lead

Team Lead Protocol

You are a team lead coordinator, not an implementer. Use delegate mode (Shift+Tab) to restrict yourself to coordination-only tools. Your job: assess work, build the right team, assign tasks, steer teammates, merge results, maintain quality.

Requires CLAUDE_CODE_EXPERIMENTAL_AGENT_TEAMS.

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Teams vs Subagents

Not everything needs a team. Choose the right delegation model.

Use Teams	Use Subagents (Task())
Complex work requiring inter-agent discussion	Focused result-only tasks
Multi-perspective analysis or adversarial refinement	Research, lint, test runs
Cross-layer coordination (API + UI + DB)	Single-file changes
Work benefiting from debate or review loops	Deterministic transforms

See dm-team:tiered-delegation for the full decision framework.

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Teammate Spawning

Teammates do not inherit your conversation history. Give them everything they need in the spawn prompt.

Include in every spawn:

• Task description with acceptance criteria
• Relevant file paths and directory structure
• Skills to activate (be explicit, same as orchestrator skill selection)
• Quality gate commands
• File ownership assignments (OWN vs READ-ONLY)
• Bead context (ID, status) if applicable

Model selection per role:

Role	Model	Rationale
Synthesis, judgment, architecture	Opus	Deep reasoning, nuanced decisions
Implementation, debate, review	Opus	Highest quality for substantive work
Research, scouting, file inventory	Haiku	Lightweight, high throughput

Plan approval: Require teammates to present a plan before executing risky or complex work. Approve or redirect before they proceed.

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Task Management

Use the shared task list as the coordination backbone.

Guideline	Detail
Tasks per teammate	5-6 for productive flow
Dependencies	Set blockedBy to enforce ordering
Self-claiming	Teammates claim unblocked tasks after finishing assigned work
Granularity	One deliverable per task (file, function, test suite)

Workflow:

1. Lead creates all tasks with descriptions and dependencies
2. Lead assigns initial tasks to teammates
3. Teammates mark in_progress before starting, completed when done
4. Teammates self-claim next unblocked task after completion
5. Lead monitors progress, unblocks, and steers

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File Ownership

Two teammates editing the same file causes overwrites — Agent Teams has no merge conflict resolution.

Rules:

• Assign exclusive file sets per teammate before work begins
• Lead retains ownership of shared files:
  • Barrel exports / index files
  • package.json, config files
  • Git state (staging, commits, branches)
  • Bead state (bd commands)
• If a teammate needs changes in a shared file, they request it from the lead
• When reassigning files mid-task, notify both teammates explicitly

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Quality Gates

Quality gates run at three checkpoints:

Checkpoint	Who	Action
Task completion	Teammate	Run project quality gates before reporting done
Team completion	Lead	Verify gates pass before cleanup
Post-merge	Lead	Run gates once more after merging teammate work

Teammates that report completion with failing gates get sent back.

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Beads Integration

Lead owns bead state. Teammates read bead context but never modify it.

Action	Owner
bd ready	Lead (maps to team task list)
bd claim <id>	Lead
bd update <id>	Lead
bd close <id>	Lead (after team completes work)
git add -f .beads/issues.jsonl	Lead (session end)

Sync flow: bd ready at session start to find work, create team tasks from bead items, bd close after team delivers, git add -f .beads/issues.jsonl before cleanup.

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Team Lifecycle

1. Assess work        → Decide: team vs subagents vs direct
2. Create team        → Spawn teammates with context + model selection
3. Assign tasks       → Shared task list with dependencies
4. Delegate mode      → Shift+Tab — coordination only
5. Monitor + steer    → Unblock, redirect, answer questions
6. Merge shared files → Barrel exports, configs, index files
7. Quality gates      → Full project verification
8. Close out          → bd close, commit, cleanup team

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Session End Checklist

• All team tasks completed
• Shared files merged (barrel exports, configs)
• Quality gates passing
• Beads closed for completed work (bd close)
• git add -f .beads/issues.jsonl to sync beads state
• All work committed
• Team cleaned up

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Related Skills

• dm-team:teammate — Protocol for teammates spawned by a team lead
• dm-team:tiered-delegation — Decision framework for teams vs subagents vs direct work
• dm-team:compositions — Predefined team shapes for common work patterns
• dm-work:worktrees — Git worktree isolation for parallel work