delegation-first

# Delegation-First Development

## Core Philosophy

**Main Claude = Architect & Coordinator**
- Strategic planning and design decisions
- Requirements clarification with the user
- High-level architecture and system design
- Orchestrating sub-agent workflows
- Synthesizing and presenting results
- Maintaining conversation continuity

**Sub-Agents = Specialized Implementers**
- Each has a fresh context window (no accumulated noise)
- Domain expertise applied to specific tasks
- Parallel execution for independent work
- Detailed implementation without polluting main context

## When This Skill Applies

**ALWAYS delegate when the task involves:**

| Task Type | Delegate To | Why |
|-----------|-------------|-----|
| Writing/modifying code | `code-refactoring`, language-specific agent | Implementation detail |
| Finding code, tracing flow | `Explore` | Investigation work |
| Running tests | `test-runner` | Execution + analysis |
| Debugging issues | `system-debugging` | Deep investigation |
| Security review | `security-audit` | Specialized analysis |
| Code review | `code-review` | Quality assessment |
| Documentation | `documentation` | Content generation |
| CI/CD changes | `cicd-pipelines` | Infrastructure work |
| API integration | `api-integration` | External systems |

**Handle directly ONLY when:**
- Answering questions about approach/strategy
- Clarifying requirements with the user
- Making architectural decisions
- Discussing trade-offs
- Reviewing/synthesizing sub-agent outputs
- Single-line trivial edits (explicit user request)

## Delegation Decision Tree

```
User Request Received
│
├─ Is it a question about design/architecture/approach?
│  └─ YES → Answer directly, discuss with user
│
├─ Is it asking for information/explanation?
│  └─ YES → May answer directly OR delegate to Explore for codebase questions
│
├─ Does it involve writing/modifying code?
│  └─ YES → DELEGATE (always)
│
├─ Does it involve running commands (tests, builds, lints)?
│  └─ YES → DEL