Agent skill

Executing Plans

by rileyhilliard in rileyhilliard/claude-essentials

Executes implementation plans directly with a verification gate and conditional code review.

MITAuto-check passedAgent Workflows

Install Executing Plans

skills CLI
$ npx skills add rileyhilliard/claude-essentials --skill executing-plans -a claude-code

Project install by default; add -g for ~/.claude/skills/.

GitHub CLI
$ gh skill install rileyhilliard/claude-essentials executing-plans --agent claude-code

Project scope by default; add --scope user for a personal install. Needs GitHub CLI 2.90.0 or later (public preview).

Manual copy
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/rileyhilliard/claude-essentials.git skills-src && mkdir -p .claude/skills && cp -r skills-src/plugins/ce/skills/executing-plans .claude/skills/executing-plans && rm -rf skills-src

Use ~/.claude/skills/ instead of .claude/skills for a personal install. The folder must contain SKILL.md.

Claude Code skills documentation · loads skills from .claude/skills/

Facts

Skill name
executing-plans
GitHub stars
130
Token cost
~1.2k tokens
SKILL.md length
616 words
Files
1
Skills in repo
17
Repo updated
First seen
Licence
MIT

At a glance

Executes implementation plans directly with a verification gate and conditional code review.

  • Works in 4 steps: Setup → Execute → Verify → …
  • Carrying out a written plan step by step
  • SKILL.md covers 1. Setup, 2. Execute, 3. Verify and 4. Complete
  • Instructions only: no scripts, shell commands, URLs or credentials in SKILL.md

What it does

Executing Plans is an agent skill from rileyhilliard/claude-essentials. Executes implementation plans directly with a verification gate and conditional code review. Use when carrying out a written plan step by step; delegates to subagents only for large, genuinely independent, parallelizable work.

Its SKILL.md is about 1.2k tokens, which your agent loads only when the skill is triggered. It is a single SKILL.md file with no bundled scripts.

It sits in Agent Workflows, covering Planning and Subagents. The licence is MIT.

When your agent uses it

  • Carrying out a written plan step by step
  • Delegates to subagents only for large
  • Genuinely independent
  • Parallelizable work

Example prompts

  • “Use the executing-plans skill to execute implementation plans directly with a verification gate and conditional code review”
  • “/executing-plans”

Workflow steps

4 steps, taken from the step headings in SKILL.md.

  1. Setup
  2. Execute
  3. Verify
  4. Complete

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 3a67a01. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

  • Tool permissions

    Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

    From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

  • Runs code

    No scripts in the folder and no shell commands in SKILL.md.

    From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

  • Network

    No URLs in SKILL.md.

    From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

  • Credentials

    Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

    From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Executing Plans loads about 1.2k tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 61 tokens; SKILL.md has 616 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it
~61
When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches
~1.2k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Auto-check passed

The automated check found no risky patterns in SKILL.md.

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from rileyhilliard/claude-essentials at commit 3a67a01, republished under its MIT licence (© rileyhilliard). 616 words, ~1,158 tokens.

Download SKILL.mdSave it as .claude/skills/executing-plans/SKILL.md (or your agent's skills folder).
name
executing-plans
description
Executes implementation plans directly with a verification gate and conditional code review. Use when carrying out a written plan step by step; delegates to subagents only for large, genuinely independent, parallelizable work.

Executing Plans

Default to implementing directly. Delegation is the exception, not the default. Delegate to a subagent only for large tasks that are genuinely independent and parallelizable, such as a wide multi-file investigation. Do not delegate work you can finish yourself in a handful of tool calls, and do not use subagents to verify or double-check your own work. If one subagent can complete the task, use one rather than several, and keep spawn counts low.

1. Setup

Create a worktree using EnterWorktree before starting any work. This isolates changes from the main branch and makes cleanup safe. Skip only for trivial single-file changes that don't warrant isolation.

Clarify ambiguity upfront. If the plan has unclear requirements or meaningful tradeoffs, ask before starting. Don't guess when the user can clarify in 10 seconds.

Track progress with tasks. Create tasks for each major work item from the plan. Set up dependency chains between tasks using addBlocks/addBlockedBy so blocked tasks don't start prematurely. Update task status as work progresses. This keeps execution visible to the user and persists across context compactions.

2. Execute

Work through the plan's tasks directly, in order, updating task status as you go.

If delegation is warranted (large, independent, parallelizable work identified in step 1), group related tasks by subsystem rather than spawning per-task, since each agent re-investigates the codebase.

SignalGroup together
Same directory prefixsrc/auth/* tasks
Same domain/featureAuth tasks, billing tasks
Plan sectionsTasks under same ## heading

Keep concurrent agents to a small handful. Claude Code hard-fails above 20 concurrent subagents, but that's not a target, stay well under it.

Parallel vs sequential: Groups that touch different subsystems run in parallel. Groups with dependencies run sequentially (e.g., create shared types before using them). When parallel agents may touch overlapping files, use isolation: "worktree" on the Agent call.

Recovery: Fix failures inline yourself. If the same error recurs after a second attempt, stop and ask the user rather than keep retrying.

Show full SKILL.md (291 more words)Show less

3. Verify

Verification is a gate, not a checklist. Nothing proceeds to merge until all checks pass.

Automated tests. Run the full test suite. All tests must pass.

Manual verification. Automated tests aren't sufficient. Actually exercise the changes:

  • API changes: Curl endpoints with realistic payloads
  • External integrations: Test against real services to catch rate limiting, format drift, bot detection
  • CLI changes: Run actual commands, verify output
  • UI changes: Start the dev server and use the feature in a browser
  • Parser changes: Feed real data, not just fixtures

Watch for DX friction during manual testing: confusing error messages, noisy output, inconsistent behavior, rough edges that technically work but feel bad. Fix inline or document for follow-up. Don't ship friction.

Code review (conditional). For large or risky diffs, dispatch the ce:code-reviewer agent to review the full diff against the base branch after tests pass and manual verification is done. Skip it for small or simple changes.

Load relevant domain skills into the reviewer based on what was implemented. Evaluate which apply and include them in the agent prompt:

  • Skill(architecting-systems) - system design, module boundaries
  • Skill(managing-databases) - database work
  • Skill(handling-errors) - error handling
  • Skill(writing-tests) - test quality
  • Skill(optimizing-performance) - performance work

Handle the review verdict:

  • Must fix: Fix all Critical and Important issues
  • Suggestions: Fix these too unless there's a clear reason not to

4. Complete

Once verification passes:

  1. Commit the work with a message summarizing what was implemented
  2. Merge to main from the worktree branch
  3. Exit worktree using ExitWorktree with action: "remove" to clean up
  4. Mark plan as COMPLETED and move to ./plans/done/ if applicable

Match the length of written documents (commit messages, failure reports) to what the task needs: cover the substance, but do not pad with filler sections, redundant summaries, or boilerplate.

© rileyhilliard, MIT. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

Just SKILL.md in plugins/ce/skills/executing-plans of rileyhilliard/claude-essentials.

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 3a67a01

Compare with similar skills

Executing Plans next to the 5 skills that share the most tags, products or categories with it. Stars are the repository's; “used in” counts other GitHub owners with a copy.

Executing Plans compared with similar skills
SkillStarsUsed inTokensAuto-checkLicenceRepo updated
Executing Plans this skillrileyhilliard/claude-essentials130—~1.2kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Subagent Driven DevelopmentAsvarox/allkaraoke26137 repos~1.2kAutomated safety check: PassNone
Executing PlansGanyuanRan/Aegis1.3k1 repos~2.3kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Execumputun/cc-thingz483—~8kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Autopilot End-to-End Buildernick-vels/skills403—~2.5kAutomated safety check: NotesMIT
Workflow Orchestrationvxcozy/workflow-orchestration115—~1kAutomated safety check: PassMIT

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  • Subagent Driven Development

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Categories

Questions about Executing Plans

What does Executing Plans do?

Executes implementation plans directly with a verification gate and conditional code review. Executing Plans is an agent skill from rileyhilliard/claude-essentials. Executes implementation plans directly with a verification gate and conditional code review.

When should I use Executing Plans?

Executing Plans fits situations like: carrying out a written plan step by step; delegates to subagents only for large; genuinely independent; parallelizable work.

How do I install Executing Plans in Claude Code?

Run `npx skills add rileyhilliard/claude-essentials --skill executing-plans -a claude-code`. Or copy the skill folder (plugins/ce/skills/executing-plans in rileyhilliard/claude-essentials) into .claude/skills/executing-plans in your project. Claude Code loads it when a task matches its description.

How do I install Executing Plans in Codex?

Run `npx skills add rileyhilliard/claude-essentials --skill executing-plans -a codex`. Or copy the skill folder (plugins/ce/skills/executing-plans in rileyhilliard/claude-essentials) into .agents/skills/executing-plans in your project. Codex loads it when a task matches its description.

Can I use Executing Plans in Cursor, Gemini CLI or GitHub Copilot?

Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode also load SKILL.md folders. With the skills CLI, run `npx skills add rileyhilliard/claude-essentials --skill executing-plans -a cursor` (or -a gemini-cli, github-copilot or opencode for the others). To copy it by hand, put the folder in .cursor/skills/executing-plans, .gemini/skills/executing-plans, .github/skills/executing-plans and .opencode/skills/executing-plans in your project.

What does Executing Plans need to run?

SKILL.md names no scripts, command-line tools or credentials: Executing Plans is instructions for the agent only.

Does Executing Plans access the network?

SKILL.md contains no URLs. Any network use would come from the scripts or tools the agent runs. This is read from the text; nothing was executed.

Is Executing Plans safe to install?

Our automated static check of SKILL.md found no risky patterns, such as piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files or hidden Unicode. It is not a guarantee. Review the folder before installing.

What licence does Executing Plans use?

Executing Plans is published under the MIT licence (the repository's licence). It allows redistribution, so the full SKILL.md is shown on this page.

How many tokens does Executing Plans use?

About 1.2k tokens (SKILL.md is roughly 4.6k characters). Agents keep only the skill's name and description in context until a task matches; then they load SKILL.md in full.

What are the alternatives to Executing Plans?

Skills that share tags, products or a category with Executing Plans: Subagent Driven Development (Asvarox/allkaraoke, 261 stars), Executing Plans (GanyuanRan/Aegis, 1.3k stars), Exec (umputun/cc-thingz, 483 stars) and Autopilot End-to-End Builder (nick-vels/skills, 403 stars). The comparison table on this page puts their stars, adoption, token cost, safety result and licence side by side.

Who maintains Executing Plans?

rileyhilliard (a GitHub user) maintains it in rileyhilliard/claude-essentials, which has 130 GitHub stars. The repository holds 17 skills in this directory. The repository was last updated on August 18, 2026.

Source: rileyhilliard/claude-essentials on GitHub. Facts on this page come from the repository at the commit we read; the author's words are quoted as theirs.