AI Writing Skills

Your test suite is the single source of truth. But a product owner, a developer, and a QA lead all need different things from the same tests. AI writing skills let you control how your coding agent writes documentation — the audience, the tone, the level of detail.

Skills are markdown files you drop into your project. Your AI agent (Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot, or any tool that reads project-level instructions) picks them up and follows them when writing executable stories.

How it works

Copy a skill file into your project’s .claude/skills/ directory (or your agent’s equivalent)
Tell your agent to use the skill when writing stories — or it picks it up automatically
The same test suite produces documentation tuned for your audience

No config. No build step. Just a markdown file that shapes how your agent writes.

Example: three audiences, one scenario

The same “User logs in successfully” scenario, written for three different readers:

Product Owner

Outcomes-focused. Business language. No implementation details.

Feature: User Authentication

Scenario: User logs in successfully
  A registered user can access their dashboard
  by entering valid credentials.

  Outcome: User sees personalised dashboard
  Business rule: Session expires after 30 minutes

Developer

Technical and concise. Shows endpoints, payloads, and storage.

## User logs in successfully

Given a registered user exists in the database
When POST /api/auth/login { email, password }
Then response status is 200
And body contains { token, expiresIn: 1800 }
And session is stored in Redis with TTL 1800s

QA / Compliance

Structured and exhaustive. Preconditions, numbered steps, traceability.

TC-AUTH-001: User logs in successfully

Preconditions:
- User account exists and is active
- Account is not locked (< 5 failed attempts)

Steps:
1. Submit valid credentials
2. Verify 200 response with JWT token
3. Verify session created with correct TTL
4. Verify audit log entry created

Traceability: REQ-AUTH-001, SOC2-CC6.1

Available skills

Executable Stories ships 9 specification skills you can use out of the box:

Skill	Purpose	When to use
`spec-discovery-oopsi`	Structure discovery with the OOPSI mapping technique	Collaborative 3 Amigos sessions to explore requirements and avoid analysis paralysis
`spec-example-mapping`	Turn conversations into rules, examples, questions	Refining requirements with stakeholders
`spec-outside-in-behaviour`	Discover behaviour from user goals (Dan North)	Designing from the outside in
`spec-refine-examples`	Refine raw notes into precise specs (Gojko Adzic)	Cleaning up acceptance criteria
`spec-rules-decision-tables`	Decision tables for policy/calculation rules	Complex business logic with many conditions
`spec-workflow-state`	Workflows, state transitions, approvals	Multi-step processes with branching
`spec-living-documentation`	Write specs as lasting documentation	Ensuring docs stay useful over time
`spec-convert-tests`	Convert existing tests to business-facing specs	Migrating legacy test suites
`spec-review`	Review scenarios for clarity and coverage	Before merging or after writing

Each skill file lives in .claude/skills/ and can be used as-is or as a starting point for your own.

Create your own

Write a markdown file that tells your agent how to write for your audience:

# Skill: Write for regulatory auditors

When writing executable stories, follow these rules:

- Every scenario must have a unique test case ID (format: TC-AREA-NNN)
- List all preconditions before steps
- Number each verification step
- Include a Traceability line mapping to requirement IDs
- Use formal language — no contractions, no shorthand
- Include boundary conditions as separate scenarios

Drop it into .claude/skills/ and your agent will follow it when writing stories in this project.

You can combine multiple skills — one for audience, one for methodology. The agent reads all skill files in the directory.