How to create a Lean Canvas for an initiative

Use this when: You have a committed bet (and optionally a capability map) and need to produce a shareable, version-controlled initiative brief through structured elicitation. Prerequisites: product-engineering pack installed; a committed bet from place-bet and capability map from map-capabilities are recommended for pre-population, though the skill runs standalone without them. Result: A docs/product/initiatives/<ini-slug>.md initiative brief with a ## Value Proposition section and a workspace.toml entry suggestion, ready to commit and share with stakeholders.

Use the lean-canvas skill when you need to produce a shareable, version- controlled initiative brief through a structured elicitation. The skill adapts the Lean Canvas for internal initiatives — replacing startup vocabulary with initiative-appropriate labels — and writes one file: docs/product/initiatives/<ini-slug>.md.

Create a lean canvas for an initiative that gives workspace owners self-service export retention controls.

When to use this skill

After steps 5 and 6 of the PE shaping sequence (recommended)

If you have run place-bet (step 5) and map-capabilities (step 6), the skill will find your upstream shaping artifacts and pre-populate several Lean Canvas fields. You confirm or override each pre-filled value rather than answering from scratch. This is the fastest path to a complete initiative brief.

As a standalone elicitation

You can run lean-canvas without any upstream shaping artifacts. The skill runs in full-elicitation mode — it asks each field interactively. The produced file is identical; you supply the answers rather than confirming pre-fills. Use this path when you are starting a new initiative brief and earlier shaping steps have not run yet, or when the initiative is not following the standard shaping sequence.

Choosing between simple and full mode

The skill presents both options when it starts. Pick based on what the initiative actually needs captured.

Simple mode (5 boxes) — the default

Covers the core hypothesis: Problem, Unique Value Proposition, Solution, Customer Segments, Key Metrics. Sufficient for most initiatives — when you know your channels, cost profile, and strategic backing but do not need them formally documented yet, simple mode produces a complete, usable brief.

Full mode (9 boxes)

Adds Channels, Value Created, Cost Estimate, and Organizational Buy-In. Use full mode when your initiative needs to explicitly document how adopters discover and adopt the tooling (Channels), what quantified organizational benefit it delivers (Value Created), what resources it will consume (Cost Estimate), or what strategic backing makes it hard to de-prioritize (Organizational Buy-In). These are common for cross-team initiatives with significant infrastructure investment or formal steering-committee review.

Running the skill

1. Start the skill. Say “lean canvas” or “initiative brief” or “canvas this initiative” in your PE session, or invoke lean-canvas by name.

2. Provide the initiative slug. The skill asks for the initiative slug (e.g. ini-003). It uses this for the output path (docs/product/initiatives/ini-003.md) and for locating your shaping artifacts (<output_dir>/shaping/ini-003/).

3. Choose a mode. The skill presents simple and full with one-sentence descriptions. Confirm your choice. The mode is locked at this point — it does not change during elicitation.

4. Confirm or fill each field. If upstream artifacts exist, the skill pre-populates derivable fields and presents them for your confirmation or override. For fields without a pre-fill, the skill asks interactively. Any field you cannot answer yet is marked “TBD — <one-line reason>” in the produced file — never left blank.

5. Review the resolved write path. The skill surfaces the absolute path it will write to before writing. Confirm it is correct.

6. File is written. One file is created: docs/product/initiatives/<ini-slug>.md. It contains all template sections plus a ## Value Proposition section (the Lean Canvas output) inserted before ## Scope.

Reviewing the Value Proposition output

The ## Value Proposition section is the initiative’s problem-solution-value story. It is inserted before ## Scope so the core hypothesis is visible on first scroll. Review it as you would review a hypothesis:

• Is the Problem specific enough to falsify?
• Does the Unique Value Proposition make a testable claim?
• Do the Key Metrics give you an observable signal within the initiative’s appetite?

If any field is marked TBD, treat it as an open assumption — schedule time to fill it before the initiative brief is shared with stakeholders.

Linking workspace.toml and sharing

After writing the file, the skill suggests a workspace.toml entry for the initiative. Add it to the ["ini-NNN"] section in workspace.toml; this makes the initiative visible to workspace-status and the work queue.

To share the initiative brief with your team, commit the file to version control and link it from the initiative’s workspace.toml section. The produced file is plain Markdown — it renders in GitHub, GitLab, and most document tools without conversion.

What you have now

• A shareable initiative brief at docs/product/initiatives/<ini-slug>.md with a Value Proposition and workspace entry suggestion.
• Review any TBD fields before sharing the brief or moving into the delivery route it supports.