Pain Point Manager Skill

Purpose

Automatically manage the pain points tracking system by capturing new pain points, updating existing ones, archiving resolved items, and extracting patterns.

Auto-Activation Triggers

This skill activates when the user:

• Mentions "pain point", "friction", "blocker", "workaround"
• Says "that was frustrating" or similar sentiment
• Describes manual workarounds or repetitive tasks
• Mentions "we should fix this" or "this is annoying"
• Asks to add/update pain points
• Requests weekly pain point review

Core Operations

1. Capture New Pain Point

Trigger phrases:

• "This is a pain point"
• "Add this to pain points"
• "This keeps causing issues"

Workflow:

1. Read .claude/pain-points/active-pain-points.md
2. Determine next available PAIN-ID
3. Gather context automatically (file paths, frequency, impact)
4. Classify priority:
   • Critical: "blocking", "can't deploy", "broken"
   • High: "daily", "multiple times", "significant delay"
   • Medium: "weekly", "annoying", "workaround exists"
   • Low: "occasionally", "nice to have"
5. Add new entry with complete metadata
6. Confirm capture with ID reference

Template:

### [PAIN-XXXX] Brief action-oriented description
- **Impact**: Specific scope
- **Frequency**: Daily/Weekly/Occasional
- **First Noted**: YYYY-MM-DD
- **Context**: File paths, scenarios
- **Workaround**: Current approach
- **Potential Solution**: Ideas if discussed

2. Update Existing Pain Point

Update Types:

• Frequency increase
• Priority change
• Status change (resolved)
• Context addition
• Solution progress

3. Weekly Review Workflow

Steps:

1. Load active pain points
2. Check recent work for friction mentions
3. Update frequency counts
4. Generate focus areas
5. Recommend top 2-3 priorities

Review Output:

## Weekly Pain Point Review - YYYY-MM-DD

### Current State
- **Total Pain Points**: X
- **New This Week**: X
- **Resolved This Week**: X

### Focus Areas
**Quick Wins** (High Impact, Low Effort):
1. [PAIN-XXXX]: Description

**Strategic Investments** (High Impact, High Effort):
1. [PAIN-XXXX]: Description

### Next Steps
1. Approve focus areas
2. Create tasks for priorities
3. Next review: YYYY-MM-DD

4. Archive Resolved Items

• Items >30 days old in "Recently Resolved" move to archive
• Generate archival summary with resolution details
• Track biggest wins and common themes

Priority Scoring

Calculate: (Impact x Frequency) + Urgency Modifier

Impact Score (1-10):

• 10: All deployments/team blocked
• 7-9: Major feature or multiple people affected
• 4-6: Single feature or occasional impact
• 1-3: Individual developer, specific scenario

Frequency Score (1-10):

• 10: Multiple times per day
• 7-9: Daily
• 4-6: Weekly
• 1-3: Monthly or less

Auto-Prioritization:

• Score 15+: Critical
• Score 10-14: High
• Score 5-9: Medium
• Score <5: Low

Best Practices

1. Be Proactive

Listen for friction language and offer to capture without being asked.

2. Be Specific

Don't accept "deployment is slow" - require measurable details.

3. Keep It Current

Weekly reviews, monthly archival, quarterly pattern analysis.

4. Link Evidence

File paths, task IDs, commits that show the pain.

5. Focus on Actionability

Every pain point needs clear description, measurable impact, and potential solution path.

Integration

With Git Commits

Reference in commit messages: "Fix: [description] (PAIN-XXXX)"

With Memory System

• Episodic memory feeds discovery
• Pain point patterns update procedural memory

Skill Metadata

Version: 1.0.0 Category: Development Experience & Quality Maintenance: Weekly active use, Monthly archival