completed / Blocked / On Hold)
• Gantt chart (Column K onward): Weekly intervals with conditional formatting that auto-fills when a task's date range overlaps the week. Updates automatically when Start Date or Due Date cells are modified.
• Freeze panes: Column A-B and Row 1-2 frozen

Tab 2: Charters

• Row 1: Project name + "Team Charter"
• Row 2: Headers (Core Team, PICs)
• Row 3+: Roles: Program Sponsor, Business, Product & Design, TPM, PMO, BA, Engineering Leads, QA

Tab 3: Budget

• Row 1: Project name + "Budget"
• Row 2: Headers (Budget Category, Budget Owner, Amount, Currency, Notes)
• Row 3+: Budget line items
• Total row: SUM formula for Amount column

Tab 4: RAID Logs

• Row 1: Project name + "RAID Logs"
• Row 2: Headers (No, Category, Description, Impact, Status, PIC, Action Items)
• Row 3+: RAID entries (20 rows minimum for template use)
• Dropdowns: Category (Risk/Assumption/Issue/Dependency), Impact (High/Medium/Low), Status (Open/Mitigated/Closed)

Dependencies

• Python 3 with openpyxl library (pip install openpyxl)
• Optional: LibreOffice (for formula recalculation via recalc.py)

Error Handling

• If openpyxl is not installed, the script exits with a clear error message and install instructions
• If the output directory doesn't exist, it is created automatically
• If no tasks are provided, 30 empty template rows are generated
• If no budget items are provided, default Infrastructure and Vendor rows are created
• If project start/end dates are missing, they are derived from the earliest/latest task dates